Product Details

• Actors: Allison Hayes, William Hudson, Gene Evans, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Eric Fleming
• Directors: Nathan Juran, Douglas Hickox, Eugčne Lourié, Edward Bernds
• Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 1.0)
• Subtitles: English, French
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
• Number of discs: 3
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Warner Home Video
• DVD Release Date: June 26, 2007
• Run Time: 236 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (94 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000OHZJGO
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #31,210 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Cult Camp Classics 1: Sci-Fi Thrillers - Attack of the 50 Ft. Woman (1958) / The Giant Behemoth / Queen of Outer Space" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Featuring three enjoyably "awful" movies from 1958-59, Cult Camp Classics, Vol. 1: Sci-Fi Thrillers turns nuclear radiation into cause for celebration, especially if you enjoy movies with extra cheese. With the Cold War in full swing and society's worries blamed on the threat of nuclear annihilation, sci-fi buffs (like future filmmakers Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante, and John Landis) could see a new monster movie almost every week. Many of them came from Allied Artists, the low-budget B-movie production company (formerly Monogram) that rose from the ghetto of "poverty row" distribution to produce countless exploitation thrillers between 1946 and 1979. The '50s saw the rise of nuclear monster thrillers, and Allied popularized the trend with its own menagerie of giant, irradiated creatures. The key to Allied's success was its crowd-pleasing combination of exploitable ingredients, and what better way to combine sci-fi, sex, and horror than to unleash a towering babe with an attitude problem? That's exactly what Allied did with Attack of the 50-Foot Woman, a now-classic campfest in which a spurned wife (Allison Hayes) is irradiated by a glowing alien space-ball, grows to a height of (you guessed it), and exacts revenge upon her cheating husband (William Hudson). A year before she bared her shapely backside as Playboy's Playmate of the Month for July 1959, Yvette Vickers costars as Hudson's scheming mistress, giving the film an extra boost of sex appeal. With bargain-priced effects including a giant floppy-fingered hand, hilarious process shots, and cheesy models destroyed by the world's biggest bitch (for whom it is still possible to feel some sympathetic compassion), the movie's not as good as its celebrated poster (which now adorns movie-geek T-shirts around the world), but it's still a lot of fun.

The Giant Behemoth was director Eugene Lourie's obvious attempt to capitalize on his 1953 hit The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, starring a gigantic paleosaurus rising from the Atlantic with a bad case of atomic radiation. London is the monster's eventual stomping ground, but the lumbering lizard is camera-shy for nearly an hour; you can imagine Beaver Cleaver and his pals groaning through seemingly endless scenes of talky exposition, anxiously awaiting the climactic stop-motion creature effects supervised by the legendary Willis (King Kong) O'Brien. Scoring much higher on the camp-o-meter, and far more entertaining, is the cult classic Queen of Outer Space, which borrows props and costumes from Forbidden Planet, Flight to Mars and World Without End for its outrageously kitschy plot about manly astronauts who crash-land on Venus and discover an underground society of mini-skirted space-babes. Unfortunately the disfigured Venusian queen (Laurie Mitchell) is a man-hater supreme, so the spectacularly costumed Zsa Zsa Gabor (as a Venusian scientist, no less) leads a revolution against her. With a screenplay by Twilight Zone veteran Charles Beaumont and a story credited (almost incredibly) to legendary playwright/screenwriter Ben Hecht (who surely never suspected his idea would eventually yield this movie), Queen of Outer Space is exactly what you'd expect it to be: So bad it's good, and more than worthy of inclusion in this irresistibly priced triple-feature set. --Jeff Shannon

On the DVDs
Three feature-length commentaries accompany the sci-fi thrillers in Cult Camp Classics, Vol. 1. Two of the commentaries are hosted by Tom Weaver, a noted authority on sci-fi and horror films whose historical acumen is more casual than academic: While sharing the commentary on Queen of Outer Space with the film's titular star Laurie Mitchell (who became a mainstay at fan conventions at Weaver's invitation), Weaver fails to explain how the production came to use props and costumes from the classic Forbidden Planet, and that's a glaring oversight. He compensates as an amiable interviewer with the equally good-natured Mitchell, and it's a treat to hear them enthusiastically reading unfilmed scenes from the film's original screenplay. For the commentary on Attack of the 50-Foot Woman, Weaver is joined by the film's comely costar Yvette Vickers (another regular at sci-fi conventions), and their combined anecdotes provide an adequate oral history of this camp-classic production. Star Wars veterans and special-effects masters Dennis Muren and Phil Tippett provide the loose-and-lazy commentary on The Giant Behemoth, which consists mostly of Muren making sarcastic jokes about the film's glacial pacing. It's hardly the authoritative commentary that some fans might've hoped for, but Muren and Tippett are well-versed in special-effects history (Muren even owns the original stop-motion Behemoth creature model), and they share an infectious enthusiasm for the films that inspired them to excel in their profession. --Jeff Shannon

Product Description

One woman - 25 pairs of shoes?!? It's impossible not to have fun with this all-time kitsch classic which, as fans know, is actually about a very big woman with a very bad attitude. The woman is wealthy Nancy Archer (Allison Hayes), fresh from the looney bin and ticked off. Her rat of a husband (William Hudson) has been at play while the feline's away, putting the moves on Honey Parker (Yvette Vickers, Playboy's Miss July 1959) and scheming about the day when Nancy's fortune will be theirs. That day will never come - not after Nancy has an alien encounter that zaps her metabollism into overdrive. Soon, Nancy's size matches her rage. She'll prove big girls don't cry, they get even.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

37 of 39 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I am Woman, watch me grow November 2, 2001

