Rating: 
Summary: Don't Let The Cheese Fool You
Review: I know some people will groan about this, but I feel this movie has never gotten the credit it deserves. Mostly because there is a tendency to look with prejudice upon it's leading man, Nick Adams, because of the slow-down in his carreer just before his untimely and mysterious death at age 36. My father was a big naysayer of Nick Adams. His prejudice stemmed from Adams' participation in Rebel Without A Cause, a film my father saw as encouragement for youth to openly oppose their parents, without showing the parents' side of the story. However, if you watch Nick Adams at work, and keep an open mind, whether it's in one of his most famous films, like Rebel Without A Cause or Mister Roberts, or in his now legendary television series, The Rebel, you'll see a talented actor who was at ease in front of the camera. In spite of his young features (at times described as baby-faced) Adams had a screen presence that was strong and capable. Over time, my attitude of him has turned from thinking of him as a so-so player, to that of an underrated actor of whom life ended before something better came along. After you've viewed enough B-grade and lesser horror films, you begin to appreciate when a qualified and talented actor is given the lead in one of these films. And in Die Monster Die, Nick Adams was perhaps at his best during that slow-down period of his life. It's certainly one of the better B-grade horror films he was forced to work in at the time. And it's one of the better releases by MGM in its Midnight Movies collection. If you look at the title alone, you're likely to pass on this one, thinking Cheese all the way, but don't let the title stop you. I think this was one of the most original science fiction/horror films to come out of American International pictures. It's based on an H.P. Lovecraft story called The Colour out of Space. It does, of course, take poetic license in order to make a movie-length script, but it keeps enough of the original story in order to feel and taste like H.P. Lovecraft. Boris Karloff alone is worth the movie. His portrayal of a wheel chair bound quasi-scientist obsessed with using a radioactive meteor discovered on his land to make a better world is wonderful gothic material. The film has gothic painted all over it, from the sprawling English country side, to the thunderstorms, to the ancient torture chambers in the basement of Karloff's rambling English manor. These gothic feels combined with the science-fiction theme are exactly what make this movie feel like an H.P. Lovecraft story. The film features a wonderful, if brief performance by Freda Jackson, perhaps remembered best for her cackling performance in The Brides of Dracula, where she hunkered down over a freshly filled grave and coaxed a new vampire victim through the surface of the moist dirt with loving, motherly whispers. This movie also introduced one of the loveliest British starlets of the time to the big screen, one Suzan Farmer, who can also be seen in Dracula, Prince of Darkness. She plays the somewhat confused and uncertain lover of Nick Adams' character. Their scenes together seem to be filled with genuine emotion, giving just the right feeling of two lovers caught up in deadly mystery. And MGM did a wonderful job with this low-cost DVD. This film is presented in Wide Screen, enhanced for Wide Screen Television (which is the same thing as Anamorphic Wide Screen). Whatever print they used for this film was beautiful. The colors are deep and lush, the scenes clear and crisp with very little show of wear over the years. The only extra is the Theatrical Preview, and the scene-selection option. But who cares for anything more! After all, if extras are more important to you than the film, you should save your money and buy film-history books. I for one salute MGM for offering us these affordable gems in a nice quality DVD. If you're a Nick Adams fan, then buy the movie for his strong leading man performance. If you like good quality, B-grade science-fiction horror, I don't think you'll be at disappointed in this movie. And if you're a Boris Karloff fan, it's a must-see. And, if you're a Vincent Price film nut, as I am, you'll be excited to hear that MGM has released two other beautifully rendered DVDs at the same low price staring this legend of the horror cinema; The Abominable Doctor Phibes, and the sequel, Doctor Phibes Rises Again (both under the Midnight Movies titles). Plus! Watch for Fall of the House of Usher and The Pit and the Pendulum coming out very soon from MGM.
