This rock-bottom '54 cheapie clinker is the first and worst fright feature made in the 50's about the legendary Abominable Snowman. This paltry carbon copy of "King Kong" (natch), "The Werewolf of London," and even the exemplary giant ant humdinger "Them!" constitutes as a most unfortunate and inauspicious cinematic debut for the yeti.
A stuffed-shirt botanist, his comparably blah assistant, and a bunch of anonymous oriental extras embark on a perilous pilgrimage into the Himalayas to discover a rare plant species. The expedition stumbles across a predatory yeti (a very tall, gangly guy in a threadbare poorly stitched together mangy fur costume) who in tried'n'true B-movie monster fashion makes off with the first available female he can get his grubby paws on. The team members manage to get the fair damsel back and capture the humanoid beast. They bring it to Los Angeles, only to have the ratty hairball escape and seek refuge in the City of Angel's grimy sewers.
An air of total creative and budgetary impoverishment permeates every aspect of this sour lemon. There's lackluster direction by Billy Wilder's no-talent brother W. Lyle Wilder, lethargic pacing, primitive fade-outs, dry acting from a just-hitting-all-the-usual-preprogrammed-marks robotic cast, tedious running-off-at-the-mouth verbose narration ("The first few days were uneventful, monotonous and routine," the botanist comments early in the nonaction, a remark which serves as an apt concise critique of the film itself), a few stomach-knotting moments of goopy sentiment, and a pitifully unimpressive star monster. But what really deflates this celluloid lead balloon is its complete lack of any trashy vitality -- this excruciatingly sorry and static yeti stinker is so inert and lifeless that it just lies motionless on your TV screen for 71 painfully draggy and dreary minutes of sheer unbearable boredom.
A stuffed-shirt botanist, his comparably blah assistant, and a bunch of anonymous oriental extras embark on a perilous pilgrimage into the Himalayas to discover a rare plant species. The expedition stumbles across a predatory yeti (a very tall, gangly guy in a threadbare poorly stitched together mangy fur costume) who in tried'n'true B-movie monster fashion makes off with the first available female he can get his grubby paws on. The team members manage to get the fair damsel back and capture the humanoid beast. They bring it to Los Angeles, only to have the ratty hairball escape and seek refuge in the City of Angel's grimy sewers.
An air of total creative and budgetary impoverishment permeates every aspect of this sour lemon. There's lackluster direction by Billy Wilder's no-talent brother W. Lyle Wilder, lethargic pacing, primitive fade-outs, dry acting from a just-hitting-all-the-usual-preprogrammed-marks robotic cast, tedious running-off-at-the-mouth verbose narration ("The first few days were uneventful, monotonous and routine," the botanist comments early in the nonaction, a remark which serves as an apt concise critique of the film itself), a few stomach-knotting moments of goopy sentiment, and a pitifully unimpressive star monster. But what really deflates this celluloid lead balloon is its complete lack of any trashy vitality -- this excruciatingly sorry and static yeti stinker is so inert and lifeless that it just lies motionless on your TV screen for 71 painfully draggy and dreary minutes of sheer unbearable boredom.