Movie Review: Revenge of the Creature (1955)

The movie stars John Agar, Lori Nelson, John Bromfield and Nestor Paiva.

One of my biggest complaints about movie sequels to popular monster movies is, more often than not, the monster is put in a situation that makes you feel sorry for it to the point it just isn't scary any more.

That, unfortunately, is the case in this movie. When we were first introduced to it in The Creature from the Black Lagoon, it was mysterious and scary. In this movie, it was nothing more than a helpless creature that was taken from its natural habitat, chained up and pretty much tortured in the name of science. As a result, by the time it escapes, it is very easy to find yourself cheering for it and hoping it gets away.

To be fair, the movie wasn't too terrible. Because of what I said above, there was definitely quite a bit of tension building up throughout the film and it was easy to tell it was only a matter of time before something bad was going to happen. And, judging by its obsession over the woman that was helping to study him (Nelson), it was pretty obvious she was in some sort of danger.

And, once he does escape, things do get interesting. After all, he's a creature that can walk on land but, at the same time, can easily escape and do even more damage by jumping into the nearest body of water. That, coupled by his strength and armor-like skin does make him one of the most dangerous monsters ever to come out of Universal Studios. I figured they would eventually find a way to stop him (though I don't think they killed him considering there is a third movie). But, I also knew the creature would manage to cause some deaths first.

I think my biggest complaint about this film, other than the fact they tortured the creature, had to be the music. Having scary music playing when the creature is doing something scary makes sense. Playing it whenever it appears on screen seemed to be overkill and, after a while, the music did prove to be somewhat annoying. I can only hope they cut back on that in the third film.

I did have some doubts when we watched this movie last night. However, it was actually a pretty decent sequel and, ultimately, I thought it was entertaining to watch, even though it did make me cheer for the Gil Man's escape.

My Grade: A