I usually enjoy these 50s sci-fi. I really liked The Thing From Another World, also starring Ken Tobey. But this movie falls flat for some reason. It starts off boring and stays that way for the whole film. I was compelled to review this because there seems to be so many good reviews, when in fact the movie is so utterly poor. Before watching i checked the IMDB listing and after looking at some of the pictures, i thought this would be right up my alley so I made popcorn. The movie runs only 79 minutes long. Watching it on a 2.5 hour Svengoolie, it makes for a lot of dead time. 79 minutes of movie and 71 minutes of stale Svengoolie bits and annoying commercials made the movie seem even worse. A bad night for the usually funny Svengoolie. Maybe the movie would better if it played without breaks, but i don't really think so. It just stinks.
Also, while Tobey and Domergue were just okay, Curtis wasn't any good, and there weren't any 'hidden pearls' turned in by the rest of the cast, who were mostly non-existent. I expected more from this movie after seeing the grand marquee. What we have here is a weird love triangle between the three top billed, an uninteresting script, and a mostly unscary/unintriguing monster. The 2 stars is only because they do sort of sell the monster bit talking about a big squid off the coast of Maine and Tobey smoking in the lab with no smoking signs posted.
Also, while Tobey and Domergue were just okay, Curtis wasn't any good, and there weren't any 'hidden pearls' turned in by the rest of the cast, who were mostly non-existent. I expected more from this movie after seeing the grand marquee. What we have here is a weird love triangle between the three top billed, an uninteresting script, and a mostly unscary/unintriguing monster. The 2 stars is only because they do sort of sell the monster bit talking about a big squid off the coast of Maine and Tobey smoking in the lab with no smoking signs posted.
Tell Your Friends