Rating:
Summary: Nice DVD edition of uneven Karloff occult thriller
Review: Roger Corman's long-time art director, Daniel Haller, who later helmed a handful of cult films (Wild Racers, Devil's Angels) and innumerable TV series, got his first directorial shot with this entertaining if ultimately somewhat disappointing mixture of gothic mystery, occult, and science fiction elements. The screenplay by Jerry Sohl unsurprisingly bears only slight resemblance to H. P. Lovecraft's original story, although it's still pretty outre for 1965. (Sohl also penned a few Twilight Zone, Outer Limits, Star Trek, and Invaders scripts, not to mention Frankenstein Conquers the World and Curse of the Crimson Altar, the latter also starring Karloff and loosely based on Lovecraft.) The "frightened townfolk" beginning is laughably heavy-handed, although the middle section where we're slowly fed details about the bizarre goings-on at the Witley mansion is actually fairly absorbing. Unfortunately any suspense and air of mystery that's been generated is completely dissipated by the obvious, schlocky "monster on the loose" climax (did anyone really think audiences would be fooled into thinking that stuntman in the plastic mask was Boris?). Twerpy Nick Adams (who apparently fancied himself leading man material and took his inevitable career slide harder than most) exudes little charisma as the hero, although Suzan Farmer (Dracula: Prince of Darkness, Rasputin the Mad Monk) is appealing as Karloff/Witley's daughter Susan. There are a number of other positives: Paul Beeson's cinematography and the Witley mansion sets look great, of course; Freda Jackson (Great Expectations, Brides of Dracula), Karloff, and Patrick Magee (Dementia 13, Clockwork Orange, Asylum, etc.) lend some class to the proceedings; the cosmic stones and eerie mutant plants are effectively realized; there are a few credible shocks; and the brief gore FX are surprisingly over-the-top for a mainstream film of the era. But as much as I would like to love this movie, it really needs a better finish. (Apparently a crowd-pleaser though, Die Monster Die played the drive-in circuit for years, often filling out dusk-till-dawn shock-o-rama bills.) Definitely worth a look for Karloff completists and AIP junkies (like myself) who will watch and usually enjoy virtually anything with their logo on it. Lovecraft cultists and mainstream movie fans expecting an intelligent denouement are bound to be disappointed. Haller adapted Lovecraft's The Dunwich Horror for AIP five years later with similarly variable results.
MGM Home Video presents the movie in an unspectacular but quite serviceable package. The trailer is letterboxed to 2.35:1 with overall excellent image quality marred only by some light speckling. Sixteen chapter stops and French and Spanish subtitles are the only other extras. The source print used for the feature is not exactly stunning but still quite a bit above average. The brightness, contrast, detail, and color saturation of the anamorphic widesceen (2.35:1) transfer are excellent throughout. The image is not razor-sharp, but still acceptably crisp (the slight softness of some shots seems to be resident in the source print). Physical damage is limited to some sporadic very light speckling. Overall quite satisfying for the very reasonable price.
Rating: 
Summary: Get That Healthy, Green Glow...
Review: Some day, a genius like Peter Jackson will take the works of H. P. Lovecraft and make an incredible series of slithering fun. Until then, we've got movies like DIE MONSTER DIE! to give us some minor shivers. Nick Adams plays a man summoned to the Whitley estate by a rotting Freda Jackson, in order to save her daughter Susan (Suzan Farmer) from the family curse. It turns out that dad (Boris Karloff) has been using a radioactive meteorite to mutate animals and grow fifty-pound tomatoes in the greenhouse! His butler keels over dead from radiation sickness and the adventure begins. I like DMD with all of it's goofiness and pretention. Should be seen as a double feature with THE DUNWICH HORROR. Check it out...
Rating:
Summary: Eerie and worthwhile
Review: This is an often times overlooked gem, usually panned as being boring, but this really is a very worthwhile film. A young American goes to visit a girl he met in college. He finds an aging mansion with burnt vegetation, unexplainable sounds and Boris Karloff denying that there is any problem. I first saw this film about 15 years ago as a late night creature feature and I like it as much now as I did then. The slow deliberate pace of this film adds to the mood rather than hindering, the sets are very good and the acting is solid (especially Karloff). Certainly worth seeing.
Rating:
Summary: No classic, but still enjoyable.
Review: This mild, but unexceptional adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's "Colour Out Of Space" features horror king Boris Karloff as wheelchair-bound patriarch Nahum Witley who discovers that a fallen meteorite is causing the physical disentegration of several people. It's the familiar "some things are better left alone" theme, and the film has very little on Lovecraft's original story, but Karloff's strong presence makes it most worthwhile. For a better filmization of Loveraft's literary genius, see THE DUNWICH HORROR, also directed by Daniel Haller.
Rating:
Summary: No classic, but still enjoyable.
