The Monster of Piedras Blancas [Blu-ray]

This review is for the Blu-Ray release of 'The Monster of Piedras Blancas' released by Olive Films in July, 2016.Up until this release....this movie was very difficult to find but you could find it if you were willing to purchase a bootleg. I was looking forward to this release because I had only previously viewed this movie from a poor bootleg copy. I was not disappointed.My rating for this movie is based on the print quality and the movie itself taking into account the time period and the budget.BLU-RAY: The transfer is very good though not perfect. The picture had a slightly grainy look throughout. There are occasional imperfections...mostly tiny static like spots that appear throughout also. But overall it's nice to have such a nice print available for such an obscure 'B' science fiction movie from the 50's. There is, however, a downside to such a nice print. When the picture is this clear on old science fiction movies, all the imperfections come out. For example, the monster suit looks slightly less realistic. In one scene in particular, the scene where a crab is picking at a severed head, a string is very obviously attached to the crab. This was for the purpose of moving the crab sharply after it is shot. Overall, I am quite happy with the picture.EXTRA'S: Almost nothing here. You get subtitles, if you count that as an extra, and that is it.If this release had had some decent extra's, a commentary track, making of documentary, etc. I would have given it 5 stars.PLOT/SUMMARY: The movie opens with a scene of a monstrous hand getting some food from what appears to be a dog dish. The dish is lying amongst rocks on a rocky beach. This is followed by a scene in which a lighthouse keeper, Sturges, is yelling at two boys to stay away. Then we get the opening credits.The next morning, the Rinaldi brothers are found dead and decapitated with all the blood drained from them on the beach. The bodies are brought to Kolchek's store to be put in his refrigeration room until the bodies could be examined. Kolchek is a superstitious sort and warns all the townspeople of 'the monster' that is supposed to be living near the lighthouse. The townspeople seem to think the lighthouse keeper, Sturges, knows something but is keeping to himself. Sturges' daughter, Lucy, is dating Fred, a marine biologist who lives in town. Sturges gets into a spat with Kolchek about meat scraps. Kolchek is supposed to save them for Sturges' dog but he has sold them to someone else. Sturges gives Kolchek a warning and tells him he will be responsible. That evening the monster visits Kolchek's in search for food and kills Kolchek. The next day during the funeral for the Rinaldi brother's, Jimmy, a little boy discovers Kolchek's body. At the scene, what appears to be a scale is found. Fred and Doc come to the conclusion that it comes from some sort of undersea life. Eddie a local, is put in charge of watching Kolchek's store. Shortly thereafter, a little girl is found murdered by her father. The body is brought to the local diner and the constable and Doc go looking for Eddie when nobody can seem to find him. The constable enters the refrigerator and a scream is heard. Everybody approaches the refrigerator and the monster comes out holding Eddie's head. The monster is struck with a cleaver by a local but then the monster knocks the local out. Another scale is found on the axe. The townspeople get together and hunt for the monster. Another man is killed on the beach and another badly injured.Meanwhile, Sturges is recovering from his injuries after he was knocked unconscious the night his daughter went for a swim. After she tells him she feels like she was being watched he goes out to take a look. He insists on getting out of bed to tend to the lighthouse. He is afraid of what might happen if he doesn't turn the light on. He's afraid somebody will crash into the rocks and get killed by the monster. Lucy, doesn't want him to go so he is forced to reveal what he knows. He tells her that for many years he has been leaving food for the monster but he has never seen it. He just knows that it is living in the caves by the lighthouse. The bottom line here is that the monster is now killing people because he was hunting for food after Sturges failed to leave the meat scraps a few evenings earlier. Ultimately this all leads us to a showdown between Sturges, Lucy, Fred and the townspeople at the lighthouse.PRODUCTION: According to 'Keep Watching the Skies' by Bill Warren, the movie was not shot at Piedras Blancas but was shot at Point Conception.The movie stars veteran movie actor Les Tremayne as Dr. Sam Jorgenson and Forrest Lewis as Constable George Matson, Don Sullivan as Fred, John Harmon as Sturges, the lighthouse keeper and Jeanne Carmen as Lucille Sturges.There were a few seconds of stock footage used for whatever reason. This occurs when Fred and the constable leave the cave when they hear some commotion coming from the beach. The film is of very poor quality and they are wearing different outfits and they both have hats. Why this was deemed necessary for just two seconds is anybodies guess.THOUGHTS/CONCLUSIONS: The scene where the monster walks out of the refrigerated room with Eddie's head must have been startling in it's day. I doubt very many people had seen such a thing in 1959. Despite some criticism that the head looked fake, I thought it was pretty decent and actually looked very much like Eddie.Another surprising scene for the time involved Lucy walking out of the ocean in the nude. Although you couldn't see her private parts due to dark shadows covering her front. Later on there is a scene of her undressing and she is wearing just a skimpy bra. Once again, for the times, this must have been surprising.The idea for this movie very obviously sprung from 'The Creature from the Black Lagoon.' I hate calling movies a 'rip-off' of another picture but that's what it basically is. I'd rather say it was 'inspired by.'I felt the acting was decent for a very low budget movie. The male lead, Don Sullivan, plays the lead in another 'cult' 50's science fiction movie, 'The Giant Gila Monster.'I felt that it was a good idea to not show the monster for most of the movie. Even though this sort of thing was often done to hide a poor costume, it is still effective. The costume was decent but the actor wearing it seemed to have a very tough time moving around in it. It was obvious that he was struggling to move and it was a good idea to have the monster shot a few times which could partially explain his inability to move on the stairs and try to knock the door down (which he manages to do anyway with very little effort!)There weren't that many obvious plot holes or gaps of logic as there are normally in a movie of this type. One is when the light house keeper, after being knocked unconscious by the monster, states that perhaps the rumors are true of a monster. He obviously knows that it is true as he has been feeding the monster for many years, including in the opening scene! He then remains quiet even after bodies start regularly showing up.I felt that finding the second scale was basically useless. Maybe there was a rewrite somewhere along the line. Afterall, they found the second scale after everybody had already seen the monster. It's not as if they didn't have the murder mystery solved at that point.Does the monster actually die at the end? He is thrown off the lighthouse top but lands in the water. He is, we are told, an amphibious creature. The assumption is supposed to be that he dies but logically he may not have. I suppose this could have led to a sequel?CONCLUSIONS/RECOMMENDATIONS: I give this movie a slightly generous 4 1/2 stars because there was basically nothing available before. I'm giving the plot 3 stars. However, it gets only 1/2 star for the extra's (subtitles). Overall I give it 4 stars. OK...I know it should probably only be 3 stars but I'm giving it an extra star just because I want to.Recommended for anybody who is a collector of 1950's science fiction movies.Recommended for anybody who likes the movie because it is easily the best version available.Thanks to Olive Films for releasing this movie on Blu-Ray.

