Cyclops, The (DVD)

Steve Barton |

Mar 18, 2011

Starring James Craig, Gloria Talbott, Lon Chaney, Jr., Duncan ‘Dean’ Parkin

Directed by Bert I. Gordon

Both The Amazing Colossal Man and War of the Colossal Beast are two of this reviewer’s favorite movies. There’s just never a wrong time to see a giant bald man in a makeshift diaper wreck the city of Las Vegas only to fall off of the Hoover Dam and then come back for more with half of his face ripped of. Really. There’s not.

The Cyclops is sort of like the bastard third entry into the short-lived Colossal franchise. It’s never been dubbed an actual sequel mind you, but we do indeed get a giant bald man in a makeshift diaper with one eye running rampant and making noises usually reserved for after a late night meal at Taco Bell.

In the flick an expedition to Mexico to find a long lost pilot who crashed deep within the wild jungle yields startling results when our adventurers come face-to-big-toe with a twenty-five-foot one-eyed behemoth. But that’s not all. Along the way they also encounter giant bugs, huge dinosaur-like lizards, and glowing mountains of uranium. What else could have caused such beasts?

When all is said and done, The Cyclops is indeed the cheesiest and weakest of the giant man movies. It takes way too long to get going, but when it gets there? Mayhem – hilarious mayhem ensues. Good thing for us the great Lon Chaney, Jr. is here to help us through the film’s duller moments. Is he over-acting? Or is he just soused? We may never know, but one thing is for sure … the monster makeup in this flick is nothing short of memorable in a Arseface kind of way.

Again, this is a Warner Archive title. All titles released under that banner are made to order and not mass produced. As a result, once you order, you don’t get an “official” DVD, just a DVD-R in a pretty box, so if you have a player that has problems playing that type of disc, you may want to steer clear. Even more unfortunate, we get no extras whatsoever. Not even a chapter select. Still, this is the only way to see titles like this so we can easily forgive the shortcomings.

The Cyclops is a must own for any fan of Fifties horror. With its release the Warner Archive has given us a cheese-laden gift of the highest regard. Bless their gigantic uranium-enriched hearts!

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