Woodyanders
A series of gruesome decapitation murders in a remote Swiss town turn out to be the grisly handiwork of hideous alien monsters. Director Quentin Lawrence not only keeps the enjoyable and engrossing story at a steady pace, but also ably crafts a strong spooky gloom-doom atmosphere. Jimmy Sangster's compact script presents a neat array of interesting and engaging characters. Forrest Tucker makes for a solid and likeable take-charge hero. The lovely Janet Munro likewise impresses as fragile psychic Anne. Moreover, there are sound contributions from Laurence Payne as stalwart reporter Philip Truscott, Jennifer Jayne as the concerned Sarah Pilgrim, Warren Mitchell as jolly scientist Crevett, Andrew Faulds as the rugged Brett, and Stuart Saunders as the hearty Dewhurst. The tentacled eyeball monsters are pretty creepy looking. Both Stanley Black's robust score and Monty Berman's crisp cinematography are up to par. Look fast for ubiquitous British bit player Reg Thomason as a rescue worker. A fun little flick.
stangya sorensa
If anyone out there used to read the English comic "Valiant", but in the series "The Steel Claw" there was a story where aliens resembling the ones in this film landed in England with the intention of using the rural community where they had landed as a beachhead for an invasion; fortunately they are defeated by the series' hero Crandell, a "James Bond" parody who (a) possessed a prosthetic hand (the "Steel Claw" of the title) and (b) could become invisible more or less at will! It was a parody three times over; of this movie, of the ABC-TV series "The Invisible Man", and of the James Bond phenomenon of the period (the Sixties).
Hitchcoc
Forest Tucker meets two attractive sisters on a train to a mountain in Switzerland. Instead of going on to Geneva, one of the young women (part of a pair of professional mind- reader) feels compelled to stop at a remote town which is known for its mountain climbing. It turns out that several climbers have met their fates (including one which we witness at the beginning). So the threesome end up in a mountain chalet with people who are interested in scaling the peak. It turns out that people are being found with their heads missing and it has something to do with a cloud that sits next to the mountain. Everything gets jumbled up. It's the usual thing where people go ahead and stupidly make their way into danger, totally unprepared or ignorant of the dangers. Forest is the hero and he finds himself in the middle of all this. One of the girls is empathic and keeps getting herself in danger. Of course, we eventually see the "crawling eye." It looks like a big pastry with one eye and skinny tentacles. There is also something about the temperature on the mountain. Anyway, it eventually gets down to fighting with fire. It's not that I don't appreciate these kinds of films, but lets not get carried away with praising them, other than their sentimental attraction to drive-in movie goers of the fifties.
bkoganbing
Even with some holes in the plot the Queen Mary could have floated through, The Crawling Eye remains a favorite of mine from my adolescence. It's literally filled with atmosphere and it's atmosphere that these nasty eye creatures from some other world are trying to recreate.Wherever these things come from it's real cold so they say on mountain tops. Why this wasn't set in the Himalayas is anyone's guess.They were first reported in the Andes mountains and scientist Forrest Tucker was investigating there too. Now they're in the Swiss Alps and Tucker has responded to a call for help. So has Laurence Payne who is a reporter and smells a story first in the Andes and now in Switzerland.These creatures apparently don't like telepaths, one was killed in Argentina and they've taken an interest in young Janet Munro who has a mind reading nightclub act with her sister Jennifer Jayne. It's Munro whom they're after and they take their below freezing cloud cover atmosphere with them to get her any way they can.Lots of holes in this plot including a locked door murder which might have needed the help of Agatha Christie to get right. But for atmosphere and chilling thrills you can't beat The Crawling Eye.
AD
