RetView #79
Title: Island of Terror
Year of Release: 1966
Director: Terence Fisher
Length: 89 mins
Starring: Peter Cushing, Edward Judd, Carole Gray, Eddie Byrne, Sam Kydd
Something monumental happened within the English cultural landscape in the summer of 1966. Something that would send shockwaves far and wide, and leave a lasting mark for generations to come. Something for people to aspire to. Yep, that’s right, Island of Terror was released. Directed by British horror legend Terence Fisher of Curse of Frankenstein (1957), The Gorgon (1964) and Hound of the Baskervilles (1969) fame, Island of Terror was based on an original story by Edward Mann and Al Ramsen. It was distributed by Planet Film in the UK and Universal Studios in the US as a double bill with The Projected Man (1967).
On a remote Island off the coast of Ireland, a farmer’s wife contacts the authorities claiming her husband has gone missing. He soon turns up in a cave, dead, without a single bone left in his body. What the eff has happened ‘ere? Local copper John Harris (Kydd) doesn’t have a scooby and calls the local doctor (Byrne). He too is clueless, so travels to the mainland in search of answers and eventually hooks up with ‘noted London pathologist,’ Dr Brian Stanley (Cushing). He too is unable to work out what might have happened (can you see a theme developing?) so they seek out Dr David West (Judd), an expert on bones and bone diseases. Although the mismatched duo interrupt West’s quiet evening at home with his rich lover Toni Merrill (Gray), he is evidently more interested in bones and stuff so the whole gang promptly decamps back to the island in Merrill’s dad’s helicopter, which was handy. Once there, they soon discover a castle laboratory and upon inspection find the occupants all dead and boneless. This prompts our intrepid band of heroes and heroines to hypothesise, not unreasonably, that whatever is going around killing folk and turning their bones to mush probably began life in the lab, possibly as the result of an experiment gone wrong.
Some notes they find written by a Doctor Landers (I know, I know, too many doctors) confirm as much, and hint that in a quest to find a cure for cancer, the lab’s head honcho may have accidentally created a new lifeform that was especially partial to bones. And what’s worse, the lifeform (or lifeforms) might still be there. These amorphous grey creatures are nicknamed “Silicates” by Dr. Brian and Dr David, and kill their victims by injecting a bone-dissolving enzyme into their bodies. The Silicates are incredibly difficult to kill, as the luckless Doc Landers learns when he has a rush of blood and attacks one with an axe, and multiply every six hours. It’s unclear how. Regardless, the group estimate that if the multiplication is allowed to continue for a week there would be a million of them. At one point, we actually see this multiplication happening. After making some farty noises, one of the creatures splits open and some tinned spaghetti spills out, prompting Dr. Brian to yell, “They are multiplying!”
Dr. Brian, Dr David and the rich girl then mobilise the islanders, and with the help of the island ‘leader’ and the bloke from the shop (which just happens to sell dynamite), declare war on the silicates and attack them with everything they can find, not much of which is very effective. They shoot one a few times and all it does is wave its tentacle menacingly, moving Stanley to say, “Nasty little creatures, aren’t they?” During an epic battle scene, a silicate drops out of a tree onto a dude chucking petrol bombs at them. We aren’t told how the silicate managed to climb the tree with no arms. Speaking of no arms, after he has a brief encounter with a silicate, Dr David lops off Dr Brian’s arm and minutes later asks him how his arm is.
Like, what arm? You chopped it off, you daft bassard.
Anyway, when one of the ‘nasty creatures’ is found dead, apparently after accidentally ingesting radiation from the lab, the gang realise they must find more of the stuff and figure out how to contaminate the remaining silicates before it’s too late. Long story short, they eventually succeed, of course they do, but an epilogue reveals a visit to a satellite programme in Japan, where technicians are duplicating the work that spawned the silicates with predictably unfunny results. It may have been 1966, but let’s hope they didn’t want to come home. That’s the last football reference, I promise.
Brian J Dillard writing for Online database Allmovie gave the film a generally positive review, saying: “This creepy yet clunky sci-fi-horror flick boasts one of the coolest monsters ever to grace the silver screen – radioactive silicone beings that suck the calcium right out of your bones. A Saturday-afternoon creature-feature favorite, Island of Terror also boasts one of the most memorable amputation scenes ever.” Meanwhile, TV Guide awarded the film two out of four stars, criticizing its “shaky plot” but commending Cushing’s performance and Fisher’s direction. Radio Times also gave the film two stars and called it “Long on logic but high on hysteria,” whatever that means. All good fun. You can watch Island of Terror RIGHT HERE for nuffink!
Trivia Corner
Terence Fisher directed Peter Cushing (who plays Dr Brian Stanley) in a total of 13 films, including the last offering before he died in 1980 at the age of 76, Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974).
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