If there was evil, its buried with him.
Welcome back to my Dark Corner of this Sick World.
‘I don’t remember having invited you’
We’re looking at Die Monster Die or the Monster of Terror.
‘Chains for Devils’
Why Boris Karloff is in it I have no idea.
‘That’s really none of your business’
The film is based on one of H P Lovecraft’s most celebrated stories,
The Colour Out Of Space, a story that makes a genuine attempt to depict truly alien life.
‘Why do you persist in these delusions?’
The film, however, jettisons that and goes for a cross between a 1950s sci-fi B Movie ...
There are many rooms down there... SCREAM!"
and one of Roger Corman’s Poe adaptations
‘You must have seen them’
Although it lacks their the florid, gothic wit.
‘There’s no similarity whatever’
This is an old Dark House movie with crazy women in the attic
I must have your promise now.'
Spooky things in the cellar
and a cloaked figure prowling the grounds.
not to mention something that keeps screaming in the potting shed.
'WEIRD SCREAM'
'What was that?'
But the spooky thing in the cellar is a meteorite.
'I thought it was a gift from heaven.'
and everything else is genetic mutants.
'WEIRD SCREAM
Oh, its horrid
Maybe there’s a film in which these genres can be made to work together, but this isn’t it.
‘Sorry mate’
The gothic settings and superstitious English villagers...
He wants to know if there is anything wrong with that house!
seem to be in a different movie to Nick Adams’ modern – if somewhat boring - hero
‘What’s wrong with everyone in this town’
and the House of Usher Ending...
would be a lot more powerful if it wasn’t preceded by Karloff turning into a luminous nuclear ghoul.
and dying of clumsiness.
If that was the only problem this would be a pretty watchable mish-mash.
‘It’s fantastic’
But the most irritating thing about this movie is that it is simultaneously too fast and too slow.
‘Fraid I don’t understand’
Whether it’s lengthy shots of foggy houses.
or Karloff being slowly wheeled along.
the actual scenes are glacially slow.
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about’
and almost nothing happens in them until, someone leaps to a wild conclusion.
‘Uranium’
that against all the odds, turns out to be right.
'Genetic mutation probably caused by radiation.'
So, while nothing actually happens, the plot proceeds in these massive leaps
‘This is the answer, there’s no doubt about it’
It’s like watching that bar when you’re downloading something and it suddenly leaps from 13% to 84%
'I'm sure it was Helga.'
He’s never even met Helga
‘There’s one under every plant’
He checked two
‘If you don’t listen to me every living thing in this house will die.’
Where are you getting this information!
‘How can this happen?’
Lovecraft stories famously defy adaptation, this was never gonna be easy...
‘I don’t think it had to happen’
I give the director points for trying
‘He went insane’
and anything with Karloff in is worth a look
‘I know’
But the speed with which Nick decides that something is rotten in the state of Arkham
‘Something funny’s happening in this town’
and figures out what it is
‘I’ve seen a glow like that once before in a radiation lab?’
beggars belief.
‘I see it but I don’t believe it’
He’s only there one night!
Die Monster Die is unlikely mix of sci and Poe,
What improbable genres would you like to see put together?
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