saw this film on the horror channel and made my whole family laugh more than most hollywood comedys ever can. its genius comes from how awful it looks now, when juxtaposed against the modern CGI of Star Wars and Independance Day but the gigantic stop motion scorpians still capture awe as they demolish everything they come across- vehicles, mexico and a hornby train set.
does anyone know of similar releases?
or if this is out on DVD/VHS?
I'm not a fan of most CGI when it looks as fake as it does in some movies regardless of it being more "modern".
The funniest thing about this movie is that the close-ups of the scorpions look completely different (in the head) than the other shots.
You could remove your brain and enjoy, or you could turn your brain on high and completely make fun of it. Like MST3K.
share[deleted]
I still had my brain running when watching this movie and really enjoyed it alltogether. The stop motion was pretty good, and the story wasn't as crappy as most SF/horror movies' stories in the late fifties.
This movie should be rated higher than a 3.8, that's way too low. I gave it a 7.
[deleted]
I remember going to the neighborhood movie theatre just up the street where I lived with one of my friends as a little girl seeing this when it just came out.In the 50's it was much safer to walk on the streets then it is now. This movie really scared me to no end and I couldnt waite to see it again.I saw it only a few times on tv,but they never seemed to show it all that much.Now I own this movie on dvd and I can watch it over and over again,I just love it.I never get tired of it.I totally agree.One can NOT compare todays computerized creatures to yesterdays stop motion monsters.Its totally a different period of time.That is where our "brain" needs to come in and differenciate. One needs to appreciate the hard work that went into making of these monsters and creatures of time past.Though I am not saying some of the movies back then werent bad,I certainly have seen my share.But we sure do have bad ones today too being turned out on cable channels.I also felt that the rating was too low.I will also give this movie a 7.
shareThis is one of my favorites from my childhood. Growing up in Texas I had plenty of experience with scorpions, and I couldn't imagine anything nastier than giant ones. I did find the hero irritating (much more so than his buddy), and so was the kid, but the scorpions themselves were very satisfying. NOT the close-ups, those rigidly staring, drooling things. But the stop-motion scorpions were particularly effective, I thought. Scariest scene, for me, was when we first see them attacking those phone line repairmen, one man watching helplessly as they approach to pluck him off his telephone pole.
share[deleted]
Just rememeber it was movies like this that influenced Spielberg, Lucas and a slew of other filmmakers.
shareI just watched this movie this morning on TCM. I'm a great admirer of Willis O'Brien & Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion FX.The scorpions truly are nasty looking suckers,so to do a stop-motion movie featuring them was perfect.The script would be excellent for MST3000 even though the animated sequences are well done. I was laughing at all of the romantic dialogue between Mara Corday & Richard Denning. My biggest lol moment:When the military man hauls the cable in with the electrified spear on it & then grabs the spear & kills himself as Denning shouts "Turn it off,turn it off." Whoops.
shareWhile this movie today, here on IMDB, I perused a few other "monster" movies made in Mexico during the 1950s, and I came upon "Kronos" - about a huge alien robot that sucks energy as it traverses the landscape.
There was some comment on the messageboards about a guy who is killed when he tries to scale a protective fence that surrounds a huge transformer. That's right - the fence that is supposed to protect people from getting a lethal voltage jolt is lethal in itself!
Then I saw the scene you cited as well and I was like "WHOA! Hmmm...must be something about Mexican electricity..."
"Don't call me 'honey', mac."
"Don't call me 'mac'... HONEY!"