Horror Classic 9 of 50: ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES
Q: What's worse than a bloodsucking leech?
A: A giant, bloodsucking leech.
Q: What's worse than that?
A: A swamp full of giant, bloodsucking leeches!
This week's movie is Attack of the Giant Leeches, a 62-minute epic from 1959 that just happens to be produced by B-movie master Roger Corman (see also Creature From the Haunted Sea). It's an hour and change of good, clean, bloodsucking fun, including a fat guy, a Mark Trail clone, and a Playboy centerfold. Let's dive in!
Synopsis
Our setting is a swampy rural town in Florida. At the general store, local man Lem tells his friends about the strange creature he encountered last night, before the opening credits. It was bigger than an alligator, it looked like an octopus, and he had to shoot it five times before it went away! None of the guys believe him. The guys include Dave, a big ol' boy whose trashy-sexy wife "Liz-baby" (played by Yvette Vickers, who according to Wikipedia was a Playboy centerfold in 1959) is so wild and insubordinate that she refuses to turn down the volume on her record player. After an impressively gratuitous scene of Liz rubbing lotion on her legs, she leaves the house for the night.
Next we meet Steve Benton, the new game warden in town. I'm not sure, but the actor playing Steve may have been made out of wood. Steve hangs out with Doc, who has some theories about strange creatures in the swamp, and Nan, Doc's daughter, who I guess was supposed to be Steve's girlfriend but I never really got the impression that they liked each other much.
Remember Lem? Well, his body is found mangled, and Steve is convinced that it's the work of the mysterious swamp creatures. The local sheriff is unconvinced, but the marks on the body confirms Doc's suspicions that the animal responsible has suckers like those of an octopus. (Why didn't the filmmakers just go with octopuses? I suppose Attack of the Somewhat Larger Than Average Octopuses isn't as frightening a title.)
Soon after, that rascal Liz makes a little visit to the swamp with Dave's buddy Cal, for the purpose of makin' out. That's right -- Liz is a cheater, and we all know how well they fare in these movies. Dave finds them, and he's not too happy about what he sees. Plus, he has his shotgun with him, which reduces Cal to a snivelling, crying baby who tries to blame the whole thing on Liz. What a sleaze! Dave doesn't shoot them, but he chases them into the water, where, to his horror and theirs, the two illicit lovers are dragged off by the mysterious and barely-seen swamp creatures.
Naturally everyone suspects the fat, furious cuckold of killing Liz and Cal... everyone, that is, except Doc and Nan, who believes Dave's story of monsters. Even Steve has just about given up on the possibility of ever finding the critters. Meanwhile, the sheriff announces a reward for the discovery of the bodies, and two hicks jump at the chance. They take to the waters in an old rowboat, and guess what happens to them? Yes, you're right! They do get taken away by leeches!
Up to this point we haven't gotten a clear look at the leeches, and I was beginning to think we never would. But the filmmakers reward our patience with a scene revealing the leeches' secret underwater cave, where they keep their victims alive so they can suck their blood and give them hickeys.
Doc wants to toss some dynamite into the water to blast the creatures out of hiding... or possibly to bring the bodies of the victims to the surface. I wasn't sure about that. But Steve's having none of it: the explosion would harm the other animals in the swamp. So Doc does it anyway, and sure enough, a bunch of bodies roll out of the cave and float up to the surface... but Liz's body is nowhere to be found. Steve and his buddy Mike do some heroic scuba diving, shoot some leeches with harpoons, and the whole thing ends anticlimactically with Steve agreeing to let Mike drop a heap o' dynamite into the swamp to kill the leeches. The... end. Yes.
Is It Scary?
No, and although this has all the ingredients necessary for an archetypal 50s/60s monster movie, I really can't imagine that anyone at the time found it very frightening. The leeches looked kind of like sleeping bags with neck pillows sewed on.
Lessons I Learned
- If you listen to the background noises in a Florida swamp, you'll hear the sounds of jungle birds
- Dogs can sense giant leeches
- According to Doc: If you accept the possibility that a giant leech exists, you must consider the possibility that several giant leeches exist. (Seems like sound reasoning to me.)
- Also according to Doc, two minutes before the end of the film: Giant leeches are created by "rocket tests" with atomic energy from Cape Canaveral mutating normal-sized leeches
- Steve to the sheriff: "Go soak your fat head!"
- Cal to Dave, shortly before Cal becomes a quivering mass of chicken: "You better put that gun down before I get so mad I make you eat it!"
There's a lot of unpleasantness in this movie, and I don't just mean people getting devoured. Liz cheats on Dave without an ounce of regret. When confronted by Dave, Cal immediately tries to convince Dave to let him go and punish Liz. Then, when Dave is falsely accused of their murders and taken to jail, he hangs himself. Sheesh.
Doc's explanation for the giant leeches' existence feels pretty rushed and tacked-on. It's like the director said, "Oh hey, maybe we should explain where the monsters came from. Oh, and we can make it seem like some of the characters actually learn something. How about 'Don't tamper with atomic energy?' Yeah, that's the ticket."
It's interesting to note that the underwater sequences were shot by a camera outside a tank looking in. The reason I know this is that there are several moments when you can see smudges on the outside of the tank. Oh, Roger Corman...
Mystery Science Theater 3000 covered this film. I haven't seen the episode, but I'd like to now, so I can see if I thought of any of the same wisecracks.
Letter grade for Attack of the Giant Leeches: C-
Next movie in the DVD set: The Screaming Skull
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