Credentials: 3.6 out of 10 (Imdb.com)
Plot: During a routine radar test flight, an electrical
engineer by the name of MacAfee (Jeff Morrow) spots a UFO that’s “as big as a
battleship.” The Air Force sends fighters to investigate, but they don’t find
anything. Worse: one of them doesn’t make it back. So of course everyone thinks
MacAfee is a dangerous nut. Until more planes start disappearing. Then more
people spot the UFO and eventually we learn it’s not a ship, but a giant
intergalactic vulture that emits an antimatter force field, making it immune to
weapons. You know, that old chestnut. It’s up to MacAfee, the world’s most
attractive mathematician (Mara Corday), a few generals and a drunken French
Canadian to kill the bird, save the planet and restore order to the scientific
community.
Why it stinks: I have no idea why this movie is called “The Giant
Claw.” None. The giant, intergalactic space vulture, like all regular and
Earth-bound vultures, has two claws. So I guess a more accurate title would be
“The Giant Claws.” Why the producers chose to single out just one of its claws
is beyond me. Also unknown is whether the title refers to the left or right
claw of the intergalactic winged menace, since they both seem to be roughly the
same size.
Petty
moaning about the title aside, “The Giant Claw” was made in the 50’s, it was
made on the cheap and boy does it show. Look no further than the intergalactic space
vulture. Sweet jesus lord, the thing looks like something a demented kindergartener
would draw. It has a beak AND huge pointy teeth! Why?? That kind of early-stage psychosis
will almost certainly get you sent to the principal’s office and enrolled
in some type of counseling.
Not
only is the character design bizarre, the puppet used to bring that design to
life is an absolute disaster. There are no words to describe it other than it’s
like something out of Jim Henson’s cheapest, ugliest nightmare.
Side note: The bird is either from "some godforsaken antimatter galaxy" or the past, depending on who you believe.
Let’s
face it though, the human characters in the movie really aren’t any better
constructed than the puppet. Our hero, if you can call him that, MacAfee is
just so easy to root against. Perhaps his shining moment comes while he and the
lady mathematician are on board a plane. She’s asleep, so naturally he takes it
upon himself to start making out with her. Now, at this point in the story, the
two have no relationship other than business, and she really doesn’t even seem
to like him all that much.
So, she
does what any intelligent woman would do when she wakes up to find a creepy guy
with his tongue down her throat: She starts throwing around sex euphemisms and
laughs the whole thing off. Next thing you know the two are a couple! What a
story that’s going to make for the grandkids! “You see little Jimmy, one day
your pop pop started having his way with me while I was asleep.”
The
characters also have an annoying habit of identifying each other by what they
do. For example: MacAfee is an electrical engineer, and we’re told that over
and over again. I guess in case you’d forgotten what his occupation was in the
5 minutes since it was last brought up.
Being a
Z-grade 50’s sci-fi movie, “The Giant Claw” relies on a lot of stock footage
and narration to tell its story. In terms of the stock footage, fans of
aviation should get a kick out of spotting all of the different time a plane
changes to something else in mid scene, based on what was available. Bombers,
fighters, it’s all the same as far as “The Giant Claw” is concerned.
And the
narration. Boy oh boy. This movie features some of the most trivial narration
ever committed to film. “It was eleven o’clock. On a Thursday. The sky was
clear. Visibility, unlimited.” Who cares! The movies only 77 minutes, stop
wasting time with a weather report!
Worst
of the worse
If you’ve
never seen a model plane crash into a model forest in truly unspectacular
fashion, and want to, then boy have I got the film for you!
Video
Evidence
There
it is, “The Giant Claw.” Bumblebee tuna.
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