Revenge Of The Creature

The Giller Memorandum

Revenge Of The Creature
USA 1955
Directed by Jack Arnold
Universal Blu Ray Zone A

After the incredible success of Creature From The Black Lagoon in 1954 (which I reviewed here), a sequel was inevitable and director Jack Arnold returned for the gig. If you’re into your trivia, this one was released (less widely is my understanding) in 3D in selected venues and so this one counts as the very first time a 3D movie had received a sequel shot in the same process.

Now, although this was reportedly the most successful of the three Creature features in terms of box office receipts, Revenge Of The Creature is not nearly as good as the first movie and the quality does tend to go down in terms of the three pictures as they go forward (the posters on the next one in the series promised much but had a huge drawback and is the most disappointing of the series). There are almost no characters joining the returning director from the first movie in this one. We basically have the titular Gill-man, who we last saw floating into the depths of the Black Lagoon as quite possibly a lifeless corpse (played by various actors, at least one of whom was the same as in the first picture) and we have, for about the first 15 minutes but in a much larger role than he had in the first one, Nestor Paiva as Captain Lucas, who takes the two man ‘safari expedition’ into the same area that he previously encountered the creature.

The story line is not nearly as punchy as the original but actually delivers a lot more on the expectations of the original picture. That is to say, this time around it’s more or less a remake of the 1933 classic King Kong (reviewed here). So, man brings creature back to be experimented on, trained and exhibited at Florida’s Marineland (see some of my early Al Adamson reviews for more mention of Marineland) and, even though the scientists are a bit mean to it (giving electric shocks to obey the command of “No” or “Stop”), it develops a kind of fish-man equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome, escapes and then stalks the lead female scientist while she’s out having a good time with her new leading man. Of course, all comes right at the end and we’re left with a conclusion which perfectly mirrors the final shot of the last movie. That’s about all of the story I need to cover right here.

In terms of actors we have the human ‘almost-villain’, who is a much lighter character and is the one responsible for bringing back the creature to civilisation... Joe, played by John Bromfield. We also have the leading lady Helen, played by the charming Lori Nelson and the real leading man, Professor Clete, played by John Agar. These last two, even though they spend a lot of the movie trying to shock condition the creature, thus ensuring the audience are fully sympathetic to the Gill-Man’s plight, are actually pretty sympathetic characters so we can completely root for John Agar as he runs around Florida with the police in a desperate attempt to retrieve his girlfriend from the clutches of the creature.

And, it’s an okay film but, like I said, nowhere near as good as the first movie. I’m not sure if there was any new score written for this one as a lot of it seems to be tracked in from the first movie, including the use of that three note creature theme probably even more often than in the previous installment. It has a certain mood or atmosphere that the first one doesn’t have which, due to the differences in the plot and the stalking of the creature running around Florida with Helen, as he tries to stay close to a water source, takes on an almost ‘slasher film’ atmosphere to it, it seems to me. Like I said, it’s a step down but in mimicking King Kong’s idea of a monster brought to civilisation and then breaking loose, it’s not just a retread of the first one, which I guess we can be thankful for. For that matter, neither is the third in the series but... yeah, I don’t really want to say too much about the third yet. I’ll get there on another review.

Of course, by now, Millicent Patrick, who had designed the original version of the title character, had already had her career ruined by Bud Westmore and was not around to work on the picture. I think where this really falls down for Universal is in the next film where... oh yeah... not talking about that one yet. One person who is around on this is a very young, uncredited Clint Eastwood in his first movie role, as a lab technician in one scene (see pictured above). That always makes me laugh.

So, anyway, this is one short review but it’s really not the movie the first one was and, I’d not recommend seeing Revenge Of The Creature (who has no real revenge issues at all, from what I can make out) without having first watched the glorious Creature From The Black Lagoon. So definitely check out the first one if you’re thinking of watching this one at some point.