By Michael Wilk

Format:VHS Tape

When I was a little boy living in the Woodside Housing Projects in the early 1960s, a status symbol amongst the kids was how many times one had seen "Attack of the 50 Foot Woman" on TV. It seemed like it was on TV every week, on the Zacherley-hosted "Chiller Theater". Clips from it were even featured on the opening intro of "Chiller Theater", along with clips from "Plan 9 From Outer Space", "The Ape Man", "Killers From Space", "The Cyclops", and "Frankenstein's Daughter". Kids were easy to please back then.
This soon-to-be 45 year old kid STILL loves this film. "Attack" is essentially a trashy soap opera, featuring a philandering husband, an alcoholic heiress, a sexy "other woman", and, to top it off, a 30 foot giant who, in the words of artist Frank Dietz, looks like a gigantic Fred Mertz in a Roman costume!
Alcoholic heiress Nancy Archer (played by the voluptuous Allison Hayes, who died WAY too young), sees a flying saucer, which looks like the bubble Glinda travels in in "The Wizard of Oz". The 30 foot Fred Mertz lookalike emerges from the craft, and covets Nancy's fabulous diamond, "The Star of India". He wants it to power his spacecraft, or maybe for his own personal jewelry collection. Of course, everyone thinks that Nancy is just seeing pink elephants, including her two-timing, fortune-hunting husband Harry. Harry and his sexy girlfriend Honey Parker, (played by red-headed vixen Yvette Vickers) want Nancy committed, so they can get their greedy, sweaty little hands on her millions. What they don't bargain for is that Nancy has become contaminated by radiation from her encounter with Fred Mertz. Nancy then grows to a statuesque 50 feet, her hair turns honey blonde in the process, and she goes on a rampage, determined to wreak her vengeance on the slimy Harry and the sluttish Honey. The image of Ms. Hayes, in her matching bedsheet bra and half-slip, is an unforgettable icon. The film is a little slow going, and the "Attack" doesn't come til the last 10 minutes of the film, but it is fascinately, entertainingly awful to watch. The women's clothes look like they came straight out of a 1958 Frederick's of Hollywood catalogue, the dialogue is atrocious, and the special effects are cheesy-you can see through the Fred Mertz giant and the titular character (yes, it's a pun). The film also has that crazy 1950s iconography. The "desert community" home of the Archers (I like to think that they didn't live far from Las Vegas), the big cars with tailfins, and, of course, the sexy "broads". One can imagine what Russ Meyer would have done with this film! My favorite line occurs in the film after Nancy's first encounter with the jewelry-snatching giant, and Nancy says to Harry, "I think he was after my diamond!" I may also add, on a personal note, that two of my dearest friends, a married couple, are named Nancy and Harry. We all get a big laugh out of it! One final anecdote: I'm pretty sure Federico Fellini saw this film and was impressed. The hilarious Italian comedy "Boccaccio 70", comprises of 3 stories directed by different directors. The Fellini-directed story, "The Seduction of Dr. Antonio", deals with a straightlaced, uptight moralist and his encounter with a 50-foot tall Anita Ekberg. WOW!

29 of 32 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars What a bargain! June 8, 2007

By C. A. Luster TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:DVD

If you enjoy 1950s campy B movies, then I don't see you going wrong here with this first set. For details just search each of the movie titles and you see each movie alone runs almost as much as this set and you will see from the reviews they are all kind of legends as far as the genre goes. They actually are some of the best of that period of B movies. I know I like all three of these in this set. I can say I compare the "50 ft Woman" to the "War of the Colossal Beast" and "The Giant Behemoth" to "Beast from 20,000 Fathoms". The last one with Zsa Zsa Gabor on the planet of women is not to be missed if nothing more than to see how far we had plunged into skimpily clad women with bad lines in B class SciFi moviedom. Hmmm does B stand for bad? Well even if it does these movies are entertaining for most fans of science fiction.

The first two movies in the set are black and white movies but they look like they have been gone over and cleaned up. "Queen of Outer Space" is in color and very clear and sharp. I got my set a few days ago so my wife and I watched the first two in the set a couple nights ago and the third last night. All the DVDs are sharp and clear. Each had a commentary available by someone in the movie. "Does anyone know if the costumes, sets, and music for "Queen of Outer Space" was done by people that later worked on "Star Trek"? The mens uniforms and radios definitely looked like they came from the "Forbidden Planet" wardrobe. I'm definitely glad I got this set.

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good to see these films again June 26, 2007

By R. Gorey

Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase

Prints for these films look fine, and it's good to see such modest movies cleaned up and given the DVD treatment, though some purists will question the minor letterboxing on "50 ft. Woman" and "Behemoth". Yvette Vickers commentary on "50 ft. Woman" is a treat. She remembers the film well and speaks fondly of it and of her time spent making the movie. Be aware though: the advertisements say the trailer for "Woman" is on the DVD, but for some reason it isn't. Strange: probably an oversight. "Behemoth" looks sharp and clear, but Dennis Muren and Phil Tippet's commentary does a great disservice. They clearly don't respect the film at all, and spend much of their time insulting it, even mocking it, before wrapping up with "well, I guess now we know why they never made a sequel to this movie." Wish they'd had some affection for the film, or had at least familiarized themselves with it before offering such caustic feedback. By the ninth or tenth time they say, "Ray Harryhausen would have done this SO MUCH better" the novelty wears thin, and one wonders what Harryhausen himself might have said about the movie. "Queen of Outer Space" has the novelty of color, and the surprising pedigree of a Ben Hecht screen story. Kudos to Warner Bros. for putting these films out, and yes, the "Behemoth" disc has the often cut ferryboat scene, for those who are interested. Too bad about the shoddy "Behemoth" commentary, but fans should enjoy thoroughly these long-awaited B movies.