The Giant Behemoth aka Behemoth the Sea Monster (1959)

The Giant Behemoth aka Behemoth the Sea Monster (Dir: Eugène Lourié, 1959)

Taking inspiration from The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (Eugène Lourié, 1953) and Godzilla (Ishiro Honda, 1954), The Giant Behemoth (released in edited form in the UK as Behemoth the Sea Monster) is 1950s monster movie mayhem on a minuscule budget.  

In a classic 'when atomic testing turns bad' scenario, a pre-historic Palaeosaurus comes ashore on the Cornish coast, threatening the lives of marine life and crusty old fishermen. Not content with terrorising townsfolk in the West Country, the rampaging radioactive reptile heads to London. What is a bored behemoth to do in the big city but riot? If only the meddling military don't stand in his way... 

It would be easy to dismiss this, admittedly schlocky, sci-fi as just another second feature monster flick with second rate special effects, but to do so would be doing The Giant Behemoth something of a disservice.

Granted, its plot is a bit of a potboiler, already over familiar by the late 1950s. Regardless of which, a great deal of pseudo science is employed to explain the onscreen events, resulting in a rather talky first half. Surprisingly, it doesn’t have too much of a detrimental effect on the pacing. Padding it may be, the 'science part' doesn't detract too much from the tension building and the movie is actually rather well paced, in spite of obvious exposition; although I am sure most audience members are just eager to see the monster create chaos in the capital.

Already a noted art director, Eugène Lourié  made his directorial debut with the influential sci-fi classic The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, often regarded as the movie which started the monster fad of the 50s. The Giant Behemoth sees him in similar creature feature territory. While the former was a low budget affair, its superior stop motion animation by effects genius Ray Harryhausen would lend the film a polish that belies its budgetary restraints.  ...Behemoth, too, utilises stop motion animation, but with less satisfying results. Harryhausen's mentor Willis O’Brien was the uncredited special effects designer and creator, although his work here is a considerable step down from his contribution to the staggering effects in King Kong (Merian C Cooper & Ernest B Schoedsack). In actuality the stop motion animation is decent here, especially when seen in wider shots. However, this is greatly undermined by some wretched close-ups of a clearly static puppet. We see the same cars trashed and the same extras attacked time and again, diminishing the otherwise sterling model work. 

For what it's worth Lourié makes the best of the meagre ingredients and delivers a well paced, enjoyable B picture. He would direct four features in total, all in a similar pulp sci-fi vein. While each movie has its merits, all but The Beast... are hampered by tiny budgets. The Giant Behemoth is no monster masterpiece but it is a worthy edition to the creature feature genre. Rough and ready, certainly,  but with an undeniable cut price charm.