Yours portly had a pretty lazy (yet oddly productive) Saturday.  I spent a good bit of the day at the computer, hammering out some blog posts, tweaking some assignments for the first two weeks of school, playing some old video games.  I also did a bit of composing, and listed several new pieces for sale via Noteflight.

I also watched some schlocky old movies, as I am wont to do.  Shudder had a couple of B-movies featuring giant monsters wreaking havoc, both from the late 1950s and early 1960s—the golden age of loud, alarmist monster movies.

These classic monster movies are the kind of thing that would have aired on cable television in the 1990s on a dead, lazy Saturday or Sunday afternoon, when nothing else was worth watching.  You’d stumble upon them in your idle quest for entertainment, then nod off into a fitful, sweaty nap, maybe waking up as the beast undertaking its third-act rampage.  These airings would be buttressed by ninety-minute infomercials for vinyl siding, which you (or, at least, yours portly) would endure, hoping that it’s got to end any minute now, vainly waiting for the vinyl to sidle into some crumb of afternoon mediocrity.

I could see myself drifting off into a fitful, sweaty nap with these two films, The Giant Gila Monster (1959) and Gorgo (1961).  That’s not an indictment, though; while neither film is a masterpiece, both possess their own dated, nostalgic charm.

The Giant Gila Monster (1959)

The Giant Gila Monster is very much a relic of its time.  It incorporates all of the hallmarks of late 1950s youth culture:  hot rodding, popular local DJs, a guy playing a sappy song on a ukulele.  There’s also a giant Gila monster (actually a Mexican beaded lizard, per Wikipedia, but still pretty cool).

The premise is simple and absurd:  the titular giant Gila monster has been living in the brush outside of a rural Texas town for so long, it’s grown to outrageous proportions.  Unlike many of the films of the time, the monster is not some sort of commentary about the dangers of nuclear weapons and radiation.  There is one expository scene in which there is talk about a Russian baby that weight 130 pounds and was taller than his mother at the age of one, and the reasoning that if it could happen there with a human baby, why not in Texas with a Gila monster?

Otherwise, the monster is kind of in the background.  Yes, he kills some people, which catalyzes the hodge-podge of a story presented in the film.  Two teenagers go missing, and for some reason, the local sheriff gets the kindly leader of a local hot rod gang to aid in the investigation.  This hot rodder, Chase, is the sweetest guy in the world—he’s hardworking, kind to his kid sister, loves his Mexican girlfriend, etc.  But because he builds hot rods, he’s under the suspicion of some folks in town.  For some reason, the sheriff lets him take the white-wall tires from the deceased teen boy’s car to put on his own, which naturally deepens suspicion.

The Giant Gila Monster is loaded with cameos from people who would have been popular among teens at the time:  the 1957 French contestant for Miss Universe; DJ Ken Knox of KLIF; and comedian Shug Fisher, who plays a convincing town drunk who dispenses dubious advice to the youngsters and brags about his Model A Ford.  There are even musical numbers (the aforementioned ukulele tune, for example).  The monster is honestly kind of secondary to the whole thing, which is really just an attempt to cram in as many things as possible that seemed popular in 1959.

What I did like about the flick was the monster himself.  He’s an actual lizard on a set of miniatures; shot in black and white, he looks pretty cool, albeit a bit sluggish (imagine shoving a live lizard’s head into the side of a miniature barn and filming it; you get the idea).

Gorgo (1961)

Which brings me to our second film, 1961’s Gorgo.  Gorgo is the kind of movie I would have written in middle school:  a blatant rip-off of King Kong (1933) and Godzilla (1954).  Indeed, the film is meant to be some kind of misguided tribute to Godzilla, but it really smacks of a cash-grab riding on the monster tails of the classic Japanese film.

When I say that the film is a “blatant rip-off,” I mean it.  The first third of the film is pretty much King Kong, which some changes to the details (there’s no Fay Wray character, for example):  a group of sailors are forced ashore off the coast of Ireland following a volcanic eruption.  They encounter a bipedal sea monster, dubbed “Gorgo,” and manage to capture it.  An unscrupulous promoter transports Gorgo to London to showcase to the public (and to get rich in the process).  There’s even a scene where a newspaper reporter takes a picture of a tranquilized Gorgo, who angrily tries to escape!

Then the film becomes Godzilla.  Gorgo is a baby of its species, and its mother is ticked off that her baby has been stolen.  So Gorgo’s mom attacks London, destroying all sorts of famous landmarks.  The military is powerless to subdue her.  They even try to rig up the electrical wires to electrocute her—just like Godzilla!—but Mama Gorgo and her baby head back out to sea once they’re reunited.

The final third of the movie is just constant noise—the part that would have woken you up on that lazy, dead Saturday or Sunday afternoon in the mid-1990s—but also features some cool shots of the monster.  Gorgo and Mama Gorgo are clearly guys in rubber suits (and puppets in other shots), but they do look good for the time.  The miniatures of London in the early 1960s are also really detailed, and the film does a great job of creating scale between the massive Mama Gorgo and London.

Parting Thoughts

I would not classify either of these films as “classics.”  I wouldn’t really even recommend them.  I love schlocky old movies like these, though, and if you just want some mindless, fun entertainment that doesn’t really preach at you, these are good for wiling away a boring afternoon.

Not every film has to be some kind of masterpiece or carry some message (although one could certainly find messages in these films:  don’t judge a hot rodder by his white walls [The Giant Gila Monster] and don’t steal a baby from its mother [Gorgo]).  Sometimes it’s just fun to watch the British military in the early 1960s shoot at a guy in a rubber suit.

Also:  you can apparently watch both films on YouTube; how legal that is, I don’t know, but here they are: