Monster on the Campus (1958)

I really don't know what to make of this film - it's an odd but kinda okay to watch. The movie isn't quite as fun as I expected it be but it wasn't all that bad either. Just a so-so film I guess.What got to me was when Prof. Donald Blake first got his hand in the prehistoric fish's mouth, the hand was bleeding badly and he didn't dress the wound, instead he wanted to move the fish tank and his hand slipped into the dirty fish water then he started sucking on the wound with the dirty fish water. WTF? Not what I would expect from a professor at all. But it was funny.The creature the professor became is kinda cheesy looking but that's what made it fun. The story is average. There is one scene which surprised me a bit - when the forest ranger got it with the axe - that was unexpected! Overall, it's not bad - just not one of the better Universal sci-fi horror films I seen.5/10

In "Monster on the Campus", the excellent character actor Arthur Franz plays Professor Donald Blake, who receives an interesting package one day. His new prize is a coelacanth, a hideous prehistoric fish unchanged for centuries while other species have evolved. He accidentally cuts his hand on its teeth, and this effects horrible changes in his own body. He periodically turns into a throwback, or primitive man, that goes out and kills.The script by David Duncan doesn't bring anything really new to the table in terms of the monster-on-the-loose formula, but typically good direction by sci-fi expert Jack Arnold helps a lot, as well as the efforts of an engaging cast. Franz is especially fine in the lead. Much like many a protagonist in this type of story, he does earn our sympathies, and it's still compelling watching the character come to learn what we in the audience already know.The creature design by Jack Kevan and makeup by Bud Westmore are decent. Stuntman Eddie Parker takes over for Franz once Blake is transformed into the monster. Joanna Moore is a pretty and appealing leading lady, Judson Pratt does well as the detective on the case, Arnold regular Whit Bissell is solid as ever as Blakes' disbelieving colleague, and Troy Donahue is reasonably likable as student Jimmy Flanders. Use of stock music is adequate throughout, and the finale is good, albeit with a VERY familiar resolution to fans of these kinds of scary movies.Seven out of 10.

Spoilers abound: I've only seen Monster On the Campus a couple of times, find it entertaining and competently made. It's a nostalgic trip to the old Universal back lot of what's now a half-century ago, thus a lot of the sets are familiar to film buffs of the Hollywood of an earlier time.Arthur Franz plays the title character well and without a whiff of condescension. He's a better actor than the material requires, gives his all. Whit Bissell, like Franz, was also an old hand, a veteran of science fiction pictures of the period. Both actors had played professor-scientist types before, and both were good at it.The actors in the film consist of familiar faces and a few familiar names, most notably soon to be teen heartthrob Troy Donahue. Joanna Moore is the leading lady and, like Franz, does nicely with what she's given to do. Overall, the movie is a solid professional job, as director Jack Arnold had made a number of films like it before.My only complaint, and it's a minor one, is that the movie cues the viewer how it's going to end on the last leg of the journey, when the professor spends what's supposed to be down time in a mountain cabin. There are shades of earlier Universal films in Monster On the Campus, whose main character is not unlike the Invisible Man; and his fate is rather similar to that of the Wolf Man, with a needle instead of an autumn moon, but no matter.Those old, easy to guess plot twists,--it's pretty easy to guess who's going to "get it" next--were, to me, reassuring, and I think they would be for most viewers. The absence of much in the way of surprise in the story doesn't really hurt the movie, a road well traveled by those most likely to want to watch a film with a title that, well, says it all.

This movie has some good performances and suspenseful sequences, alternating with unintentionally funny moments. There's something irresistibly humorous about the scene where earnest college professor Arthur Franz's lovely fiancée confides to her college president father, in what sounds like a genuine Southern accent, " I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but I couldn't help overhearing him talking to Madagascar about a fish!" The scenes where the partially glimpsed monster stalks people are effectively done, especially the moment when a horrified couple discover the body of a victim hanging from a tree by her hair. The darkened campus at night as a place of potential terror is contrasted effectively with the opening daytime scenes of students strolling around. There are plenty of nicely done character roles such as the genial grounds-keeper, Helen Westcott as a nurse who has a thing for the Professor, and Judson Pratt as a worldly-wise police detective. Whit Bissell as a disbelieving colleague and the grumpy university president are also effective.Arthur Franz carries the movie as the dedicated scientist who can't get anyone to believe in his strange discoveries, or his theory about a prehistoric man being the killer the police are searching for. He plays his role so seriously that it risks becoming unintentionally humorous at times, especially the moment when he puffs on his pipe without realizing he's ingesting some pretty strange stuff that got into it by accident.This movie isn't too bad, taken all together. It's a bit dull in spots and could have used some more action of the monster, but there are compensations in the form of classic Fifties automobiles on display ,along with beautiful women wearing very becoming Fifties fashions. Good fun for fans of Fifties science fiction and those who enjoy a bit of camp humor.