Review: This mild, but unexceptional adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's "Colour Out Of Space" features horror king Boris Karloff as wheelchair-bound patriarch Nahum Witley who discovers that a fallen meteorite is causing the physical disentegration of several people. It's the familiar "some things are better left alone" theme, and the film has very little on Lovecraft's original story, but Karloff's strong presence makes it most worthwhile. For a better filmization of Loveraft's literary genius, see THE DUNWICH HORROR, also directed by Daniel Haller.
Rating:
Summary: Lurking With Lovecraft
Review: Veteran screenwriter Jerry Sohl and scene designer/fledgling director Daniel Haller expand Lovecraft's "colorful" short story into a typical feature-length AIP shocker, with mostly good results. Nick Adams visits his fiance Susan Farmer's ancestral estate in the country, where he is not welcomed with open arms. Farmer's father, Boris Karloff, has a feared and hated name in the region, for reasons no one will disclose. Karloff himself tries to send Adams away upon his arrival, but Farmer won't hear of it - nor will her mother, the sickly and sequestered Frieda Jackson, who sent for Adams in the first place. Standoffish Karloff is hiding something, and even Jackson isn't fully sure what it is. It has something to do with a meteorite that permanently blasted the nearby heath some years ago, and is somehow killing Karloff's household. Jackson wants Adams to take Farmer away from the unhealthy environment. But Adams discovers from town doctor Patrick Magee that Karloff's family has always been twisted with a bizarre space-cult religion, which in some way has something to do not only with their penchant for undiagnosable wasting illness, but also seems to have created an unknown poison that is sucking the vital life force out of the entire area and gives birth to mutations. It isn't long before Adams discovers the hidden source of Karloff's family's - and the town's - woes: Karloff has been keeping the meteorite in his diseased progenitors' religious shrine, where its unearthly cosmic force continues to ravage anything in the vicinity. Before the story is out, most of his household will succumb to it - in colorfully hideous fashion, by way of disintegrating facial makeups and sundry other mutations - and Adams will have a nasty time delivering poor Susan Farmer (and himself) to safety. The movie is uneven, and takes a while to get going. There are a lot of stalking-through-the-mansion shots. But director Haller's experience as an artistic scene designer shows, and the film is indeed extremely colorful and atmospheric. There are some clever puppet effects used to show mutated plant-creatures and lesser changed animals. Jackson's disintegration is a great moment, very creepy and unsettling. And Karloff undergoes a final unlikely mutation himself, transforming from a wheelchair-ridden irascible old man into a silvery-greenish, bald, athletically powerful alien attacker - which makes no logical sense whatsoever, but is great fun to watch. A typical movie of the studio and the time, but elevated by a good cast, decent script, and terrific production design and cinematography.
Rating:
Summary: Typical 60s AIP Brit-Horror
Review: Whether or not you like the style of the films AIP made in the UK in the mid-sixties will determine what you think of this. Nick Adams arrives in the cosy little English village of Arkham and discovers peculiar goings-on up at a big old house where Boris Karloff is creating strange mutated things in his greenhouse with the aid of a glowing green meteorite. Boris's wife is starting to mutate as well and she manages to go on the rampage and get her face melted before the whole thing ends predictably in flames. Daniel Haller's exercise in adapting Lovecraft was presumably filmed around Bray studios as the house used for the exterior shots is none other than Oakley Court, the location used for many a classic British horror film including The Reptile, Vampyres and The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
As a piece of filmic Lovecraft the picture doesn't really work. If, however, you want a well-preserved widescreen slice of mid-sixties Brit horror then look no further. MGM's print has a few scratches but the colour photography in the opening scenes of the railway station and the village must look as good as (if not better than) when the film was first released. The special effects are what you would expect from this time period - psychedelic colour filters and rubber puppets twisted into funny shapes to simulate the greenhouse mutations. Good value for money, even if the only extras are a trailer and chapter selections.
Rating:
Summary: Die, remake, die!
Review: While this film takes a few bits of Lovecraft's terrifying "The Colour Out of Space" and is graced by Boris Karloff and Freda Jackson, it's really a remake of Boris's THE INVISIBLE RAY, even down to the fiery climax when the irradiated Karloff explodes at the end! Boris and Freda carry the film on their capable shoulders, but it's tough sledding apart from them. Some of the effects of the mutated plants are nicely done, but HPL's plot has been diffused too thin here. Haller did much better with THE DUNWICH HORROR.
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