Tor's Last Stand!

Can your heart stand it???





THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS-1959-Much like THE CREEPING UNKNOWN, this movie pushes the envelope on “so bad it’s good” entertainment. It’s not really a movie. It’s more like a bunch of scenes edited together with the bulk of the story provided by an off screen, nameless narrator (in this case it’s the director Coleman Francis). The sort of story involves Russian scientist Dr. Javorsky (lovable old Tor Johnson in his last film role) “noted scientist” who carries a briefcase containing “secret data” about a “Russian moon shot”. Javorsky and some US agents arrive by plane in Yucca Flats. Almost immediately foreign agents attack them. When the US agents are all killed Javorsky somehow manages to escape into the desert just as a A-Bomb is exploded and he is “reduced to nothing”. Actually he becomes a scar-faced ogre with a large cane that sleeps in a cave. He kills a couple of people and terrorizes two little boys (the director’s real kids). A lot of time is spent with the sheriff and his deputy chasing the wrong man! They track him by plane and then take pot shots at him with a rifle!



Tor say: "Pretty girl".



The narrator reminds us of things that have already happen and says weird stuff like “flag on the moon…how did it get there?” In the end the Doctor-Monster fights the two lawmen and gets shot. He’s left to die in the sand while a rabbit licks his face! According to associate producer Tony Cardoza (who plays one of the US agents) the rabbit scene was unplanned. He just hopped in while they were filming! Cardoza had previously been an associate producer of Ed Wood’s NIGHT OF THE GHOULS so you can see where he was coming from.



And you don’t have much of a movie when the highlight is an improvising rabbit!



There’s also an unrelated pre-credit scene of a topless woman taking a bath who winds up being brutally strangled. It makes no sense at all and has nothing to do with the rest of the story!



Director Coleman Francis made two other train wrecks, I mean movies: THE SKYDIVERS and RED ZONE CUBA (aka NIGHT TRAIN TO MUNDO FINE). At least the latter had a brief appearance by John Carridine who also sings the title theme! Francis made un-credited acting appearances in movies like BLONDIE’S REWARD, THIS ISLAND EARTH, TWILIGHT OF THE GODS, Ray Dennis Steckler’s THE LEMON GLOVE KIDS MEET THE MONSTERS and Russ Meyer’s BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, his last in 1970. He died in 1973.



Big Tor left us two years earlier.



Look for another Ed Wood alumni Conrad Brooks in a small role.






Thanks for reading!