Word: werdegast
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Dates: during 1968-1968
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About fifteen minutes into the picture, a television set presents us with a sublime moment from Edgar G. Ulmer's The Black Cat, starring Karloff and Lugosi. Lugosi plays Dr. Vitus Werdegast, a tortured psychoanalyst imprisoned during WW I by the villainous General Poelzig (Karloff) who, in turn, married and murdered Werdegast's wife Karen. Werdegast, after fifteen years in the prison from which few men return ("I have returned," he says gravely at one point), journeys to Poelzig's house to investigate Karen's death and eventually kill the murderer. Through a nasty turn in the weather...
When Head cuts in, the young bride has gone into a strange trance as a result of a sedative Poelzig has given her, as well as the sensual psychic vibrations emanating from the house. Werdegast is explaining all this to the bewildered husband, who skeptically asserts, "Sounds like a lot of supernatural baloney to me." Werdegast smiles calmly and explains, "Supernatural perhaps. Baloney? Perhaps not." Definitely one of the great moments of the American screen...
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