Monster of the Day #3447

Updated on August 4, 2023 By Ken Begg 4 Comments

SPOILER ALERT: Above image telegraphs the resolution of the film’s extremely hard to predict romantic triangle.

Unsurprisingly, all the best stop-animated monsters from the ’50s came courtesy of Ray Harryhausen. (Well, and Willis O’Brien.) The rest of the movie is a snooze–you definitely doing something wrong when Kenneth Tobey can’t elevate your film*–but man, that quintipus is dynamite. No matter how great the poster was, a Harryhausen movie always exceeded expectations.

*Although there’s a Tobey moment I’ve always loved. When his failed romantic rival (oops, sorry) is caught on the Golden Gate Bridge as it’s be destroyed by IT, Tobey drives out on the bridge to save him. They barely make it out alive, and as they zoom back to safely, Tobey looks at the other guy and gives him a cheerfully rueful “Can you believe that shit?” expression. Great little bit.

Happy Friday, everyone. Watch something stupid. Watch Party next Friday.

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  • Beckoning Chasm

    There’s a great “romantic triangle diffused” moment in “Earth vs. The Flying Saucers.” Donald Curtis (again) is spending an awful lot of time with Hugh Marlowe’s wife and you worry where this might go. Then the scientists discover that the alien’s weapon is (spoiler alert) based on sound. Donald Curtis says, “Having two small boys around the house, I know sound doesn’t do a man much good” and BOOM! Every kid in the audience breathes a sigh of relief. Whew! He’s married!

  • 🐻 bgbear_rnh

    Today in SF people are discouraged from stopping rampaging cephalopods. There is a video of a cuttlefish leaving a 7-11 with his tentacles full of cartons of cigarettes.

  • Faith Domergue is in it. No other considerations are needed.

    Seriously, I love this movie. It’s a lot of fun. Domergue’s character alone is a scream. Repeatedly. At length. I’m telling you, the woman rivaled Fay Wray in lung compacity.

  • zombiewhacker

    Always been a big Kenneth Tobey fan. A shame that he aged out of leading man roles into more villainous parts as time wore on. I would have loved seeing him play a hard-boiled cop in a French Connection style flick. He looked more like Eddie Egan (the real-life police detective who inspired Popeye Doyle) than Gene Hackman did.