Review of The Monolith Monsters

Making a movie about killing stones is a hard one. Don't slate me for this because I'm between a rock and hard place with this film. It's somewhat good, but not really. If the movie was boulder with its horror, maybe it would be more well-known. It was weird that this movie was released to theater as a double feature with the movie 'Love Slaves of the Amazons'. These two, have nothing to do with each other. Sadly, this movie didn't rock my world, too much. I did find it funny that the title of the film is 'The Monolith Monsters' because there's no actual monster, in the film. Even the DVD cover is misleading as it has a Frankenstein like creature on the cover. No, the Monoliths are just a bunch of big stones that has destructive like power. Given the Cold War hysteria of the 1950's, Monoliths was a stand-in for the perceived threat of nuclear war. The monoliths act like sponges that suck up any silicon based life form around them turning those objects into stone figures similar to what a nuclear blast might do. The monoliths then reproduce by growing a certain height, and then falling over, shattering so each piece becomes a new creature. Ready to threaten to swallow the whole North America continent if somebody stop them. It seem to be a symbol for the spread of communism at the time. Another big fear of the time was the unknown of space itself. The space age hasn't yet embark so many people dreamt up stories and rumors of what space might be like. The fear by the general audience of the unknown space was key to the large amounts of sci-fiction movies and books being produce at the time. Nearly nobody at the time, knew much about space, or in this case, meteors to the point that the writers of this film, Robert Fresco and Norman Jelly capitalize on that fear of an unknown extraterrestrial source entering Earth that might pose harm. To give you an example of what the monoliths look like, if you haven't saw this film. The Monolith Monsters extraterrestrial meteorite fragments served as the basis for what would become Tiberium in the Command & Conquer video game series and works the same way. They also remind me of kryptonite crystal from the Superman comic book. Instead of it, only hurting superman, it's killing everything in sight. The mineral turning into people into stone rather sucking them dry is a bit outlandish, but in the 1950's era, there was a limited on how gory you can have in your horror movies. It was a safe way to keep the movie from being banned. Too bad, most of the stone turning kills happen off camera, so we don't see them turning to stone, just the aftermath. I thought that was a downer. I wanted to see how this was able to happen. There was a few plot-hole about that, as it is established that contact with water "activates" the monolith rocks, and that contact with the rocks, results in turning the victims to stone. But it is never explained why everyone else who handles them afterward is unaffected by the results. It's like the mineral choose who to inflect and who not to. The movie was directed by John Sherwood, a veteran with over 50 films with his name. The movie plot seems unique and interesting, but can't help it wasn't scary or suspense enough. The only person that would probably be scare of this movie, would be people with silicone breast implants. This movie gives a new meaning to getting stoned. There isn't much to be afraid of a stone-faced rock. The acting in the film was pretty alright. Everybody fit in the roles that they were given. Grant Williams as Dave Miller was a pretty convincing geologist and Lola Albright works well as the female lead, Dave's girlfriend, teacher Cathy Barrett. The effects were pretty good for the time with the use of paint backgrounds, and mini-models. Great use of optical illusion composite shots forced perspective to make the monoliths look huge. There were a lot of recycle stock footage that I didn't like. It felt weird that they use the footage from 1953's 'They came from Outer space' for the meteor crashing on earth shot. The locations used was great and make sense to the plot as there isn't supposed to be that much rain fall. If the town looks familiar to you, it's should. It was reused for 1950's Hill Valley in Back to the future films. One thing that bugs me is the ending, without spoiling it too much. When you think about the solution, they come up with to stop these things, when you think hard about it, you notice that the 'solution' only neutralized their grown. Therefore, once it rains again the rocks will again begin to grow and spread. So it a bittersweet ending when you think about it. For 77 minutes, it's pretty good. Some things, I didn't like, the music can be a bit overbearing, and the science is a bit out there. Overall, it's worth checking out, if you like 1950's Sci Fiction movies.