“Within 48 hours, Dr. Bradford had closely examined the creature and the spaceship and reached a number of conclusions. He was sure the creature had come from beyond our solar system.”
Synopsis:
A sheriff (Vic Savage) returns from a honeymoon with his new wife (Shannon O’Neil) to find a spaceship has landed, and an enormous shaggy monster is devouring everyone it sees.
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Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:
- Mutant Monsters
- Science Fiction
Response to Peary’s Review:
Peary writes that this “stunningly bad low-budget sci fi film… features the worst excuse for a monster in history” — a creature that “looks like an old deformed carpet with several white misshapen beards and a large mouth”. He points out that the “actors playing the [creature’s] victims actually have to force themselves into the mouth of the barely mobile creature”, and notes that “adding to the absurdity” is the fact that “director Art. J. Nelson” (who also starred as the sheriff under the stage name Vic Savage) “lost his soundtrack, but, rather than tossing out footage of a lot of people having conversations, he simply added a narrator so we wouldn’t be curious about what everyone is saying”. He concludes his review by noting that the “film is for bad-movie lovers only — but even they may find [it] pretty tiresome.”
Indeed, I can’t really imagine watching this sub-Z-grade movie without the “assistance” of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 crew, who add appropriately derogatory commentary and/or supplemental dialogue to every scene in the film — humorously highlighting all of Peary’s complaints above blow-by-blow. Viewed simply as a TRULY TERRIBLE movie, however — how much worse could it be? — this flick holds a certain surreal allure: as Richard Scheib writes, it “exerts a terribleness that is fascinating to see. The gap between what it sets out to achieve and what it actually does achieve is a gaping chasm.”
Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
- Stunningly bad — everything
Must See?
Yes — simply for its cult infamy as such a truly terrible movie.
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One thought on “Creeping Terror, The / Crawling Monster, The (1964)”
Ultimately not a must – but, again, if you catch the MST3K version, Mike Nelson and his buds once again come to the rescue. Completely? No, but almost. Films of this type of ‘badness’ still play out at varying levels…and this one isn’t even as ‘good’ as ‘Horror of Party Beach’ – the last 15 minutes or so really drop the ball, so there’s little that even the MST3K gang can do at that point. You’re only as good as what you have to work with.