Abbott & Costello Meet the Killer

The first murder victim and Lou.

Following the huge success of Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), Universal Pictures was anxious to make another horror-comedy with its top stars. The studio purchased the rights to a screenplay titled Easy Does It, which was originally intended for Bob Hope. It then cast Boris Karloff as one of the heavies and bestowed the film with the awkward title of Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff. The on-screen title, though, is just Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, with Karloff's name listed under the title as one of the film's stars.

Karloff as a suspect.

Abbott plays Casey, the house detective at the Lost Caverns Resort Hotel. It's a pretty easy job until a famous attorney registers as a guest and winds up murdered before he can unpack. The chief suspect is Casey's bellboy pal Freddie (Costello), who lost his job because of the attorney. There are plenty of other more likely killers, to include a hypnotist (Karloff) and a femme fatale named Angela (Lenore Aubert). To make matters worse, additional hotel guests start turning up as a corpses--which keep disappearing and reappearing in the most unlikely places.

There aren't a lot of new comic routines in Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, but that hardly matters. Lou Costello was a comedy genius in terms of his timing, facial expressions, and voices. As for Bud Abbott, he was a perfect set-up man, always willing to let Lou get the laughs. Many comedy teams have performed the "moving body" gag, but A&C do it with a precision that deserves praise. They were--and are--truly underrated as comedians. 

Lou Costello and Lenore Aubert.

The duo's best films--which include Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer--feature solid plots with a bevy of one-liners. The scene with the most zingers is the one where Angela tries to convince Freddie to sign a confession.

Freddie (to Angela): Gee, you're pretty!

Angela: I bet you say that to all the girls.

Freddie: Yes, it don't go over so well with the boys.

Later, Angela pleads with Freddie to take a sip of champagne--which may be poisoned:

Angela: Just one teeny weeny sip...for little Angela.

Freddie:  I wouldn't drink it for big Angela.

Bud and Lou play bridge with corpses.

There are fine visual gags, too, such as Casey and Freddie (dressed as a hotel maid) playing bridge with a pair of corpses as Percy Helton's character flirts with Freddie. The climax in the caverns and Freddie trapped in a steam machine also generate some laughs. 

However, there are some missed opportunities, especially with Karloff. He only has one significant scene with Costello, in which the Swami tries to hypnotize Freddie into committing suicide. In fact, Boris Karloff is in very little of Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, which is a shame. As he proved on stage in Arsenic and Old Lace and later in films like The Raven (1963), Boris could be very amusing.

As a follow-up to Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, A&C Meet the Killer must have seemed disappointing when first released. It still turned a nice profit at the box office, though, and paved the way for additional monsters and mystery pairings with the Invisible Man, the Mummy, and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (with Karloff again). In hindsight, A&C Meet the Killer is a tidy, above-average comedy-mystery and easily one of Bud and Lou's best films.