BEAST FROM HAUNTED CAVE

pitiful victims of Beast from Haunted Cave

BEAST FROM HAUNTED CAVE (1959). Directed by Monte Hellman. Produced by Roger Corman.

Handsome ski instructor Gil Jackson (Michael Forest) is unaware that a certain bunch who require his services are actually a gang that needs a place to hide out after stealing gold bars from an office. The head of the gang is Alex (Frank Wolff), who gets increasingly jealous over his girlfriend Gypsy's (Sheila Noonan) attention to Gil. The other thieves are nervous Marty (Richard Sinatra) and the nerdy Byron (Wally Campo). To cause a distraction during the robbery, Byron plants some charges in a nearby mine, inadvertently killing an old man. As the gang hide out in Gil's cabin with his Native housekeeper Small Dove (Kay Jennings), a bizarre, barely seen creature with snagging tentacles comes out of the mine ... 

Michael Forest

Beast from Haunted Cave might have been a more memorable picture if Roger Corman had not just produced but directed, as the film lacks the snappy tension of, say, Attack of the Crab Monsters (which also had a better premise). Charles Griffith's screenplay serves up some moderately interesting but half-baked characters, but it's the acting that makes them come alive, with each member of the cast giving more than the picture is worth. An amusing aspect is that Byron goes into the cave to see if he can save Small Dove after she is carried off by the tentacles, but hero Gil just sort of forgets about her as he tries to run off with Gypsy. Andrew M. Costikyan has contributed some moody and atmospheric photography of the cave and the woods, while Alexander Laszlo's score (Attack of the Giant Leeches) is typically strange but effective. 

Frank Wolff and Sheila Noonan

The squeals of the monster were lifted from Burt Gordon's Earth vs the Spider, and are the sounds of the giant spider. The monster in this, played by Chris Robinson, resembles a hulking, amorphous thingamajig covered in seaweed and webbing and with skinny, pincer-like appendages. It wraps its still-living victims in flimsy cocoons and apparently wants to suck their blood. An unintentionally hilarious scene has Gypsy telling Gil that the gang members are going to kill him, then adding that she intends to "stick around with him" (after he's dead, perhaps?) This movie might have been better if there was more of the monster and less of the gang. Michael Forest, a hunk with talent, appeared in many subsequent productions, as did Wolff. Noonan was also in The Incredible Petrified World but only had a few other credits. 

Verdict: With Corman at the helm this might have been more memorable. **1/4.