scar to death start in the central city morgue where a pathologist ( stanley andrew ) be about to begin his gruesome work on a dead woman name laure van ee ( molly lamont ) and a the corpse of laura lie there it begin to tell the tale of how she end up dead . cut to dr. josef van ee ( george zucco ) and his son ward ( roland varlo ) and they discuss laura and how she would not give ward a divorce and how she be generally a moody paranoid btch . laura think that someone be try to kill her and she suspect everyone and from lilly beth ( gladys blake ) the maid to the private patrol officer bill bull raymond ( nat pendleton ) to a creepy stranger professor leonide ( bela lugosi ) to her husband ward and dr. josef . no one be safe from her accusation and mood and woman eh . however it seem laura may have a point and she receive a decapitated dummy head and the feeling that she be be spy upon and mysterious letter that appear to unsettle her . then a tip off reporter name terry grant ( dougles fowley ) and his bird jane cornell ( joyce compton ) turn up and invite themselves in and start sniff around for a story . before the night be over they will get one . direct by christy cabanne this be a pretty poor film whichever way you look at it i be afraid . the script by walter abbott play much more like a murder mystery than a horror film that the title may suggest . the murder plot be confuse and it try to cram a many stupid red herring a it can . every character in scared to death act so suspiciously it become both irritate and distract and i mean do these people want to be suspect of murder even though it hasn not even happen yet . i quite like the idea of a corpse narrate it own murder but for some bizarre reason the film like to concentrate on the comedy relief supply by the dim witted raymond . the end might have be effective if not precede by such a lame and confused and boring hour of badly write comedy and mystery and character who do not need to be there and i mean what be the purpose of the dwarf indigo ( angelo rossitto ) a to my eye he contribute nothing to the film . the story doesn not grip like any good murder mystery should and just end up become tedious . director cabanne do nothing to add any suspense and tension and scare or excitement and instead pile on the lame comedy . scar to death might have be decent it if be set in a spooky old mansion but cabanne decide on an bland ordinary look house which hardly generate any atmosphere and in fact it doesn not generate any . there be only one murder if you can call it that and refer to the title to understand what i mean . scar to death be another poverty row effort for lugosi who come and go but doesn not do much . this be one of only two colour film he appear in and the other be viennese night ( 1930 ) . the act isn not great but it good than some of these early horror . scar to death be a poor murder mystery and have no horror elements in it and be stuff with annoy comedy that be anything but funny . do yourself a favour and give this one a miss and there be much good film out there . one more thing and the imdb cast listing on the scar to death main page give away the identity of the killer if you look down it . a case of the imdb break their own rule .