The Blob (1958) – Review

The 1950s were certainly the glory days when it came to monster movies and science fiction — two great tastes that taste great together — and if atomic testing wasn’t awakening creatures like Godzilla and The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, then mad scientists were creating Monsters on Campus and giant Tarantulas, but in 1958, a new kind of monster crept its way into theatres, something that had never been seen before, a seemingly unstoppable blob that devoured everyone in its path.

Over the years, the silver screen had seen a variety of monsters, but usually they fell into two categories: they were either humanoid, like Frankenstein’s monster, or monstrous beasts like King Kong and Mothra, and they were mostly cases of either man “Meddling in God’s domain,” or they explored Lands Unknown, but in 1958, producer Jack H. Harris gave us a unique creature from the depths of space. Now, threats from outer space were certainly nothing new, such films as It Came from Outer Space revelled in such perils, but The Blob gave us an alien amoeboid that sported neither a veiny forehead or sharp talons, and it certainly had no interest in body snatching other than to dissolve said body as a snack. The Blob was a faceless and seemingly mindless creature with only one goal, consume and get bigger; a creature that if left unchecked could threaten all life on Earth.

It’s lucky for humanity that these two were necking nearby.

Jack Harris’ The Blob is a classic example of the 50’s B-movie, having an insanely low budget and a mostly unknown cast — Steve McQueen being two years away from starring in The Magnificent Seven — but it’s the simplicity of the story and the creature itself that has made this film stand the test of time. The movie opens with two young teenagers, Steve Andrews (Steve McQueen) and his girlfriend, Jane Martin (Aneta Corsaut), as they spend the evening kissing at a lovers’ lane, but rampaging hormones are put on hold when a meteorite streaks across the heavens and lands somewhere nearby. Steve is all for checking out this astronomical event, much to his nonplussed date’s desires, which leads them into almost running down an old man (Olin Howland) who staggers into the road looking rather distressed by the fact that he has a particularly nasty jelly-like globule stuck on his hand, which he had the misfortune to acquire after poking the contents of the aforementioned meteorite with a stick.

Safety Tip: Do not poke things from space with a stick.

The two civic-minded teenagers drop the old man off at Doctor Hallen’s (Stephen Chase) office, a man of medicine who takes the sight of a gelatinous blob eating a man’s hand rather well, and then the Doc sends the kids back to where they found him to see if they could locate his people. But before our heroes can get all Scully and Mulder, they are distracted by the appearance of some of Steve’s friends, one of which challenges Steve to a car race. Steve agrees to the race, adding the stipulation that they race backwards, and thus cemented my earlier conclusion that Steve was a bit of an idiot. Not only did he get sidetracked from making out with his girlfriend by a shooting star, but almost immediately he sets aside his mission to investigate the Blob so that he can goof around with a trio of fellow idiots.

Rebels without a clue.

The Blob may have one of the more interesting and original monsters in cinema history, but sadly, that’s where the originality stops, as much of the film deals with Steven and friends trying to get the adults in town to believe them about the monster from outer space. We get the two counterpoints of the understanding in the form of Lieutenant Dave (Earl Rowe), who let’s slide the whole racing backwards thing, and the very angry Sergeant Bert (John Benson) who hates all teenagers because one reckless teenage driver caused the death of his wife, which one has to admit could skew one’s belief in today’s youths, but between these two police officers and Steve and Jane’s concerned parents, we find ourselves spending way too much time watching people argue and not enough time with the Blob’s oozing rampage.

We don’t get so much as a rampage as we do a murderous amble.

Stray Thoughts:

• Did teenage girls in the 50s actually wear pearls when going to Lover’s Lane?
• Doctor Hallen has his nurse first try acid against The Blob, but when that fails, he tries to shoot the thing, which has to be about the dumbest weapon to use against an amorphous blob.
• The nurse gets eaten because she trips over a lamp allowing the slow-moving Blob to get her, which really sums up the Blob as a poor threat unless you are clumsy and incredibly slow.
• This town has a grocery store that closes at 10:00 pm which must have been a rare thing for a small town in the 50s.
• The Blob attacks a midnight creature feature at the local theatre. You have to respect a monster that attacks with irony.

Notice the smiling faces of the fleeing populace.

The Blob may not be full to the brim with thrills and chills, but the effects work used to create the title creature was a testament to low budget ingenuity, created with silicon and red die — sometimes coated over a weather balloon — The Blob is a rather effective monster movie and the use of matte paintings and miniatures all go towards making a credible creature from space. Unfortunately, as mentioned, the film’s meagre budget didn’t allow for much Blob-on-populace action, and so the bulk of the film’s eighty-two-minute run-time is spent with a group of movie teenagers who one would guess had their dialogue written by dyslexic aliens who only caught a portion of Rebel Without a Cause, and certainly not helped by the leads not looking remotely like teenagers.

Steve McQueen, the twenty-seven-year-old teenager.

Director Irwin Yeaworth did the best he could with the limitations he was dealing with, such as not having enough money to afford proper coverage, thus, we get an entire scene that only gives us the back of Steve McQueen’s head, but he still managed to generate a good sense of dread and suspense, which resulted in a film that is if not the best of its genre, easily one of the more fun to watch installations. 1958’s The Blob is a film I can heartily recommend to fans of the cheesy 50s monster flicks, but if you want a true horrific version of this outer space menace, the 1988 remake was surprisingly good and worth checking out as well.

Sequel Set-Up: The Blob is defeated by being frozen by CO2 fire extinguishers and then transported to the Arctic, which leads Lieutenant Dave to state, “At least we got it stopped,” but with Steve pointing out, “Yeah, as long as the Arctic stays cold,” but the sequel Beware! The Blob just has some poor mook bringing a sample back from up north, so a proper sequel made today, one that deals with Global Warming, seems like a natural.