The Black Scorpion

When you watch films like this, you must put aside your ideas of what are or are not good special effects......if we compare all older movies with present films with modern technology, we would write off classics like "King Kong" and "Lost World" because they don't look like "Jurassic Park". Times change, computer generated effects are "in" and we sometimes forget that people like Willis O'Brien were pioneers in the fx field, working with little but their imagination and creativity. So enjoy this typical 50's Big Bug entry for what it is. I have seen it a number of times and have a little soft spot in my heart (not my head!) for it. It is full of those actors that were popping up all the time during the 50's as second leads or in "B" films. The cavern scene with the worms and scorpions is pretty damn good but that little brat Juanito needed to be scorpion bait from the beginning! Probably the funniest thing in the film is the reaction of the military men in the stadium when one of their own gets electrocuted because someone forgot to turn off the power....they just blow it off and go on. It's a fun film......just enjoy it and don't think too much.

Way above average giant insect thriller, mainly due to the awesome special effects of Willis O'Brien ("King Kong" - 1933). Three set-pieces are superb: the first appearance, rather unexpectedly, of heroine Mara Corday talking to telephone linemen, who soon are under attack, then the train wreck which is terrifying and bizarre, and the final confrontation in the stadium, featuring grand editing and surprising touches. Mexico setting works well, music and sound effects are exemplary, sub-Earth sequence featuring more creatures is eerie. Title refers to the largest creature in the climax, budgetary limitations revealing a black traveling matte, still mystical, with fascinating zoom-in camera shots. Some have faulted the scorpion's "drooling" close-ups, but I find them bone-chilling. Even the main titles are innovative - alternating flashing white/black letters on white/black backgrounds, set to gripping soundtrack. Defects: some poorly-executed process shots, and the leading actors, Corday, Richard Denning, and Carlos Rivas, are hammy and unsubtle and a Corday-Denning romance occurs too late in the script, especially after all the mayhem.

Volcanic activity in Mexico frees an enormous variety of scorpion from entombment in the Earth. The beasts proceed to terrorize the locals, and it's up to macho geologists Hank Scott (Richard Denning) and Arturo Ramos (Carlos Rivas) to help save the day. Naturally, Hank also has to spend whatever spare moment he's got romancing rancher Teresa Alvarez (Mara Corday).

You're assured a reasonably good time with 1950s genre perennials Denning ("Creature from the Black Lagoon") and Corday ("Tarantula") as the stars, and with Willis O'Brien of "King Kong" fame doing the stop motion animation of the creatures. Now, granted, it's slow to start, tends to get dialogue heavy at times, and the romantic subplot also helps slow down the pace while the movie should be building to a peak. But "The Black Scorpion" hits its stride at the beginning of the middle third, once the creatures make their appearance. If you're anything like this viewer, you'll be laughing with appreciation every time they make an appearance. (Especially when they're shown in close-up. I, for one, wasn't aware that scorpions drooled this much.) The highlight has to be the big set piece when Hank and Arturo descend into the scorpions' lair and encounter not just the arachnids, but a tentacled worm that was originally intended for use in the "ravine bottom" sequence in "King Kong". Some of the special effects are dodgy, but that doesn't apply to O'Briens' work, which is impressive as always.

Denning, Rivas, and Corday are engaging leads who receive capable support from supporting players Mario Navarro (as the annoying tag along kid Juanito), Carlos Muzquiz (as Dr. Velazco), Pedro Galvan as Father Delgado, and Arturo Martinez as Major Cosio. Navarro is appealing, but he's required to play a kid who only succeeds at putting himself in harms' way in his attempts to "help".

Not among the best "giant creepy crawlie" features of the 1950s, but it's still pretty good fun, with an appropriately rousing finale.

Seven out of 10.

Giant scorpions are unearthed by an earthquake and threaten to attack New Mexico. By the numbers script, but the acting is (surprisingly) good...it's just that the script is VERY dull. And when the giant scorpions (and worms and spiders) are on screen the movie is fantastic. These creatures look terrifying (the close ups of the scorpions' face are not pleasant) and the stop motion animation is superb. So...dull except when the monsters are on screen. Worth seeing for monster fans.

By the late 1950s, filmmakers must have been running out of insects that they could mutate and transform into giant monsters. Audiences had already been treated to such fare as "Them" (giant ants), "Tarantula" (spiders), "The Monster From Green Hell" (wasps), "The Beginning of the End" (grasshoppers), "The Deadly Mantis" (praying mantises), et al. All of which, I suppose, left scorpions. Hence, "The Black Scorpion," in which a Mexican volcano belches forth a slew of the title nasties to terrorize the countryside. This film, a poor man's "Them" but still better than some of the others just named, features impressive stop motion FX from master Willis "King Kong" O'Brien (although close-ups of the scorpions' slavering countenances are pretty ridiculous looking), realistic-looking shots of a countryside shadowed by that smoldering volcano, and a formulaic 1950s monster script. It also boasts three exceptional scenes: a descent into the subterranean lair where the scorpions and other giant creepy-crawlies dwell; a scorpion attack on a speeding railway car; and the final battle, in a sports arena, between the last surviving arachnid and the Mexican army. Mara Corday, who also starred in "Tarantula," here adds some nice eye candy, and '50s sci-fi stalwart Richard Denning is his usual sturdy self. All in all, not a bad time killer...and, on this DVD incarnation, with some nifty extras, too.