While Donna and I were watching the 1933 Mystery of the Wax Museum on Turner Classic Movies the other night, we started to compare it to the 1953 Vincent Price classic House of Wax. We then both realized there was another Wax Museum movie out there that had a one armed killer in it, but neither of us could remember the name of it.
So today I hit the IMDB and came up with a killer movie marathon of Wax:
- Mystery of the Wax Museum, 1933
In London, sculptor Ivan Igor struggles in vain to prevent his partner Worth from burning his wax museum...and his 'children.' Years later, Igor starts a new museum in New York, but his maimed hands confine him to directing lesser artists. People begin disappearing (including a corpse from the morgue); Igor takes a sinister interest in Charlotte Duncan, fiancee of his assistant Ralph, but arouses the suspicions of Charlotte's roommate, wisecracking reporter Florence.
- House of Wax, 1953
A sculptor of wax figures for a museum is horrified when his partner proposes setting fire to the unpopular museum in order to collect the insurance money. As the wax figures melt amid the blaze, the two men have a fight. The sculptor is knocked out in the scuffle and left to "perish" among the flames. He resurfaces many years later for the launch of his own wax museum. The opening coincides with the sudden disappearance of some dead bodies from the city morgue. His assistant begins to suspect his boss of foul play, especially after the deranged wizard of wax begins eyeing his assistant's lovely girlfriend's friend as a model for a waxed figure of Marie Antoinette.
- Chamber of Horrors, 1966
A one-handed madman (he lost the hand while escaping a hanging) uses various detachable devices as murder weapons to gain revenge on those he believes have wronged him. (He hides in a Wax Museum)
- Nightmare in Wax, 1969
The disfigured curator of a wax museum murders his enemies and then uses their bodies as exhibits in his museum.
- Terror in the Wax Museum, 1973
Wax museum curator Claude Dupree is murdered by his Jack the Ripper exhibit apparently come to life. With the lack of a will, his niece Meg Collins inherits the museum. Her guardian Julia Hawthorn takes control and reopens the museum, exploiting the sensationalism of the murder. But then the killings continue. (*)
- Waxwork, 1988
A waxwork museum comes to town, and a mysterious man invites some teens to come to a special showing at midnight. Once inside, while viewing different exhibits, the scenes come alive and the viewer is sucked into the story being portrayed. (The sequel Waxwork II: Lost in Time (1992) is a continuation of the story, but doesn't take place in a Wax Museum) - House of Wax, 2005
Six friends are stranded in a ghost town where a towering wax museum looms ahead. And inside are two brothers who have a special way of making the wax figures look real.
Side note: According to IMDB, Fay Wray was very busy in 1933. Not only was she in Mystery of the Wax Museum, but in classic King Kong and 9 other movies.