Fresh and Exciting

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

Along with The Beast of Yucca Flats (1961), Monster a-Go Go (1965) and Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966), The Creeping Terror is among the all-time anti-classics of 1960's horror schlock. It's one of those films whose reputation goes before it and it doesn't exactly disappoint (if that is the right term). Yes, this one really does feature an alien monster which seems to largely consist of a carpet and some tubing. It goes around a hick community picking off a selection of (very) inert victims. This ultra-slow monster doesn't so much as creep about as appear very clearly in broad daylight in full view from several metres away, yet the half-wits who populate the local area not only do not have enough sense to walk away, they almost seem, if anything, to actively dive into the creature's gob. To be fair, all the scenes with the carpet-tube monster constitute the highlights of the movie, as despite its ropey appearance it does elicit a certain fun factor. Otherwise, the film has a selection of characters trying to understand and contend with this alien invasion. Much of these scenes have been overdubbed with narration, as seemingly several sound reels were lost and this proved to be the most economical solution. It's just that kind of film. Despite the hilarious presence of the creeping terror itself, I have to say that the single funniest moment doesn't directly involve it, it was the uproarious blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment when we see the effects of inertia on the young couple when they slam their car into the monster late on in the film. That bit of comedy gold is worth a rewind or two. In the final analysis, this very silly film is very bad indeed on certain levels, yet it is also rather entertaining and memorable on several other levels. It's worth watching I would say.

Apparently Vic Savage, director of THE CREEPING TERROR, never worked in film again after the debacle that was this film. I've watched it twice now and, to that news, I'm not surprised. This movie has earned the dishonor of being the absolute worst movie I've ever seen, rocketing past WAR OF THE ROBOTS as most insufferable collection of images ever put to celluloid. There is absolutely nothing positive I can think to say about THE CREEPING TERROR. I was gleefully watching my way through a 50-movie collection of cheesy science fiction movies until I came to this one; I put the collection down and still haven't gone back for fear of coming across another movie as miserably bad as THE CREEPING TERROR. What if there's another one out there, waiting to turn my brain to slush? I have never regretted another 75 minutes of my life as much as this. And I did it twice! I gave it the benefit of the doubt, believing there had to be some modicum of entertainment to be gleaned from it. I was wrong and I hate myself for trying. A friend of mine learned of my suffering and suggested I watch the MST3K episode on it, but I haven't been able to bring myself to sit down and willfully subject myself to this movie again, MST3K or no MST3K. I hate it with a passion and the mere mention of the title is enough to send flashes of searing pain through my mind.THE CREEPING TERROR believes it's about a crashed rocket ship in a small American town and the alien "monster" it unleashes on the unsuspecting populace. What THE CREEPING TERROR is actually about is a patchwork of shag carpet samples thrown over some poor soul who's forced to drag a series of children's' wagons behind them at an excruciatingly slow pace while some underpaid actor or actress does their best to feign terror before being "eaten" (i.e. being uncomfortably dragged through the hole at the front). Any and all information is passed along to the viewing audience by means of voice-over narration. This movie is almost entirely voice-over narration, which plays over boring scenes of people doing mostly nothing. Sounding like a mid-twentieth century government PSA, it's hard to find an ounce of tension anywhere in this movie. As if the narration weren't enough to kill the mood, no one in this movie can act. When the crashed rocket ship is first discovered, a local policeman crawls through an opening and gets eaten inside (we never see it because this movie is awful) but no one reacts. A lawman is eaten alive by an alien life form and dude just wanders over to the patrol car without a care in the world and radios it in. And no one in town could care less. Everyone just goes about business as normal with an "alien" on the loose because writer Robert Silliphant wanted audiences to suffer. And suffer we did. That monster…Most of this abomination is footage of the "terror" creeping up on people at a snail's pace, confronting them, and the victims failing to do anything short of standing still and screaming. Grandfather out fishing with his grandson? Eaten. Hippies have a picnic? Eaten. All of them. No survivors. A bunch of teens having a dance party in the community center? Eaten. All of them. All. Of. Them. Somehow, no one can escape a creature that won't fit through most doorways and could be easily outrun by a toddler. One hundred and fifteen insufferable minutes of this. Someone, somewhere thought making a movie was a piece of cake. And then someone, perhaps even more incompetent than Vic Savage and Robert Silliphant combined, gave clearance to release this piece of utter trash to unsuspecting audiences. They knew what they'd done. This was released in 1964. Movies had been around a good while at this point. They had to know this was unfit for human consumption and they released it anyway. At least I got 49 other movies to dull the pain from having put money toward this; those poor souls in 1964 who wandered into a theater or the drive- in, ready to have some fun, I mourn for them. All I can do is warn future generations of cheesy, Z-grade creature features to search for their next fix elsewhere. THE CREEPING TERROR has nothing to offer and may have lasting damage to their psyche if subjected to the full 115 minutes.

This is bad cinema at it's absolute finest. I would recommend this film to anyone who likes comically bad movies and to the average person as well. Within, the first 10 minutes of this film, you will see stock footage of a rocket-launch played in reverse used as an alien spacecraft landing, complete with the REWIND-LINE! The monster itself is laughable, it's not quite as stupid-looking as the one in "Robot Monster" but it's pretty close. You will easily be able to distinguish the people under the monster-suit and even their shoes throughout the movie. Probably the best moment for the monster is when it invades a jazz concert and "absorbs" everybody. I won't ruin that for you though. Seriously, this movie is so bad that it's mind-boggling and entertaining to boot. It is a particularly great watch if you are up really late in the night and don't have to worry about waking anybody up with laughter. I cannot give a Z-Movie a 10 but this kind of movie is why there are B-movie fans like me out there. Don't expect to learn anything but if you watch this you will probably have a pretty good laugh in the process.

SPOILER: The main "Monster" in The Creeping Terror racks up a pretty impressive body count despite it's lack of speed.The "Monster" looks like it just walked off line from a Chinese New Year's parade and moves with all the speed of a lame turtle or a government worker getting paid by the hour. The only things in this movie that couldn't outrun the "Monster" are a rock and a tree. The only way a person could get caught by the "Monster" is if they ran into a tree or tripped over a rock and knocked themselves out.The only time I rooted for the "Monster" to show up was in the "Dance Hall" scene. If the darn thing could have moved faster, we wouldn't have to endure the mind-numbing music that seemed to have the same few notes looped over and over again as the girl in the skin-tight gold pants gyrated on.(Taken from my show RETERO MOVIE REVIEW on spreaker.com and iHeartRadio. A different review can be found on "Oklahoma & The Movies" on spreaker.com)