Fiend Without a Face (1958) MGM/Sci-Fi-Horror RT: 74 minutes No MPAA rating (violence and icky effects) Director: Arthur Crabtree Screenplay: Herbert J. Leder Music: Buxton Orr Cinematography: Lionel Banes Release date: June 3, 1958 (US)/December 1958 (UK) Cast: Marshall Thompson, Kynaston Reeves, Kim Parker, Stanley Maxted, Terence Kilburn, James Dyrenforth, Robert MacKenzie, Peter Madden, Gil Winfield, Michael Balfour, Launce Maraschal, R. Meadows White, Kerrigan Prescott, Lala Lloyd, Shane Cordell. Box Office: $650,000 (US)
Rating: ***
I recently found the answer to one of my life’s biggest mysteries. It started when I was 14. I had just gotten home from my usual Saturday afternoon trip to the movies. As usual, Creature Double Feature was on the tube. Normally, I didn’t pay a lot of attention to whatever was being shown but this movie caught my eye. It involved a group of people barricaded in a house fighting off brain monsters. It was surprisingly gory for an old horror movie. Whenever one of the creatures got shot, it would bleed out in full view. I only caught the end, but I liked what I saw. The problem is I didn’t know what it was called. I tried to track it down over the years. I described it to other film geeks, but couldn’t get a line on it. Then serendipity stepped in.
I decided to check out the 1987 horror flick Bloody New Year a couple of weeks ago. There’s a scene where the main characters watch an old horror movie. I was shocked to discover it was the same one that’s confounded me since late ’82. I paid close attention to the end credits and learned that the elusive movie is Fiend Without a Face, a B&W British atomic-phobia shocker about a rural Canadian farming community being terrorized by invisible monsters that might be related to nuclear experiments being conducted at a nearby military installation.
A series of mysterious deaths leaves the local yokels pointing fingers at the US military. Things were fine before they came along and built their base. Now the cows give tainted milk and people are being killed in a manner that can’t be explained. The victims are missing their brains and spinal cords; the only clue is two puncture marks at the base of their skulls. Major Jeff Cummings (Thompson, It! The Terror from Beyond Space) launches an investigation into the matter. Surely, there has to be a logical explanation for all that’s occurred. Absent logic, there has to be an explanation of some kind.
He meets with Professor Walgate (Reeves, The Forsyte Saga), a retired scientist well-versed in psychic phenomena, to discuss the situation. It turns out he’s been experimenting with thought projection and managed to create an invisible malevolent new lifeform, the same one responsible for the murders. The attacks are a means of replicating itself into creatures (also invisible) that feed on nuclear power from the base.
Eventually, the creatures take control of the reactor and dial the power way up which causes them to become visible. They are the victims’ missing brains and spinal cords. This is where German special effects artists Karl-Ludwig Ruppel and Florenz Von Nordhoff (credited as “Ruppel & Nordhoff”) step up with some outstanding creature design. The brains have eyes at the end of extended stalks; the spines have tendrils and legs. Their movements are achieved through stop-motion animation. They’re flexible, fast and able to leap long distances. They are the true stars of the climax which has Cummings, Walgate and other supporting characters fighting off an attack in a barricaded house. One of them is Barbara (Parker, a fire maiden from Fire Maidens of Outer Space), assistant to the professor and love interest to the major. In any event, it’s the very scene I saw as young Movie Guy. It’s still cool with all the blood, ooze and goo.
Based on the short story “The Thought Monster” by Amelia Reynolds originally published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales, Fiend Without a Face created quite a stir when first released in the UK. Even with cuts, the British Board of Film Censors still slapped it with an X for its graphic violence. Parliament members actually raised questions about it in session; they wanted to know how it got past the censors. In the US where it was released on a double bill with The Haunted Strangler (starring Boris Karloff), the Rialto Theater in NYC created a public disturbance when they displayed a model of the brain monster outside the theater. The crowds of onlookers grew so large that they interfered with pedestrian and vehicular traffic. Police ordered the manager to remove it at once. WOW! I did not know all this. Isn’t it cool?
Like its kindred spirit American B-movies, Fiend Without a Face contains the usual cheesy dialogue, spliced-in stock footage and character types- e.g. upright hero, eager sidekick, mad scientist, spunky girlfriend, etc. It follows a familiar plot trajectory while exploiting our atomic age fears of nuclear energy. However, it also generates real suspense by keeping the fiends off-screen until the end. The horror is instead suggested by sound; specifically, the slurping noises they make as they approach their victims. This is a smart move on the part of director Arthur Crabtree (Madonna of the Seven Moons) who, story has it, didn’t report to the set most days as he felt directing a horror movie was beneath him. It’s said that star Thompson directed most of it.
I watched a beautifully restored version of Fiend Without a Face, one of few 50s monster movies (if any) that received the Criterion Collection treatment, a prize usually reserved for prestige films like The Bicycle Thief, Solaris (the Andrei Tarkovsky version) and The Seventh Seal. The effects still hold up after more than a half a century. Need I repeat my opinion of CGI? It’s a solidly entertaining sci-fi-horror movie with genuine suspense and even a scare or two.
With this life mystery finally solved, I’d next like to know what Willis was talking about. Can somebody please clear this up for me?
