Island of Terror
Night of the Silicates / The Creepers

UK 1966
produced by
Tom Blakeley, Gerald A. Fernback (executive), Richard Gordon (executive) for Planet Film Productions
directed by Terence Fisher
starring Peter Cushing, Edward Judd, Carole Gray, Eddie Byrne, Sam Kydd, Niall MacGinnis, James Caffrey, Liam Gaffney, Roger Heathcote, Keith Bell, Shay Gorman, Peter Forbes-Robertson, Richard Bidlake, Joyce Hemson, Edward Ogden
written by Edward Mann, Al Ramsen, music by Malcolm Lockyer, special effects by Michael Albrechtsen, John St. John Earl, W.T. Partleton

review by
Mike Haberfelner

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When island doctor Landers (Eddie Byrne) stumbles over a dead body that is completely boneless, a condition for which he understandibly has no explanation), he calls upon two scientists from the mainland, Doctor Stanley (Peter Cushing) and Doctor West (Edward Judd) - who brings his girlfriend (Carole Gray) - to investigate, and they soon find out that the local cancer research center has developed a silicate-based lifeform that's supposed to eat tumors - only it eats bones instead, apparently. At the cancer research center, everybody is already dead, but the silicate based creatures (called Silicates from here on) have long left the lab and are now roaming free, and what's worse, they multiply by cell division every few hours. Soon, the Silicates have almost overrun the island, and all of the islanders lock themselves in inside the community center. West and Stanley (who has lost one hand to the creatures already by this point) meanwhile have found out that the creatures are allergic to Strontium-90 - so they decide to contaminate the whole cattle population of the island and use it as bait (after all, cattle has bones as well, right?). The Silicates eat the bait alright, but that doesn't immediately slow them down, and soon they are all over the community center and even find their way in ... and they only die collectively and all of a sudden from radiation before they have killed the entire human island population, our heroes included.

One of these British science fiction films that will strike one as nothing short of silly upon closer examination, and of course the special effects are slightly laughable and corners have been cut to keep the budget low - yet while watching it, the whole thing (including its so-called science) makes perfect sense in itself, and a compact directorial effort and great cast (first and foremost of course Peter Cushing) more than make up for all the film's shortcomings. Ok, so the film is sci-fi-trash no matter which way you look at it, but pretty good trash nevertheless.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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