Rating: 
Summary: Ohhhh it's so bad - I love it
Review: OK, these are two egregiously awful pieces of movie-making. Yes, yes, of course.However, if you enjoy cheesy movies with over-the-top plots, truly bad monster effects, wacky dialogue, and heroines with inexplicable foreign accents, get this two-movies-in-one DVD. The price is right, and you'll have hours of guilty pleasure watching teenagers save a pathetic podunk town, and dogs with bits of carpeting glued on them gamboling about looking not at all like fierce, threatening giant shrews. But, don't be confused. These are BAD movies.
Rating:
Summary: Mixed-bag DVD is OK for the price
Review: Others here have hashed over plot details, etc. so I'll just weigh in with the general consensus that Killer Shrews is the better of the two flicks here. The budgetary limitations are obvious, but if you can get over the fact that the monsters don't look anything like shrews, and the silly duck-walking thing, there's a fairly taut little thriller in there. Giant Gila Monster is less effective, with cornball humor, cringeworthy musical numbers, liberal doses of maudlin sentimentality, and a really blah monster dragging down its 'camp' appeal. This movie really needed Eddie Cahn or Herb Strock at the helm. Watchable but probably not quite bent enough for many C-movie enthusiasts.
The Diamond DVD is a mixed bag as well. First, I did not experience any of the technical problems that others have reported here; my disc played fine (other than some visible pixelation during the lightning flashes in Shrews) and I had no problem accessing any menu items, etc. Second, while neither source print is spectacular, they are definitely NOT transferred from mediocre VHS tapes as one reviewer stated. Compared to my VHS copy of Killer Shrews, the print used here compares quite favorably. There is some light speckling and scratching, but no major damage or jump-cutting. The tonal values are quite decent, (slightly richer than my VHS) and sharpness and shadow/highlight detail are much improved. For the money spent I'm quite pleased with Killer Shrews. Giant Gila Monster fares not so well. Compared to my VHS copy taped off public TV the DVD source print is sharper but also quite a bit darker, particularly in the night scenes and toward the end of the film in general. The highlight and midtone detail are thus actually improved in many scenes, but the shadow detail fills in a bit in the lighter scenes and a lot in the darker scenes, rendering much of the climax of the movie very murky. The DVD also exhibits more overall wear: light speckling and scratching, distracting reel change 'dots', jump cuts between reels, etc. In other words, even though the DVD is sharper, I'm hanging on to my videotape.
For me, Killer Shrews alone is worth the price of this disc (I'm assuming Madacy's version is as horribly butchered as their other Killer Creature Double Features). I wouldn't recommend spending the bucks just to get The Giant Gila Monster unless you have no other copy available. Does anyone have specific info on the quality of Elite's version?
Rating: 
Summary: Terrible quality
Review: Out of the many, many DVDs in my collection, this one I can honestly say is the worst in technical quality I have ever seen. To begin, my high-end player was unable to understand the pitiful menu, rendering it utterly useless. Not that you really need it. There are really only 2 chapter stops per film. Did they actually think we would forget this? Also, I was unable to access the "bonus" features other than Diamond's promotional screen (like I will ever buy another disc from them again!) Want to skip ahead to your favorite scenes? Good luck! My player stopped the disc when I tried to navigate through one of the chapters! Whew! Also, there were a lot of annoying pauses all throughout GILA MONSTER. Never have I placed such an inept disc in my player. After this experience, I probably never will again...unless I want a headache! Why does this disc get one star? Well, if for no other reason than the fact you are getting these two wonderfully campy films on one disc. I just wished the geniuses who authored this disc had put for a little more effort. In this case, you certainly GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR!
Rating: 
Summary: A huge slithery tongue/ Dogs in shrew suits
Review: The Giant Gila Monster
This is a picture of life before CGI. The contrived dialog is part of the mystique. You get to see hotrods and large lizards. The blob it is not; but it is a necessary addition to any 50' collection.
A teenage boy and a teenage girl disappear together and the law is getting suspicious.
I want to ask the monster if teenagers taste like chicken.
Watch for your self.
The Killer Shrews
I first saw this in the movies. And let me tell you this is really spooky for kids (or used to be.)
