MONSTER ON THE CAMPUS! (1958)

Dir. by Jack Arnold
Star: Troy Donahue, Arthur Franz

Jack Arnold is clearly the pre-eminent Science Fiction film director of the 1950s. His work includes: “Creature From The Black Lagoon;” “Revenge of The Creature;” “This Island Earth;” “Tarantula;” “The Incredible Shrinking Man”---all directed between 1954 and 1957.

“Monster On The Campus” (1958) was the last Science Fiction film Arnold ever directed and that fact, alone, speaks volumes!

Unlike “The Creature” films; the fascinating make-up and gadgetry of “This Island Earth;” and the non-stop dizzying action of “Tarantula” and “Shrinking Man;” “Monster On The Campus” moves about as fast as my grandmother’s 1957 Buick and has some of the most embarrassingly overwrought and unintentionally funny acting and special effects ever to be included in the work of a major Hollywood director. Though Arnold continued directing movies (and predominantly television) for more than twenty years longer, he never again got near a science fiction film.

Arthur Franz, who died a few years ago at the ripe old age of 86, plays Professor Ronald Blake, a pioneering scientist who refuses to knuckle under to the conformity demanded by his 1950s academic lifestyle. He takes chances, rebels, and is disliked by almost everybody! When he orders a coelacanth (a primitive fish thought to be extinct) and starts examining it, some of the creatures blood falls on him and……..HE BECOMES A MONSTER! An extremely fakey, incoherent, and and unconvincing monster, but a monster nonetheless. The monster sort of looks like at.country singer Ryan Adams after he’s played 3 bad gigs in Fresno, drunk a 30 ounce economy-sized bottle of Extra-Strength Milk of Magnesia and not shaved in about three years!

Teen heart-throb Troy Donahue is Franz’ assistant and he’s totally excited and enthusiastic about conformity. It’s his bag! He’s got a neat girlfriend (though her ‘50s skirts and hairstyle is a bit frightening); a good part-time job; and he’s a happening unit! As far as Troy is concerned, long live conformity!

But The Monster soon starts terrorizing the campus and Troy’s ivory tower playhouse starts to get torn down. He needs to find the monster. Old Arthur Franz is also feeling the pressure of everyone hating him and decides to give up his grouchy ways and actually help capture the monster. Of course, he doesn’t know that HE IS THE MONSTER!

This all occurs in the first 15 minutes, so I’m not spoiling the movie, but I will go no further. Director Jack Arnold probably wishes he had done the same! No one’s motivation makes any sense, including why a major studio like Universal would finance celluloid garbage of this low-tide level.

The actors all look like they could have phoned in their performances, but, especially in keeping with the conformity theme we’ve been developing this quarter—the anemic and insipid acting (veteran bad ‘50s scientist-actor, Whit Bissel, virtually seems like Laurence Olivier compared to the rest of the cast) only further spotlights the vapid, uncreative atmosphere of this isolated and inarticulate academic world.
With all the subtlety of beating us over the head with a club, director Arnold drives home the fact that, due to his eccentricities and failure to “fit in,” Prof. Arthur Franz basically has to become a monster just to get anyone to listen to his scientific theories!
Of course, Franz’ theories are all pseudo-intellectual ca-ca and intellectually blow chunks, but that’s not the point! He shouldn't have to become a monster just to get peoples' attention.