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Greetings, and welcome to VIEWING THE CLASSICS. Here you'll find capsule reviews of vintage movies from the early days of cinema through the 1970s, with a special emphasis on sci-fi, horror, and mystery movies. Be sure to check out the Pages links, where you can find a Film Index of all my reviews, links to the reviews organized by cast members, directors, and other contributors, and links to my reviews of the films of talented young director Joshua Kennedy.

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Sunday, May 19, 2013

Curse Of The Swamp Creature (1966)

Starring John Agar, Francine York, Jeff Alexander, Shirley McLine, Cal Duggan
Directed by Larry Buchanan
(actor & director credits courtesy IMDB.com)

Fortune hunters trail a geologist searching for oil in the swamp, where they encounter a scientist who needs human subjects to achieve his dream of merging man and alligator into one creature.

Although Larry Buchanan's pedigree as a filmmaker is far from distinguished, there's some fun to be had in this picture, with Alexander making a great villain, conveying both haughty arrogance and simmering anger in his performance.  However, nothing else in the film is as accomplished, wasting the atmosphere of the southern swamp location with matter-of-fact photography, and providing an almost comical makeup for the creature that is not revealed until the film's climax.  Still, this is something of a guilty pleasure, and a personal favorite of mine among Buchanan's films, although that's not saying much.

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