Search - Die, Monster, Die! on DVD

MPAA Rating: NR Content Advisory: Questionable for Children Movie Release: 1965 DVD Release: 02/20/2001 Format: DVD - Enhanced Wide Screen Letterbox for 16x9 TV Audio Tracks: English, French Subtitles: French, Spanish SwapaDVD Credits: 1 Number of Discs: 1 Run Time: 1 hrs 19 mins Studio: MGM Total Copies: 2 Genres: Mystery, Horror, Creature Film

Also known as Monster of Terror, this British-made horror opus is very loosely based on H.P. Lovecraft's story "The Colour Out of Space". The story begins with an American scientist (Nick Adams) paying a visit to the remote estate of his fiancee's family (located in Lovecraft's fictional Arkham County, Massachusetts) and finding many of the surrounding flora and fauna horribly mutated by strange radiation. The source of the contamination is discovered to be a glowing meteorite kept hidden in the basement by his girlfriend's father (Boris Karloff), who has been using the radiation to mutate local plant life. As one might expect, the experiment has gotten a bit out of hand... and poor mommy has changed into something unspeakably horrible. Designed as a vehicle for Karloff (who is excellent), this is a decent freshman effort from director Daniel Haller (formerly Roger Corman's production designer), but the effectively creepy atmosphere would have been greatly assisted by a better script -- perhaps one more loyal to the source material. The same story was adapted (again, loosely) in 1987 for The Curse. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

Boris Karloff - Nahum Witley
Nick Adams - Stephen Reinhart
Freda Jackson - Letitia Witley
Suzanne Farmer - Susan Witley
Terence de Marney - Merwyn

Released by AIP in 1965, Die, Monster, Die! is not quite up to the level of the studio's better-known and more successful Edgar Allen Poe adaptations from the same time period -- The Fall of the House of Usher (1960), The Pit and the Pendulum (1961), The Masque of the Red Death (1964) -- but the film is not a complete wash either. Though lacking a decent script, it displays great atmosphere and a hysterical sense of dread which at least puts it on a technical par with the previously mentioned films directed by Roger Corman. Daniel Haller, the director of this extremely loose adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's classic science-fiction/horror tale, was the art director for many of Corman's Poe films. MGM's DVD has been enhanced for widescreen TVs and gives the film the best treatment it can. The print is not in the best of shape -- there are numerous scratches and pops throughout and the English mono soundtrack is tinny (the optional French mono track, on the other hand, is more pronounced) -- but it's probably the best it's ever going to get. For the most part, though, the print is sharp and stable. The film's outlandish theatrical trailer is included, along with French and Spanish subtitles. ~ Derek Hill, All Movie Guide