2016 OLIVE FILMS BLU-RAYThis review contains NO spoilers.BLU-RAY QUALITY:Both the picture and sound are vivid and clear. The picture, in particular, is striking in how clean and vibrant it is. Inky blacks. Sharp image. Extremely nice to look at. Very fresh and alive. In that regard, it reminded me of “The Earth Dies Screaming”. With the sound, I noticed no problems and had no complaints. That went well with the excellent musical score.THE MOVIE:While this isn’t the best crafted movie for this genre, I like it. In fact, I watched it a second time last night in the course of about a week. I knew there were details I had missed, and I enjoyed going back and watching it again. Plus, it’s a short movie. Not that much longer than an episode of The Outer Limits.The acting is hit and miss. Some actors were quite good in their roles. Others were marginal. None that I found to be flat-out bad. I liked the directing. There were several interesting camera angles used, particularly with scenes involving the light house. Also, there were several scenes that made good use of light and shadow.The story itself is fairly basic. While being presented as a mystery to the cast, the story is not a mystery to the audience, and that is a style of movie that I find to be refreshing. Nowadays, writers are so often striving to come up with twist endings that blow the viewers mind. The problem there is often they completely fail in that regard, making the movie end on a contrived, ridiculous note. And whether they fail or succeed, the bang only comes once. Subsequent viewings lack the surprise-ending factor, making the film a one-and-done. Movies like this one can be seen over an over, and keep their allure to the viewer.I can’t give this movie 4 stars, but giving it 3 wouldn’t reflect my enjoyment in watching it. I enjoy the look, feel, and genre of this movie a good deal.I give it 3.7 stars as a reviewer to others, but I’ll watch it more like it’s a 4.2 to me, if that makes any sense to you.Finally, here is some interesting trivia I came across regarding the monster:Connoisseurs of retro low-budget horror may notice that the strange-looking sea creature from 1959 Irvin Berwick-directed film The Monster of Piedras Blancas, bears something of a resemblance to several other B-movie monsters of old. This is probably because the fiend’s creator, Jack Kevan, had previously worked on the Gill-man suit for 1954 classic Creature from the Black Lagoon as well as the creepy costumes for 1950s B-movies The Mole People and This Island Earth. And so the creature, played by Peter Dunn, was simply made from recycled movie monster parts – specifically, the body of Gill-man, the claws of a Mole Person and the tootsies of This Island Earth’s Mutant. The suit also made an unlikely reappearance in 1965 Flipper episode “Flipper’s Monster.”

The film was alright the cast good the plot the same except the monster the creaturefrom the black lagoon he's not.

Being able to watch the movie in Blu-ray was great. I used to watch this movie when I was a kid on a b&w TV on an old series called Chiller

This is my review of the new Blu-ray edition by Olive Films.MOPB is one of my all-time favorite low budget creature films of the 1950's, and I am so happy someone finally tookthe trouble to transfer a beautiful print to Blu-ray. The PQ is outstanding, I can see details I never knew existed.Dark and washed out scenes that were on the bootleg DVD and the VHS are Crystal clear here, and I can finallyget a really good look at the rubber monster suit. There is also a bit more film footage in this disk, the beginning ofthe film is complete. It looks like they found a pristine print and used it to transfer.The aspect ration has been modified to fit modern wide screen TV's, so there is noticeable top and bottom framecropping in a few scenes, but I approve of their decision to do it this way.I can even see the grain in a few scenes that where they were apparently pushing the camera aperture to compensatefor low light. The print used here is very clean, no pop's, frame drop-outs, scratches, etc.I see very little digital enhancement noise, and there are a few scenes that look grainy because it was shot that way.I had given up hope that anyone would do this obscure film justice on Blu-ray, but Olive Films stepped up to the plate.If you are a fan of this film, or love old low budget creature movies, you need to have this disk.My reference equipment:Samsung UN55KS8000FSony BDP-S7200

Great movie! Corny but such a good take off from the 1954 Creature of the Black Lagoon...

He's not as pretty as the Creature from Black Lagoon...but, you can't help but feel empathy for him.

Très bon service et très bon film, je voulais le voir depuis longtemps