Review(s): DVD The Crawling Eye (Widescreen European Edition)
Great atmosphere, silly special effects
"The Crawling Eye" is one of those movies that people like to lump in with campy fifties monster movies like "The Brain that wouldn't Die" or "The Giant Gila Monster". It's actually several cuts above those films due to the intelligent script and the beautiful cinematography--the Swiss Alps never looked better even if it was all shot on a set. Forrest Tucker makes a capable leading man as he does in "The Abominable Snowman". The sinister cloud was apparently done by filming a piece of cotton attached to a photograph of a mountain, but it is amazingly effective. Less successful are the "crawling eyes" themselves at the end of the film--they look like white, veiny cabbages waving their leaves around. Particularly unimpressive is the climactic shot of them gathered around the obviously miniature observatory. But the journey is the main thing. Up until the fx let you down, you have a well paced, well directed thriller that stands up with the best of that period.
The Crawling Eye and the Trollenberg
After watching The Crawling Eye, also known as the Trollenberg Terror, I had a dream in which I was gripping the cable car's wire as I was descending the Swiss mountain. My boyfriend and I watched the film on Halloween, and it was the perfect horror movie. It was so convincing that I bought into the premise that a radioactive cloud and space aliens could pose a threat! This is a classic 1950s picture, and the black and white photography is superb. It would be the perfect drive-in movie, if drive-in theaters were still around!
THE BIGGER TO SEE YOU WITH
Originally released as THE TROLLENBERG TERROR, this late fifties British scifi thriller may seem corny and amateurish by today's special effects standards, but it's still an effective little thriller. We don't even see the monsters until late in the film, but that adds to the movie's suspense. F TROOP'S Forrest Tucker is an American on holiday in Europe when he is called upon by old friend Warren Mitchell to help him in discovering the cause for several "accidents" involving climbers. Seems like it's parallel to an old misadventure they had in the Andes some years before. Along for the ride are two sisters, one who is a mindreader obviously affected by the mysterious cloud hovering over the Trollenberg mountain. Janet Munro, a staple of many British films of the late fifties and early sixties, plays the psychic. Ms. Munro is a capable actress whose career ended at the age of 38 when she succumbed to cancer. The lovely Jennifer Jayne plays her concerned sibling. Although overwrought and even laughable by the ending, THE CRAWLING EYE remains a fine example of those loveably cheesy scifi films of that era.
Related DVD's The Crawling Eye (Widescreen European Edition)
That ol' cinematic devil the A-bomb has spawned a colony of giant murderous ants bent on destroying humanity in this, the seminal big bug movie (an obvious and oft-credited influence for Alien among countless others). The special effects may be dated, but this brilliantly rational-sounding film has held up wonderfully in all other regards, including some starkly effective location work in the high Arizona desert, a genuinely inspired sound design guaranteed to bring on the creepy-crawlies, and an unexpectedly dry sense of humor (mainly personified by Grade-A egghead scientist Edmund Gwenn). This is essential viewing for all those who consider themselves science fiction or horror fans. Heroic hardcase James Arness previously played for the other team as the titular character in... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): James Whitmore - Edmund Gwenn Director(s): Gordon Douglas DVD Release Date: Released the 06 August 2002 Usually ships in 24 hours
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With its modest special effects, lean plot, and small cast of lesser stars, this 1951 thriller remains a sturdy blueprint for fusing horror and science fiction. The formula has been employed countless times since, fleshed out with more extensive and elaborate production values, and manned by higher profiled marquee names, but the results have yet to improve on The Thing from Another World, Howard Hawks's lone foray into sci-fi.
The story begins as military airmen are dispatched to a remote Arctic research station where scientists have detected the crash of a spacecraft. An effort to retrieve the saucer-shaped vehicle fails, but the team returns to the station with the frozen body of its sole occupant. When the extraterrestrial pilot is accidentally thawed, the crew, headed... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Margaret Sheridan - Kenneth Tobey Director(s): Christian Nyby - Howard Hawks DVD Release Date: Released the 05 August 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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This film terrified me when I first saw it at the age of 9, but I doubt it will terrify anyone who has been raised in the era of sophisticated special effects. Nonetheless, it is a short (75 minutes), entertaining, and fun movie that captures the mood generated by the 1950s flying saucer scares.
The story centers on Nora and Frank, two strangers who've been left behind while the city was evacuated in response to an unknown (to them) threat. The eerie opening music creates the mood as Nora wakes from the stupor of an attempted suicide via sleeping pills. Alarmed to discover that both her rooming house and the entire city (as seen through her window) seem to be deserted, she gets dressed and goes off in search of someone.
With overhead photography worthy of... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Sherman A. Rose DVD Release Date: Released the 25 February 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Something's wrong in the town of Santa Mira, California. At first, Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) is unconcerned when the townsfolk accuse their loved ones of acting like emotionless imposters. But soon the evidence is overwhelming--Santa Mira has been invaded by alien "pods" that are capable of replicating humans and taking possession of their identities. It's up to McCarthy to spread the word of warning, battling the alien invasion at the risk of his own life. Considered one of the best science fiction films of the 1950s and '60s, this classic paranoid thriller was widely interpreted as a criticism of the McCarthy era (that's Senator Joseph, not actor Kevin), which was characterized by anticommunist witch-hunts and fear of the dreaded blacklist. Some hailed it as an attack on the... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Kevin McCarthy - Dana Wynter Director(s): Don Siegel DVD Release Date: Released the 25 July 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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