The Jungle Captive (1946)** (out of 4)A mad doctor (Otto Kruger) has his assistant (Rondo Hatton) steal the body of Paula the Ape Woman (Vicky Lane) so that he can do experiments on her. This includes stealing another woman (Amelita Ward) for a blood transfusion to see if the ape woman can be cured.THE JUNGLE CAPTIVE is the third and final film of Universal's trilogy dealing with Paula the Ape Woman. You have to think that the studio had rather low expectations going into the series and I'm going to guess that CAPTIVE WILD WOMAN didn't do a well at the box office, which caused the studio to really cut back on the second film, JUNGLE WOMAN, which was perhaps the studio's laziest movie. THE JUNGLE CAPTIVE is certainly a step up from that picture but it's still not all that good.The best thing going for this film is the fact that they've actually got the ape woman running around quite a bit of the running time. It was great getting to see her since the make-up on her is actually excellent and having her appear in the film is reason enough alone to enjoy this more than the second film. Another plus is the fact that Hatton is so watchable here. I can't help but feel sorry for him and the fact that Universal was pretty much exploiting his disease but at the same time he has become a cult favorite over the years.As far as the film's issues go, well, there are quite a few but the biggest is the simple fact that the story itself really isn't all that original and it's certainly something we've seen countless times before. Still, if you're a fan of the studio then there's enough good things here to make this worth watching.

Third and last entry in the series, deemed the worst (rated BOMB in the "Leonard Maltin Film Guide") but actually slightly superior to its predecessor due, for one thing, to its having a proper plot line (rather than a rehashed one) and the fact that the mad scientist (even if he is stubbornly referred to as "Mr." Stendhal throughout!) this time around is just that. Indeed, here too, the mainstay (apart, that is, from the standard 'house style' for this type of fare) is Otto Kruger's central performance (the Ape Woman herself, now played by Vicki Lane instead of Acquanetta and reverting once more to being a mute, is certainly not the protagonist in this case!).Kruger is involved in the revivification of small animals but is keen to progress on to larger ones – with his ultimate goal, of course, being Man himself; since the title creature (a convenient and somewhat lazy amalgam of the earlier 'episodes' in the franchise) is a hybrid, he knows he will be almost there if he manages to resuscitate her. The problem is that, once she has assumed human form yet again (having made imposing henchman Rondo Hatton steal the necessary files from the home of the doctor played by J. Carroll Naish in JUNGLE WOMAN {1944}, the process having actually been laid down by John Carradine in CAPTIVE WILD WOMAN {1943} – neither of these actors, however, put in 'unofficial' appearance and, thankfully, we are also spared the circus stock footage that made-up a sizable amount of the earlier films' running-time), it is discovered that she has suffered brain damage and he plans to replace it with that of his own female aide. Why the doctor, certainly among the coldest of his ilk, does not simply abduct another girl, when he would invariably have benefited from the heroine's presence by his side rather than as a laboratory subject, is anybody's guess…but, then, the latter is vehemently against her superior's intention to play God so, in this way, he would be removing the threat to his Great Experiment, were it not for the fact that, through Hatton's sloppiness, the Police – in the guise of a bemused Jerome Cowan – are already on his trail, and so is the girl's fiancé, yet another assistant! The busy finale has hero and heroine taking advantage of the Ape Woman's disappearance to escape Kruger and Hatton's clutches, only for the three to be recaptured after a short while in one fell swoop. Needless to say, however, the villain is not allowed to go through with the operation as Hatton, enamored of the leading lady (which Kruger puts down by referring to his "hardly Casanova" looks, the actor having been stricken with the deforming affliction acromegaly, and to add salt to the wound suggests that the Jungle Captive is "more in your line"!), turns on Stendhal at the instigation of the girl's boyfriend. The doctor shoots his thug dead, Lane metamorphoses into monster and cuts free of her straps and, just as she is about to incongruously attack her 'donor', Cowan appears on the premises to intervene. For the record, director Young, who had the classic swashbuckler THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL (1934), an Alexander Korda production, on his resume' was now reduced, for whatever reason, to helming the lowliest of Universal Horrors – though, to be fair, he sure made an entertaining job of it!

