Monster of the Day #1680

Updated on December 20, 2017 By Ken Begg 29 Comments

Man, this film is far more fun than it should be. I mean, it’s a piffle, but a rather fun little piffle. It’s a borderline horror movie, though, which seems right for Fox.

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  • Beckoning Chasm

    They really went all out on that painting–especially as opposed to the two previous entries.

  • I have way more affection for this movie than it deserves. Also it always amazes me that Anne Bancroft was Mel Brooks’ wife. They had a long happy marriage right up until her passing. Talk about your ugly guy/hot wife dichotomy and she absolutely manages to smoke in this silly little potboiler.

  • Gamera977

    Yeah, as Greenhornet commented yesterday the last two looked like a crime movie with a monster shoehorned into the corner. Nice to see the ‘monster’* taking center stage.

    *Despite a gorilla being a real animal I guess I can still call it a monster here?

  • Ericp

    Well a real gorilla wouldn’t be able to carry a woman like that for more than a few paces. They aren’t bipeds.

  • SteveWD

    There was a bit of a fad of tv stations (mostly uhf) in the early 80’s doing promos where they would give out 3D glasses and then show old 3D movies. I remember this movie being one of them. I was about 11 or 12, had my 3D glasses ready and was really exited. Needless to say I was a little disappointed. The 3D was terrible. I think it had more to do with the awful process they used for tv than the movie itself, but wow, was it bad. I really don’t remember that much about the movie but I’d like to check it out again sometime. Also, what’s with Raymond Burr’s name on the poster? His name is just barely larger than Produced By, Directed By, Written By, and…. And.

  • Gamera977

    Quite true, thanks for reminding me.

  • Gamera977

    I was thinking this was the one with Burr and the voodoo curse but when I didn’t see his name just assumed I was mistaken. Funny, since he had the biggest meatiest role in the film.

  • bgbear_rnh

    I assume somewhere she said “he makes me laugh”

  • bgbear_rnh

    Big man, little name.

  • zombiewhacker

    No, today’s MOTD is a different film. Gorilla At Large is a murder whodunit set in the circus. Burr is one of the suspects and a young Lee Marvin features as a cop.

    Don’t Google it if you want to avoid spoilers, but the ending is a real surprise (mainly because it’s so ridiculous).

  • zombiewhacker

    So two horror movies in a row, Fox goes lame in the poster department. Then Gorilla At Large gets released, which is NOT a horror movie, and for that Fox churns out a horror movie poster.

  • bgbear_rnh

    Perry Mason: The Case of the Shrinking Font

  • Wade Harrell

    I remember that 3-D on TV fad! The glasses came with instruction on how adjust the contrast knobs on the back of the TV to get the 3D to work, but we never got it to. I think it was one of the Creature from the Black Lagoon movies when we we tried it.

  • Wade Harrell

    I think she’s screaming “Hey pal, my eyes are up here!”

    It’s funny how we can still see a gorilla as a monster in a movie but in real life most people know they’re relatively gentle vegetarians, unlike sharks, spiders, snakes etc. which are still widely feared. Gorillas weren’t even known to western science until the mid 1800’s and at that time there was a lot of understandable excitement about their discovery, kinda like if someone today discovered a real bigfoot or yeti.

  • Rock Baker

    The gorilla stuff is fun, but the main draw here is that amazing cast!

  • Beckoning Chasm

    I think the Burr one is called “Bride of the Gorilla” isn’t it?

  • zombiewhacker

    Dang! Wish I’d thought of that one.

  • zombiewhacker

    BTW, I just looked it up. Gorilla At Large director Harmon Jones also directed five episodes of the original Perry Mason TV series. You were right on the money!

  • zombiewhacker

    When I first watched this on TV in the 80s, the biggest surprise to me was that Cameron Mitchell was once a Hollywood leading man. At the time, I was used to seeing him cast as cut-rate villain roles in genre cheapies… as well as ubiquitous guest appearances on various TV series.

    I never thought Mitchell was a bad actor, really. I even liked him in Space Mutiny. But I guess like John Carradine and other exploitation movie greats, Mitchell was simply never A-list material. So he settled for his fifteen minutes of relative fame, then after that, he was forced to grab whatever roles that happened to come his way.

  • Eric Hinkle

    So many posters of gorillas dragging away screaming women. Why not just one of a woman carrying away a screaming gorilla?

  • bgbear_rnh

    Too bad you can’t post pictures here. I was thinking Diane Fossey as played by Sigouney Weaver.

  • Kirk

    This will always be the movie where I beat the Rev. to a Simpsons reference. A small victory, but a victory none the less.

  • Gamera977

    Yes, I think that’s it! Sorry I saw Burr and gorilla and that movie came to mind.

  • Rock Baker

    In many ways, Mitchell walked the same line as Poor Joseph Cotton. Of course, part of the issue with Mitchell was the same stumbling block that got Russ Tamblyn. He was one of the young leading men during the last gasps of the studio system. When it collapsed, he had to take work in lower grade films since the studio was no longer casting him in prestigious lead rolls. On the up side of things, Mitchell never seemed to be bitter about his career slide, and genuinely seemed to be enjoying himself in whatever he did. That, ultimately, speaks rather well of him.

  • zombiewhacker

    Russ Tamblyn… he was one of my faves growing up. Back then, I’d watch him in anything from West Side Story to War of the Gargantuas. Just a fun actor to watch, and unlike Mitchell, he was more of a conventional leading man type.

    However, his career skid was far more pronounced than Mitchell’s. Mitchell never stopped working — a Hollywood supporting role here, a TV appearance or cheapie horror flick there — after his initial decline.

    Tamblyn, on the other hand, fell completely off the radar around the time he got mixed up with the execrable Al Adamson, and his career didn’t come even close to getting back on course until the late 80s (Twin Peaks). By then, it was too little, too late.

  • The Rev.

    We did the same thing when I was a kid, same movie even. I recall ours working, though. A few weeks ago I went to a theater screening of CftBL in 3-D. It was glorious.

  • That is how I saw this one as well. On DC 20 and possibly even presented by Count Gore de Vol, or at least advertised by hm. I think that’s part of the reason for my affection, it was the first 3D movie I ever saw. The fact that it actually holds up pretty well as a movie, if a slightly silly one, is just icing on the cake.

  • Wade Harrell

    It might have had to do with how good your reception was, we lived in a rural area and reception wasn’t great in the best of times.

  • Wade Harrell

    As in Washington DC? I grew up in that area too! Do you remember Captain 20, the host of the kids programming who was dressed as a Vulcan for some reason? I remember there was some kind of club where you could win prizes if they read your number on he air.