“Giant Gila Monster”
director Ray Kellogg’s low-budget creature feature “The Killer Shrews” is a
claustrophobic saga that grossed almost nine times its budget and has become a
public domain masterpiece. “Creation of the Humanoids” scenarist Jay
Simms spend most of his career writing episode for television series such as
“Laramie,” “The Rifleman,” “Rawhide,” “Have Gun, Will Travel,” “Laredo,” and
“Gunsmoke.” Before he graduated to less science-fiction, horror-oriented
material, he wrote this chiller, and he must have been channeling H.G. Wells’
“The Island of Doctor Moreau” to some extent. James Best portrays the hero in
this shoe-string budget thriller, and Ken Curtis—who produced the film—cast
himself as a drunken scientist. Aside from some footage of a boat on the
ocean and scenes inside a scientist compound, “The Killer Shrews” (** OUT OF ****) could have
been shot anywhere on its reported $123-thousand budget. Best and Curtis give
the best performances hands down, while everybody else looks a little
embarrassed by all the baloney that they try to make sound believable.
According to the Internet Movie Database, the full-sized shrews were played by
coon dogs, and the close-ups of the shrews were puppets. Wikipedia points out
that “The Killer Shrews” was lensed in Dallas, Texas.
An isolated island in
the middle of the ocean is the setting for this science-fiction/horror movie
where a team of scientists have been conducting experiments on tiny animals
called shrews. The most outlandish aspect of this movie is the reason
that prompted Dr. Marlowe Craigis (Baruch Lumet of “The Pawnbroker”) to embark
on his privately funded research. He
intends to shrink humans to half our current size so he can ease world hunger. Craigis figures that when the human race is
that reduced physically in size, people consume less and lengthen the Earth’s
food supply. Inexplicably, their science project gets out of hand. By the
time that Captain Thorne Sherman and his first-mate ‘Rook' Griswold (Judge
Henry Dupree of “My Dog, Buddy”) arrive with supplies, the shrews have grown to
the size of dogs. Dr. Craigis explains that shrews must eat their bodyweight
in anything alive to survive. The first half of “The Killer Shrews” is
spend with Craigis delivering a plethora of expository information about these
devilish critters. One of Craigis’ scientist, Jerry Farrell (Ken Curtis
of “The Searchers”), is particularly upset by this point by the escape of some
shrews. Furthermore, his lack of vigilance regarding the escaped shrews
has prompted Dr. Craigis’ gorgeous daughter, Ann (Ingrid Goude of “Never Steal
Anything Small”), to call off her engagement with Farrell. A hurricane
batters the island, and Thorne decides to stay in the compound with the
scientists after Ann reveals everything about the murderous mutants. This
doesn’t suit Farrell because he thinks that Thorne is making moves of his
former finance.
About 20 minutes into
the action, Thorne’s first mate encounters the ravenous shrews. He runs
in panic and struggles to climb a tree to elude the hungry beasts, but several
of them leap at him and kill him. Meanwhile, three other starving shrews
dig under the gates to the stable and eat a helpless horse, and then they start
searching for a point of entry to the compound. One shrew gains access to
the compound when a shutter on a window is damaged by the high winds. The
animal slips in, and Thorne and Craigis’ hired help Mario (Alfredo de Soto of
“The Big Steal”) confront the beastly thing in the basement where the food is
stored. The dog-like creature with huge fangs bites Mario, and the handy
man dies from poison that was put out on the island long ago to diminish the
population. Not only did the poison fail to work, but the shrews have
absorbed into their system with suffering any ill effects. Thorne and
Jerry trudge through the woods to the shore. Thorne whistles up Rook who is supposed to be
aboard the yacht. Rook is nowhere to be found until Thorne stumbles onto
his remains. Earlier, the jealous Farrell threatened to kill Thorne since
he kept making eyes at Ann. Thorne disarmed Farrell. After they
find Rook’s empty revolver, Thorne and Farrell hear the hunger shrews
approaching. They charge back to the compound.
Farrell arrives before Thorne and tries to lock Thorne out of the compound to
prevent more the shrews from invading the premises. Thorne scales the
wall and beats up the frantic Farrell. Bristling with rage, Thorne almost
dumps Farrell’s unconscious body over the wall.
At the last moment, he relents to everybody’s relief. No sooner
than everybody believes they are out of harm’s way than they realize that more
shrews have sneaked into the compound. Ann is poised to make coffee when
she opens a door to another room, and a shrew dashes out. The animal attacks Dr.
Radford Baines (producer Gordon McLendon), and he perishes from the poison in
the animal’s bit. However, he survives long enough to type out every symptom of
his behavior before he keels over. Thorne guns down the shrew.
Thorne, Ann, Farrell,
and Dr. Craigis evacuate themselves from the house portion of the compound
after the shrews tear apart the plaster and burrow into the adobe. Farrell appropriates
the automatic shotgun that Thorne pitched over the wall before he scaled
it. They find some drums later enough to
each of them to crawl into and duck-walk across open ground to the shore. Farrell refuses to join them and climbs atop
the roof as the shrews assemble for the final feast. Thorne uses a torch to cut oblong viewing holes
in the drums. They lash three drums together
and remotely open the patio gate. The
shrews scramble in and tear at the view slots while our heroes laboriously make
their way across uneven terrain to the shore.
Believe it or not, a sequel entitled “Return of the Killer Shrews” was
released in 2012, and James Best reprised his role as Thorne.
