BEHEMOTH, THE SEA MONSTER (1959) ** Ok, stop me if you've heard this one: because of lots of nuclear testing, you see, there's a mutation giving rise to a strange and dangerous creature... Yeah, so it's the most over-used plot in the world. At least they were worried about nuclear waste in those days, now they just say "it has a half life of two million years, bury it in Nevada. If someone else has money some other day they can buy new containment facilities, but it won't matter anyway because the shit tends to seep out." Yes, science was more responsible back in the days of sea monsters. This one, this film, is a bit different anyway. It's a Britflick, and so it takes place in Cornwall and London, instead of San Francisco or New York. Well, that's something. Apparently they couldn't find enough incompetent British scientists, though, so an American one shows up to lead the way. Among other things he has a victim take him to the cove to show where he got radiated, and neglects to ask exactly where the event occurred; and wanders around a nearly empty lab unable to identify the microscope. The monster is particularly ghastly, being both electric and radioactive, and Eugéne Lourié pays a great deal of attention to detail (lighting, angles, etc.) considering the genre. Now, whether that's sad or commendable is open to debate. I kind of like the idea.
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