This final installment in the short-lived Universal series about Paula Dupree, the Ape Woman, has some fairly creepy moments, and a good monster. Unfortunately, the Ape Woman doesn't have much to do here, unlike her two earlier appearances. She spends most of her time in the secluded laboratory of Stendhal, the mad doctor who hopes to achieve some kind of scientific goal by reviving the deceased creature.Rondo Hatton turns in his most multi-faceted performance as Moloch, the assistant to Stendhal. Unlike most of his other movie roles, where he just stalks around and kills people, here he acts friendly toward the beleaguered heroine, even smiles and makes a joke at one point, and is about as normal and likable as he would ever be shown in his Forties horror pictures. He becomes a sort of human King Kong, whose sympathy for the captive girl finally causes him to turn on his master to save her from further cruel experiments. It shows possibilities unhinted at in his other roles and is quite unexpected.Jerome Cowan is good as a breezy police detective investigating the various murders and disappearances, but Otto Kruger is so menacing as the crazy scientist that he all but steals the picture. His low key portrayal of the cold blooded experimenter is actually quite unnerving in its realism. He refuses to play the part in an eye-rolling, hammy clichéd way, and is thus frighteningly believable.Not a great movie by any means, but worth seeing for fans of low budget Forties horror movies.

***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** JUNGLE CAPTIVE is the third installment of Universals "Paula the Ape Women" series. In terms of over all entertainment quality, JUNGLE CAPTIVE falls somewhere in between the three, with CAPTIVE WILD WOMAN at a high and JUNGLE WOMEN at a low. Although this film is slightly better the previous JUNGLE WOMAN, the gulf in quality is not that wide between the two.Otto Kruger plays Mr. Stendahl, a brilliant doctor (although no one in the film ever calls him doctor) and medical researcher. Stendahl has been researching ways to bring the dead back to life, and has succeeded with animals. However, Stendahl feels the only way to really convince the medical community is to prove his technique can be used on humans. So Stendahl sends his ugly henchman Moloch to steal the body of Paula Dupree the ape women, from the morgue. In the process, his henchman kills a morgue attendant and steals a hearse. Stendahl then lures his nurse out to his secret country house and laboratory out in the boondocks somewhere, in order to use her blood in his experiments to bring life to the dead ape women. The ape is revived and turns back from a hideous creature into a beautiful women again. However, Paula"s brain is damaged and decides she needs a new one. So Stendal sends Moloch to the home of Doctor Fletcher (from the series previous film JUNGLE WOMEN) to steal his records and those of DR. Walters (whose records Fletcher had in his files) the scientist who created Paula.In order to learn how to transplant a brain. Fletcher is killed by Moloch off screen. Stendahl decides to use the brain of his captive nurse. Now shall we begin? I have gone this much into the plot because this film has such a bizarre far fetched plot. Stendahl is obviously a scientific genius, but when comes to real world smarts, he is really a few cards short of a full deck. In order to prove his life restoring technique to the scientific community, why does Stendahl use the body of a hideous mutation? Why not say, the body of some recently deceased father of five whose widow and children would happy to have their father back. Presenting the revived ape women to the public would implement him in the murder of the morgue attendant and Dr. Fletcher. Then their is actual theft of the body and the hearse. Not to mention removing the brain of his nurse and placing it in the body of the ape women he could be charged with a whole host of charges on that alone.In most of the film, the ape women spends most of her time on the lab table. The ape women this time around is played by Vicki Lane, but there is little here for her to do but lie on a lab table. When she is transformed into a beautiful women, she does little more than roam around zombie like. Vicki Lane is pretty, but she does not have the raw animal sensuality of Acqanetta from the previous films. Also, Paula's hypnotic control over animals is ignored here. When Paula escapes from Stendahl"s house, she trapped by Stendahl's dogs. Otto Kruger isn't bad as the evil Stendahl, he gives a very good low key performance. However, he has to recite so many clunker lines that his efforts are hampered. Rondo Hatton is Moloch. This was his second time in a Universal horror film. He was quite effectively used in his horror star debut, the Sherlock Holmes thriller, PEARL OF DEATH. However, in PEARL he was mute, here Hatton has lines. This time around he is more funny than scary. Hatton from here on was not an actor, but a human prop. Universal should have left Paula Dupree the ape dead for good in the first film. The ape women was only good for one film, and JUNGLE CAPTIVE confirms this.