{"id":1869,"date":"2006-12-01T15:17:27","date_gmt":"2006-12-01T22:17:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=1869"},"modified":"2021-01-06T00:21:45","modified_gmt":"2021-01-06T07:21:45","slug":"killer-shrews-the-1959","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=1869","title":{"rendered":"Killer Shrews, The (1959)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>&#8220;If we were half as big as we are now, we could live twice as long on our natural resources!&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<table>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Poster.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Poster-195x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"195\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-28532\" srcset=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Poster-195x300.jpg 195w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Poster-83x128.jpg 83w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Poster.jpg 492w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 195px) 100vw, 195px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Synopsis:<\/strong><br \/>\nA group of people on a hurricane-ridden island try to escape before they are attacked by voracious mutant shrews.\n<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p>\n<strong>Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Horror<\/li>\n<li>Mutant Monsters<\/li>\n<li>Scientists<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Review: <\/strong><br \/>\nThis campy, super-low-budget Mutant Monster flick (the directorial debut of special effects guru Ray Kellogg) possesses a relatively clever sci-fi premise and a few moments of atmospheric tension, but ultimately doesn&#8217;t offer quite enough laughs or thrills to mark it as a true &#8220;bad movie&#8221; classic. The ridiculously amateur-looking giant shrews (puppets in close-up, rug-covered dogs in action scenes) prevent one from feeling any credible sense of horror, instead simply provoking sniggers, rolled eyes, and yawns. In the back of his book, Peary lists <em>Killer Shrews <\/em>as a Camp Classic, which makes sense &#8212; it&#8217;s been lampooned fairly effectively by the MST3K crew &#8212; but also as a Sleeper, which mystified me until I read Shane Burridge&#8217;s review (no longer available online), in which he defends it as a &#8220;decent, economical piece of film-making&#8221; which &#8220;overcomes its limitations by confining its events to one set, using sound effects (the constant wind), lighting, and editing to create atmosphere.&#8221; Unfortunately, these elements weren&#8217;t enough to win me over; I enjoyed reading creative lampoons of this flick (see, for instance, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.stomptokyo.com\/badmoviereport\/reviews\/K\/kshrews.html\">the Stomp Tokyo review<\/a>) much more than actually watching it. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Redeeming Qualities and Moments: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Occasional camp value from spectacularly ridiculous dialogue, costumes, special effects, acting, and overall situations<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still-1024x552.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"345\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-47493\" srcset=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still-1024x552.png 1024w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still-300x162.png 300w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still-128x69.png 128w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still-768x414.png 768w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still-1536x829.png 1536w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/Killer-Shrews-Still.png 1785w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Must See? <\/strong><br \/>\nYes, for its status as a campy cult favorite.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Categories<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Cult Movie<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Links: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/imdb.com\/title\/tt0052969\/\">IMDb entry<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.badmovies.org\/movies\/killershrews\/\">BadMovies.org Review<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.stomptokyo.com\/badmoviereport\/reviews\/K\/kshrews.html\">Stomp Tokyo Review<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;If we were half as big as we are now, we could live twice as long on our natural resources!&#8221; Synopsis: A group of people on a hurricane-ridden island try to escape before they are attacked by voracious mutant shrews. Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors: Horror Mutant Monsters Scientists Review: This campy, super-low-budget Mutant Monster flick (the directorial debut of special effects guru Ray Kellogg) possesses a relatively clever sci-fi premise and a few moments of atmospheric tension, but ultimately&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=1869\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1869"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1869\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":61887,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1869\/revisions\/61887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}