Customer Reviews

Mystery Science Theater 3000: Creeping Terror [VHS]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

No movie comes close to being as bad as The Creeping Terror.

At many points, it seems as the director refused to shoot scenes more than once. There is a point in which a hair is stuck to the camera, several other major video problems, and several times when the actors fall for no apparant reason.

The whole plot of the movie is the monster going around eating people, most of whom are making out at the time. The monster creeps up to them extremely slowly, none of them attempt to run, and then either the people climb into the monster, or they instantly appear halfway inside of it.

There is basically no dialogue in the movie. Whenever people are talking, the narrator just explains what it is they're talking about.

Most of the scenes in the movie are completely pointless, and some are unrelated to the rest of the movie. While the monster is eating a group of people who are conveniently standing in a corner waiting to be eaten, it for some reason flashes several times to a scene of two men fighting. All of the other scenes are long and unnecessary, and involve people doing very little for several minutes, then getting eaten by the monster.

There are also some things that just don't make sense. At one part, a man suddenly explodes for no apparant reason, and it is not explained later in the movie.

I've seen a lot of MST3K episodes, but none of them come even close to being as funny as The Creeping Terror. Most MST3K movies are boring and have little plot, but this movie is actively horrible, as if the people making it were complete idiots, or just didn't care at all how it would turn out. Mike and the robots don't even have to make that many comments, because the movie is just so amazingly and obviously bad, although the skits are funny as well. I think everyone should see this movie.

Here is a true MST3K classic from Season Six. The Creeping Terror may well be the most ridiculous horror movie ever made. The creative geniuses behind the film searched far and wide for the most talented actors available and made sure that none of them appeared in the movie. The actors that were chosen were given lines to speak, but 75% of the time a weird narrator describes the action and conversations himself. Telling someone where to go loses a lot of its impact when you end up having a third party tell you that so-and-so told that guy where to go. Worst of all, the narrator wanders into lengthy soliloquies about matters such as marriage that have nothing to do with the plot. What about the monster, you ask? Oh, brother. If the sight of carpet scares you, you may find the monster a little unnerving, but I can guarantee the complete absence of terror in your reaction. For what it is worth, though, the monster has the creeping part down pat. Without the active assistance of his victims, the alien would quickly starve to death. While they could all easily flee, his victims choose to sit quietly and wait for the monster to creep over to where they are; then, when he finally manages to reach them, they are kind enough to actually pull themselves up into his mouth. I can't even describe the foolishness of this monster's appearance--you just have to see it for yourself.

The movie has other problems, as well. For instance, when the monster creeps into a dance hall (and why do all horror movies from the 50s have to have a dance hall segment, anyway?), instead of feeding themselves to the alien, two guys we don't even know decide to have a fist fight for no discernible reason. Of course, this is a vast improvement over the silly music and dancing we are forced to endure for several minutes as we wait for Mr. Slowpoke to get there (I say dancing, but I think at least one guy was having some type of seizure on the dancefloor). Speaking of the dance music, I must offer one caveat to your potential purchase of this video. You will hear a lot of the inane, repetitive dance music from the film; one host segment in the SOL features Mike listening to the tune on his new stereo for minutes on end, and the ending credits are also accompanied and drawn out interminably by the tune. It takes days to get the song out of your head, so be prepared. Laughs are what matter most, though, and this experiment has plenty of them from start to finish, making The Creeping Terror one of the better MST3K videos released by Rhino.

I wonder if producers and directors in the '50's and '60's could appreciate the idea that in merely 25 years time, their handiwork would be totally trashed by our heroes, the silloetted friends on the bottom of a TV screen! THIS piece of trollop is so bad..... no wonder that in the ending skit, Tom Servo and Crow dive for cover in the gullet of Gypsy!

Most memorable lines:

The showing of the Jr. Sherriff's baby, when Crow says! "Oh, cootsie cootsie coo, my sweet little boat anchor!"

When the portly grandfather gets "et" by the "thing in the closet" wannabe, and one of the bots say: "Looks like the world has lost another Santa!"

When the glob of blob attacks that old racecar to get at the dead teenagers, someone remarks about how canned meat isnt to fresh, and their hillarious remarks about getting a Snickers out of that vending machine! "That car has cream filling inside!"

This dog of a movie is truly a two edged sword! If you can endure the monotone narration, the outdoor scenes in glorious white-and-white, the technological superiority of the mutants with their computers with DIALS stolen from the Wizard of Oz set, and that monster's tracheotomy inviting teenagers into taking the plunge into monotany, then you will LOVE Mike and the Bots adding their own brand of "narration" to this piece of s--....er, masterpiece!

I had nearly every MST3K episode on video at one time or another. But I was young and stupid and didn't realize MST wouldn't be on forever, and so a lot of the episodes got taped over -- usually by other episodes. I still have a lot of tapes, but some of the best episodes are lost forever ... unless, of course, Rhino releases them commercially.