We find our selves on an island where a hand full of visitors, including us, find eerie from the beginning. Of course from the title we are anticipating "you know whats" at any time. But the visitors to this island have no idea what they are in for.
An experiment with the intent of correcting overpopulation has gone awry, et voilà killer shrews. These ravenous creatures must eat many times their weight daily to keep from starving. And I must say that Ingrid Goude (Miss Universe Sweden 1956) would make a tasty snack (not that I notices at the movies.)
Well the people are protected by adobe (mud) walls from the poisonous fanged carnivores (did I mention the fangs are poisonous?)
Wait, it's RAINING!
Rating: 
Summary: Shrews and Gilas make for interesting watching
Review: These movies are a hoot! In the first movie, The Giant Gila Monster it is fun to watch the teens hot rodding around in their souped up jalopies trying to escape the Giant Gila Monster. The songs are hilarious and the subplot of the young man trying to raise money for his little sisters braces makes no sense in the plot. The second movie on the DVD is the Killer Shrews. This movie has a better plot and makes a little more sense than the Giant Gila monster. Did anyone notice that the captain of the ship is the same actor who played Jim Lindsey the Guitar Player on The Andy Griffith Show. These movies are fun but dont expect too much.
Rating:
Summary: Shrews and Gilas make for interesting watching
Review: These movies are a hoot! In the first movie, The Giant Gila Monster it is fun to watch the teens hot rodding around in their souped up jalopies trying to escape the Giant Gila Monster. The songs are hilarious and the subplot of the young man trying to raise money for his little sisters braces makes no sense in the plot. The second movie on the DVD is the Killer Shrews. This movie has a better plot and makes a little more sense than the Giant Gila monster. Did anyone notice that the captain of the ship is the same actor who played Jim Lindsey the Guitar Player on The Andy Griffith Show. These movies are fun but dont expect too much.
Rating:
Summary: An incredible film, but hey it's at a bargain price!
Review: This film has got to go into someone's worst 100 films of all time. The corny acting, the incredible plot, the bathotic subplot of the crippled sister, and unrealistic monster, and the squalid special effects all contribute to this. My favorite worst moments? The hero's rock music (and he gets to sing 3 songs, and reprise at least one of them) is actually painfully bad--horrid songs, badly performed! The miniature train derailed thanks to the monster is obviously a badly-scaled vintage Marx train (each car could seat perhaps a dozen). The monster himself never appears in the same scene as a human--a dead giveaway that this is not a prime effects film--and is obviously an everyday gila monster shot amongst poor models. For the plus side? The film is tightly plotted, and moves with a certain terrible inevitability (that COULD be the stuff of high drama). The film is also efficient, without those loose ends and red herrings that destroy many lesser films.
Rating: 
Summary: The Killer Shrews
Review: This is a classic. Anyone from the Phila area who grew up watching Dr.Shock on Saturdays, should remember this one. It was always one of my favorites. The quality of the film is to be expected, but worth having. It also, makes you glad special effects have really progressed.
Rating:
Summary: Only an extra large pizza would offer more delicious cheese!
Review: This is a fairly low rent disc, four chapter stops and a hard to read bio page that offers little of real interest. The picture quality is quite poor, one posted review offers the idea that this is a copy of a VHS tape rather than a film negative, during one scene the image breaks up in a cluster of squares (I guess that is what some call refracting?). The movies themselves remain equally low rent 50s swiss cheese fests. Drive-in misfires from an alomst forgotten era. Still monster fans will find more than enough fun in the movies to gobble them up, but they may wish to look elsewhere for better looking transfers of these...gems. The movies are recommended, this particular disc release is not.
Rating:
Summary: Only an extra large pizza would offer more delicious cheese!
Review: This is a fairly low rent disc, four chapter stops and a hard to read bio page that offers little of real interest. The picture quality is quite poor, one posted review offers the idea that this is a copy of a VHS tape rather than a film negative, during one scene the image breaks up in a cluster of squares (I guess that is what some call refracting?). The movies themselves remain equally low rent 50s swiss cheese fests. Drive-in misfires from an alomst forgotten era. Still monster fans will find more than enough fun in the movies to gobble them up, but they may wish to look elsewhere for better looking transfers of these...gems. The movies are recommended, this particular disc release is not.
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