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The Giant Claw / Night the World Exploded; June, 1957
Topic Started: Sep 17 2016, 05:23 PM (283 Views)
Laughing Gravy
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The Giant Claw and The Night the World Exploded (1957) Dir. Fred Sears
ITB Strange Science Cinema #086-087

Time for another ride in the Balcony Time Machine for a classic double-feature, just perfect for a drive-in night in 1957. Both films were produced by Sam Katzman and directed by Fred Sears, so at least my drive-in date was cute and willing.

In our first film, Jeff Morrow, an engineer working for the Air Force, spots a UFO the size of a battleship over the Yukon, but nobody believes him until the darn thing starts eating airplanes, laying eggs the size of stadium domes, and nesting atop the Empire State Building. Luckily, Jeff has a crazy idea that "just might work" about destroying it with a beam of atomic particles or some such nonsense. He convinces pretty mathematician Mara Corday and not-so-pretty Generals Morris Ankrum (of course) and Robert Shayne to help him build just such a device while the big bird continues to wreak havoc. Can the earth be saved?

Legendary bad movie and deservedly so; it's actually pretty good, as these things go, until you get the bird. Katzman had intended Ray Harryhausen, who practically lived on the Columbia lot in those days, to do the special effects, until he saw what that would cost. No problem, the next best thing is to farm it out to Mexico and have them build a marionette of a bird with giant teeth. Blind children wouldn't be fooled, but no matter: at least we have a movie that's unforgettable (although for the wrong reasons), with some of the daffiest and thus most lovable movie dialog I've heard in a long time, particularly coming from the smart ass generals, as well as Mr. Morrow.

Million-dollar Dialog:
Jeff, on being the sole survivor who has seen the bird: "I guess that makes me chief cook and bottle washer in a one-man bird watching society!"

Jeff, trying to rally the troops to not give up: "I don't care if that bird came from outer space or Upper Saddle River New Jersey, it's still made of flesh and blood!"

Jeff, advising the general that once his atomic particle slingshot does its thing the bird will be vulnerable: "You can hit it with everything but the kitchen sink!"
Gen. Ankrum: "We've GOT kitchen sinks!"

One of those movies I could watch 100 times and not tire of.

Our intermission consisted of some snack bar ads (Mmmm! Grape Nehi!) and a trailer for next week's million-dollar film, Warning from Space! Wow - and it's in COLOR! We also saw a highly enjoyable (for once) Casper cartoon, Ghost of Honor, in which Casper goes to a premiere of one of his cartoons and tell the crowd about the first time he visited Paramount's cartoon studios and met Huey, Herman & Katnip, and the other Famous Studios stars(!). Good stuff.

And, on to our second film, which I'd never seen or heard of before so I'm guessing neither have you.

William Leslie has invented an earthquake-prediction machine but nobody believes it works except esteemed Dr. Tris Coffin, who's played so many oily villains that nobody believes HIM, either. Once a predicted earthquake rocks the globe, though, well, people start to come around - until Dr. Leslie's machine predicts the end of the world! Nobody believes him, so he puts his infant son in a rocket ship and... oh, sorry, wrong movie. He actually discovers rare Element 112 is to blame, it's an unstable hunk of rock that grows, catches fire, and - apparently - causes natural disasters like nobody's bi'ness. The darn element loses its destructive force when wet, though, so the answer is simple: flood the world!

Okay, nobody said Einstein wrote this movie. Still, it's fun in its way, particularly if you can accept pouty-faced, chipmunk-cheeked Kathryn Grant (the princess from 7th Voyage of Sinbad) as a brilliant scientist. It's short (if you went to the bathroom for 64 minutes you missed the whole thing) and sequences filmed in Carlsbad Caverns at least look good. Probably a third of the film's running time is composed of stock footage of buildings wrecked in the London Blitz, newsreel film of floods, and falling buildings from Earth vs. the Flying Saucers. Adding to the enjoyment are, of course, a VERY serious narrator commenting on how bad things are going, and a parade of newspaper headlines confirming the worst and then reporting the end of the crisis.

Million-dollar Newspaper Headline:
"QUAKES CEASE! NEW HOPE FOR WORLD SURVIVAL! Story on page 5."

There are a finite number of actual 1950s science-fiction double features, and this is one of 'em, and as such, a joy to enjoy. Sixty years from now, you'll be able to find The Giant Claw on Columbia/Sony's Sam Katzman: Icon of Horror Collection and the world exploding on Mill Creek's Vintage Sci-Fi 6 Movie Collection in terrific widescreen prints.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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outerlimit
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As I recall The Giant Claw has the distinction of having Clint Eastwood's first appearance (probably uncredited).
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Laughing Gravy
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I think you're thinking of Tarantula. He's in that. Different giant monster (and that one was earlier). He's in Revenge of the Creature, too. He worked for Universal in those days. He WAS a friend of Mara Corday's though, and used her in bit parts in some of his films later.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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outerlimit
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LG I will defer to your recollection.I now seem to recall that in Tarantula he was a pilot and that he was a laboratory worker in another film which I thought was this one, but probably was the Creature film as you recall.Nice that he is still with us and contributing to the movies.
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The Batman
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THE GIANT CLAW was way more fun than I expected, or it had any right to be.

THE NIGHT THE WORLD EXPLODED...is 64 minutes long.


Always be yourself! Unless you can be Batman...then always be Batman!
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