“The Monster That Challenged the World” (1957)
The US Navy vs. giant sea slugs in the California desert. (makes perfect sense, right?)
The name of the film is a bit misleading I think. It really should be, “The Monsters that challenged a few people in a very underpopulated area of southern California”. But, I suppose that doesn’t have quite the same ring to it. The movie is about an earthquake that opens up a crack in the bottom of the Salton Sea where some giant mollusks have been hibernating since prehistoric times. The warm, slightly radioactive water(from recent atomic bomb tests) revives these creatures somehow and they began to lay eggs and terrorize the local community.
This was another in the series of giant monster films that were popular in the 50′s. Some of them are goofy fun, some are just bad. This one actually stands out as a fairly decent film despite the somewhat silly premise. The story is actually quite similar to “Jaws” in some ways and I have to wonder if Spielberg was at least partially influenced by The Monster That Challenged the World. Much like Police Chief Brody in Jaws, both the Sheriff and the base commander in this film must deal with some backlash with their decision to close down the beaches because of the monster. It’s the middle of summer, extremely hot and peak tourist season. People expect to go to the beach and if they can’t, they’re going to be upset about it. Also, the two stories unfold in similar ways. In both cases the monster is a massive underwater creature that we don’t see right away. It’s not until almost halfway through the movie that we finally see the giant mollusk for the first time. There are multiple deaths prior, (Including one of a couple out for a night swim and the woman getting pulled underwater by an unseen creature-all while screaming. Much like the opening scene of Jaws) but we only gets hints as to what is responsible for the havoc. This film does a good job of letting the suspense build by holding off on the reveal. During the last part of the movie the creature actually gets a lot of screen time. Quite a bit more in fact than the monsters in other movies from the time and unlike many of the laughable, rubber suit monsters, the mollusk creature actually looks pretty good for the time.
There are some interesting performances in the film. The main protagonist, base commander Twillinger played by Tim Holt is an uptight workaholic with a cowboy drawl that seems to fade in and out. That’s probably because Holt was primarily a star of westerns. The scientist, Dr. Rogers (there always has to be a scientist in these monster films) is played by Hans Conried best know as the voice of Captain Hook in the original Disney’s ‘Peter Pan’. There are also some fun performances in a couple of small parts. My two favorites are; the coroner who offers Twillinger a sandwich which he keeps cool by storing in one of the body drawers. And the local museum curator, Mr. Dobbs. Who is super creepy and I suspect is really a serial killer.
I think my favorite scene is at the end. One of the creature eggs they collected has hatched out in the lab and is threatening Twillineger’s pseudo love interest, Gail and her daughter. Twillinger returns to the lab and finds the monster breaking down a closet door to get at Gail and her daughter. Since he is unarmed, the Commander looks about for a weapon. He turns around and looks right at a BIG FIRE AXE on the wall. He definitely sees it; we, the audience, see it; a blind man could see it. The obvious course of events is that the hero will grab the axe and commence to mollusk hacking mayhem. However, when Twillinger runs to the back of the room, he instead grabs a fire extinguisher! What? Really?
If you ever encounter a man-eating snail the size of a horse, I recommend choosing an axe over a fire extinguisher. Just sayin. Anyway he distracts it long enough for men with guns to come in and kill it. The day is saved. The end.
All in all an entertaining movie for the most part - if you’re into giant bug movies from the 50′s. (which I am) Although it did get a little slow at times and at others it stretched suspension of disbelief to new levels. Yet, this is one I have watched several times and will watch again. Check it out.
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