(imdb)THE BEGINNING OF THE END-1957-When the town of Ludlow, Illinois is mysteriously destroyed and the army blocks all roads, famous reporter Audrey Ames (Peggie Castle; later in the TV series “Lawman”) inves-tigates. Col. Strugeon (Thomas B. Henry) and Captain Barton (James Seay) give her the lowdown on Ludlow and later let her visit the destruction. Nearby, she meets agriculturalist/entomologist Ed Wainwright (Peter Graves; in BAYOU the same year), his mute assistant Frank (Than Wyenn) and their large experimental vegetables. When the 3 of them investigate a warehouse wreck, they discover giant locusts are causing the destruction and poor Frank is killed. They tell Strugeon but he doesn't believe them until he takes out a platoon and they are attacked. Ed figures the locusts got big eating his radiated vegetables. General Hanson (Morris Ankrum) sends General Short (Frank Wilcox) back to Illinois with Ed and Audrey where the locusts are on the march. Unfortunately, the government orders Hanson to drop an A-bomb on Chicago if Ed can't come up with a solution! After they capture a live giant locust, Ed discovers a high frequency signal that drive the horde into the water.
The sfx are really laughable even by director Bert I. Gordon standards. Scenes of the locusts crawling up buildings are them just crawling over pictures! Also with Richard Benedict and Hank Patterson. Mr. BIG made two other classic low budget features in 1957: THE CYCLOPS and THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN.
Thanks for reading!
No comments:
Post a Comment