Unfortunately, whether for copyright reasons or its own perverse marketing sense, Rhino seems committed to releasing good-but-not-quite-the-best episodes like 'The Creeping Terror,' while allowing others to remain but fading memories in the minds of devotees like me.

Oh well. Anyway, 'Creeping Terror' is a monster-from-space flick not unlike 'Earth versus the Spider,' 'Teenagers from Outer Space,' and several other MSTed movies. The film is mostly narration, the special effects are ... special, and the acting even worse. M&TB (Mike and The Bots) do the best they can, and get in some good riffs. But sometimes movies are so awful that even Our Heroes seem at a loss. The film itself often seems to creep as slowly as the monster does.

Maybe the fimmakers could only afford one microphone, so they gave it to the narrator! Overall, this a pretty decent episode. The flat, monotonous music that gets played at the dance party will stay in your head for days afterward. It's even funnier when, in one of the host segments, Mike is surrounded by these giant speakers for his new sound system and he just stands there listening to that same flat, monotonous music! Then it gets played again over the end credits! ARGH!

The Creeping Terror is such a bad movie that even in 1964 I refused to pay the .25 cents admission price. Fast Forward forty-seven years and it was on cable so I finally watched it and it seems I was smarter in 1964. The movie has no worth but it deserves at least two stars for its achievement in incompetence.

A Alien spacecraft lands in a remote section of Anywhere USA and out slithers the creature who begins to devour the locals.

The creature is made up of a combination of bed comforter and living room fringed rug. The head is a paper mache kindergarden project with streamers for teeth.

Most of the soundtrack was lost so a nasally narrator fills in the missing dialogue.

When the monster strikes, the "victims" actually drag thenselves under the rug. Or may I say "they were swept under the rug?".

There is a scene at a local dancehall where the patrons are dancing the twist which looks like a group of spastics having a fit. The monster invades the dancehall and all the patrons gather in a corner to be swept under the rug. Considering how they danced, they deserved to be eaten.

The army is called out to destroy the monster but even the troop of 5 that show up are no match for the walking carpet.

I wish I had seen this movie with the MST3K "bots" it would have been hilarious with their wisecracks but then again anyone can make wisecracks with a movie this bad.

One piece of advice. When a creeping fringed carpet invades your little hick town in Anywhere USA and you are at a loss at how to defeat the invader......"USE A VACUUM CLEANER,MORONS".

I selected Creeping Terror because it was a sixth season Mike Episode and some of the reviews made it sound like a hilariously funny episode. Sadly, it really did not live up to my expectations. The movie itself has little to offer the review geniuses, especially in the side of dialogue.

As a bad carpet sample lands on Earth and starts slowly eating people a newly wedded deputy wanders around keeping many deaths from the public, I think. It's hard to discern exactly what's going on as the director decided to rely upon a narrator going on and on about marriage instead of explaining what was going on with the title character eating people.

The scenes with the high school dance (even though everyone was 40) are the funniest of the whole movie as Mike and the 'bots go after every single horrid, rhythmless, typical '50's adult twitches to very banal music. As one woman's hinnie is about to explode, a subplot spills out onto the screen from no where.

Even the bits are not that up to par. The first one about raising the flag seems to come from no where and go there. The second and third bits are more funny, but still nothing to write home about.

But even with all this, it is still a MST3K episode and there are laugh out loud moments that are enough of a reason to buy Creeping Terror. However, if you're looking for a hilarious Sixth Season Mike episode then I recommend "Angels Revenge" that is if you can stand the sight of Jim Bakkus.

Put aside for a moment the fact that this movie has more padding than Twiggy's bra, as all of the action literally creeps along. What really sets this film apart is the fact that it's got one of the goofiest looking monsters of all time. It looks and moves like a crazy float from a parade in the bizarro world. The monster's victims must be suicidal, because most of them literally crawl into the creature's mouth. At least, I think it's his mouth! Most of the time we only see the legs of some girls going inside it as they're being devoured. Tom Servo notes, "I think this is kind of a weird little turn-on for the director." There's a scene where the monster goes to lover's lane and eats the kids making out in the cars. That gives a whole new meaning to term "meals on wheels." The creepy monster creeping along, combined with the hilarious MST3K comments, makes for an unbeatable combination. This is one Mystery Science Theater 3000 movie that should be released on DVD.

One of the most memorable pieces of cinematic slime ever unearthed on the show, this flick features a slow-moving, not-at-all-scary rug monster with clearly visible human feet and some truly awful narration (due to, so the story goes, the original soundtrack being lost in the lake). Add top-notch riffing and some good host segments and you've got one classic episode.

Well, I'll try to write a review: A giant shag carpet/caterpillar monster from outer space lands on Earth. It moves about a 40 feet an hour but the people it likes to snack on help it out by climbing inside it's mouth. There is very little dialogue, a subplot about the wonders of marriage, and the most monotonous narration ever put on film. It's a wonder Mike and the bots made it out alive.