50's American Horror Part Twenty - (Richard E. Cunha Edition)

GIANT FROM THE UNKNOWN

(1958)

Overall: WOOF

 

Cinematographer-turned-director Richard E. Cunha only got behind the lens on six features, the first of which was the painfully humdrum Giant from the Unknown, (Giant from Devil's Crag, The Diablo Giant).  Oddly perhaps, the film's downfall is that it is as competently made as any other low-budget, independent drive-in B-movie, meaning no better or worse than the most forgettable of them.  Cunha points his camera at what he is supposed to, the music hardly ever shuts up as was the norm, the Caucasian leads, (including one playing a Native American), all fit the blandly "Aww shucks" bill, and a monster of sorts shows up in the last act.  As far as compelling dialog, interesting characters, clever themes, impressive visual flourishes, or memorable set pieces, there is none of that to be found.  Overtly talky to the point where any sane viewer will turn it off long before six foot six Buddy Baer shows up to stumble around and stare for a couple of seconds, there is a fetching side-note for genre fans at least in that none other than Jack Pierce did Baer's Neanderthal-esque make-up job, even if it is a far cry from his iconic Universal work.

 

SHE DEMONS

(1958)

Overall: MEH

 

A typically sluggish drive-in cheapie, She Demons at least boasts a unique angle for fusing the Nazisploitation, jungle woman, and mad scientist sub-genres together.  Made for around sixty-five thousand dollars as part of a double bill with the same year's Giant from the Unknown, director/co-writer Richard E. Cunha keeps it simple with only three characters, (chisel-jawed Tod Griffin, wise-crackin' Irish McCalla, and Asian American character actor Victor Sen Yung speaking without any stereotypical accent or mannerisms), who do a tremendous amount of talking before they finally come in contact with dancing, scantily-clad tribal ladies and some Nazi refugees who are doing evil experiments because what else would Nazi refugees be doing in such a situation?  The plot line writes itself as one could imagine, but the specific pairing of cliches gives it a slight edge over other such B-movies that isolated their tropes instead of haphazardly slamming desperate ones together, as is the case here.  Even with a meandering pace, pulp sensibilities, and hilariously dated acting, the make-up work on the female demons of the title is wonderfully garish, which along with their gyrating and barely-clothed bodies, gives the film just enough mild sleaze to laugh at.

FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER

(1958)

Overall: MEH

 

Indistinguishably in line with American International Pictures' crop of teenage monster movies, (which included its own schlocky ode to Marry Shelley with I Was a Teenage Frankenstein), Frankenstein's Daughter is just as forgettable and stupid.  We have cringe-worthy musical numbers, youngsters having a lūʻau, gargantuan amounts of talking, women fainting, women being gaslit by men in nearly every scene, outrageously bad creature make-up, and a moronic, hilariously chauvinistic mad scientist agenda from a Frankenstein relative played with bland abandon by square-jawed Donald Murphy.  Speaking of bland, the world's most uncharastmatic actor John Ashley was top-billed, looks as bored as ever, and gets the brunt of the "not believing any word that his hysterical girlfriend ever says" dialog, though Murphy comes a close second in trying to convince everyone that Sandra Knight imagines all of the things that happens to her.  Notably embarrassing for having a man portray the hulking, re-animated lady brute, all other aspects of the production are neither worth remembering nor discussing.