Revenge of the Creature (1955)

User Rating:

5.0/10   

Director:

Jack Arnold

Writers:

William Alland (story)
Martin Berkeley (screenplay)

Release Date:

22 July 1955 (Finland)

Genre:

Horror | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

Weird Monster Escapes! Terror Seizes City! ...a woman's beauty the lure for his dangerous desires!

Plot:

The Creature from the Black Lagoon is back! This time he's captured by scientists and transported to an aquarium in south Florida...

Plot Keywords:

Barracuda | Underwater | 3 Dimensional | Alien | Beautiful Woman

Cast

John Agar	...	Prof. Clete Ferguson
Lori Nelson	...	Helen Dobson
John Bromfield	...	Joe Hayes
Nestor Paiva	...	CAptain Lucas
Grandon Rhodes	...	Jackson Foster
Dave Willock	...	Lou Gibson
Robert Williams	...	George Johnson (as Robert B. Williams)
Charles Cane	...	Police Captain (as Charles R. Cane)

Runtime:

82 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.00 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

USA:Approved (PCA #17220) | USA:Unrated (video rating) | West Germany:16 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-12 | Sweden:15

Filming Locations:

Jacksonville, Florida, USA

Company:

Universal International Pictures (UI)

Trivia:

Look for a young, uncredited Clint Eastwood in his first screen appearance as the goofy white coated lab assistant who does the silly mouse gag in the lab scene with the monkey.

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: In the scene where the Creature attacks a pair of college students, it picks one of them up and tosses him into a nearby palm tree. The line attached to the stunt double is clearly visible as he hurtles through the air.

Quotes:

Lab Technician: I've lost my white mouse.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Monsterama Sci-Fi Late Night Creature Feature Show Vol. 1 (1996) (V)

The Gill Man Has Esaped!

**SPOILERS** Fairly good sequel of "Creature From the Black Lagoon" has the Rita II traveling back to the Amazon Basin to capture the Gill Man who survived in the earlier film from his would-be-captors or executioners.

Getting the Gill Man trapped in the Black Lagoon the boat's crew headed by aquatic scientist Joe Hayes, John Bromfield, blast the Gill Man out of the water with high explosives.

Knocked out and helpless the Gill man is shipped back to the USA to Ocean Harbor Aquarium in Silver Springs Florida to be exhibited to the eager and curious public and examined by scores of scientists and ichthyologists. To see just what he's all about and if he's the missing link between man, before he evolved into a primate, and fish.

Put in this huge water tank and held down by a steel chain tied to his leg the Gill Man is a major curiosity piece for the thousands of tourists who visit the aquarium.

Much like in the first Gill Man film the underwater photography is breathtaking with the Gill Man trapped, swimming around in circles, and having nowhere to go. As well as when he's free in the open ocean and in the Amazon River swimming and diving like he were an Olympic Gold Medal winner.

Examined by Prof. Clete Ferguson, John Agar, and ichthyologist Helen Dobson, Lori Nelson,the Gill Man develops a crush on Helen and that drives him almost bonkers as he's just out of reach of grabbing Helen when she and Clete are studying him underwater. It doesn't take long for the Gill Man to break his chain and escape from the tank. After tearing up the aquarium, and killing a couple of people, he jumps into the Atlantic Ocean and swims away.

The Gill Man for some reason doesn't travel south to the Amazon River where he comes from but north to the St. Augustine/Jacksonville area in Florida to follow Helen who's there with Prof. Ferguson and her dog Chris.

Obviously madly in love with Helen but too shy to ask her out on a date the Gill Man spends the last half of the movie stalking her all the way up Florida's Atlantic Coast. He finally gets enough nerve to approach Helen and burst into the local Lobster House, during a Saturday night bandstand party, knocking the place, with it's tables chairs and people, over and putting a couple of drunk party goers into the hospital. Grabbing a terrified Helen the Gill Man disappeared with her into he night.

The ending was what you would have expected with the Gill Man stymied in his attempt to swim back home, to the Black Lagoon, with Helen and shot up by Prof. Furguson and an army of police and local townspeople but still making a successful getaway.

Even though the villain in the movie the Gill Man evoked far more sympathy in "The Revenge of the Creature" then he did in "the Creature from the Black Lagoon". Since he had more screen time and showed genuine sensitivity and feeling for Helen. He was also minding his own business in the safety of the Black Lagoon, when he was kid or creature-napped by a bunch of strangers, the crew of the Rita II. Who's only reasons for doing it was to glorify and enrich themselves at his, the Gill Mans, expense and freedom.