The Crawling Eye (1958) - With Head Munching Spoilers

An eye...that crawls. Doesn't sound too frightening, does it? How about one that's as big as a bus, is telepathic and eats people's heads? Still laughing at The Crawling Eye?

Well, you probably are. However, for a modestly budgeted Fifties sci-fi film, this English production (originally titled The Trollenberg Terror...I think the name change helps...otherwise, I'd be expecting menacing Swiss people) delivers a good story, some nice visuals, and even a few moments that are pretty gruesome for a film of this era.

Synopsis

The film starts off with an arresting scene - a trio of climbers on Mount Trollenberg (also the name of the near-by town) hear an odd beeping noise. This is followed by one of them being decapitated by an unseen force. Soon, Alan Brooks (Forrest Tucker, exuding beefy charm) arrives in the town with a pair of English sister in tow, Anne (Janet Munro) and Sarah Pilgrim (Jennifer Jayne). Ann is telepathic - the sisters are a "mind-reading act" - who is able to listen in on the alien's thoughts, something they are aware of and not too happy about.

As the death toll mounts, it is revealed that Brooks has encountered similar events - mysterious deaths on a mountain in the Andes, psychics experiencing visions, a radioactive cloud hugging the side of a mountain - and has come to Trollenberg to help a colleague (Professor Crevett, played by Warren Mitchell), a local astronomer conducting cosmic ray experiments, who was present at the events in South America. Soon, one of the victims - one who keeps his head - is brought back from the dead and tries to kill Anne. When this fails, the aliens attack the town and Trollenberg is overrun. The townspeople flee to Professor Crevett's mountaintop science-bunker (it is built like a fortress because of avalanches). After trying to fight off the aliens with molotov cocktails, Brooks convinces "the authorities" to napalm them, killing the aliens on the mountain; but, the invasion (or whatever it is the aliens are doing on Earth) goes on. The End.

Analysis

The film suffers from threadbare special effects. The model work is laughable, and the aliens - giant brains with a single, cyclopean eye - are too goofy to be menacing. The scenes on the mountain are obviously set-bound. Most of the movie takes place in a hotel, which obviously saved on costs by limiting the number of set needed. For those who are connoisseurs of B-movies, these are familiar limitations.

The movie also suffers from uneven acting. Janet Monroe, while easy on the eyes, over plays her role, translating 'psychic in distress' into enthusiastic scenery chewing. Forrest Tucker is adequate as a leading man, although he looks a lot older than his 39 years. Many of the supporting cast affect faux-German accents.

The movie's strong points, however, outweigh any faults. The story is logically constructed and, for the most part, the characters behave in a believably fashion. In particular, the efforts by the protagonists to piece together what is happening, proceed rationally. It's never clear why the aliens are doing what they are doing. A few theories are thrown out, but nothing is confirmed. This makes sense and adds to the verisimilitude of the film; the protagonists would be in the dark, given what little information they have and how alien the creatures are. The way the movie is tied into an earlier event serves to increase the believability by making it part of a "larger world." This also provides motivation for the protagonists, both to investigate what's happening on the mountain, as well as explaining why Tucker's character is reluctant to inform the authorities. He was scoffed at and humiliated when he reported the events in the Andes, so he's not about to go through the same thing again. It is this kind of care in storytelling that makes it easier suspend disbelief. Jimmy Sangster, the screenplay's author, had a long career in horror films, penning some of the best Hammer films (e.g., The Curse of Frankenstein and Dracula: Prince of Darkness). Sangster's scripts always were tightly written, with memorable characters and a distinct lack of condescending attitude towards the subject matter.

Film Highlights

• Forrest Tucker is not the guy to be around if you're trying to de-tox. Within the space of a short time, he offers the sisters a flask - because Ann had a bad dream - and a pack of smokes. I assume the scene where he pulls out the heroin was cut.
• Actually, everyone drinks and smokes. Vast amounts. Most of the film seems to take place in a hotel bar, with everyone getting hammered, regardless of the time. When a pair of mountain climbers is abut to head to the Trollenberg, they get liquored up first and make certain to pack extra booze for the climb. I think I should've lived in the Fifties.
• The first thing the alien animated corpse (Brett, a local guide) sent to kill Anne wants; a drink and a smoke. Of course.
• Professor Crevett boasting about how much money he has gotten from the government for his experiments, all spent on things that seem superfluous to "cosmic ray" research. This is where your tax dollars go.
• Brett's arm melting when exposed to heat...a simple optical effect, but still pretty gruesome.
• While hampered by poor model work, the final attack of the aliens on the mountain observatory is pretty awesome. Tense and audacious - a half-dozen giant brains, Molotov cocktail armed heroes, jets dumping napalm on the aliens who writhe in agony...pretty neat.

Verdict

By treating the subject seriously and creating believable characters with understandable motivations, The Crawling Eye is set apart from lesser efforts in the science fiction and horror genres. Too often, the creative team behind these movies treats them as a disposable product, with more emphasis on special effects or shock scenes, and little thought given to story, plot or characters. This is not something found only in low-budget films or b-movies. Modern films like Avatar, with a budget thousands of times greater than The Crawling Eye, are content with providing pretty pictures and hyper-kinetic action scenes, while short-changing character development and story. While it would be easy to see only cheap special effects or overacting, an attentive viewer will also see good story telling, visual inventiveness and a movie that is a prime example of how to over come the limits of a low budget.