THE GIANT CLAW (1957)

 1957's GIANT CLAW is similarly risible despite its straight-faced approach. However, its script does succeed in conjuring its cosmological motif with greater complexity, and as more than one fan has observed, it might have been one of the better giant-critter features had it not been for the FX used: probably the gooniest looking marionettes ever to appear in a 1950s creature-feature.

Nevetheless, the giant bird-- nicknamed "La Carcagne" on some websites because one character associates the monster with a French-Canadian myth about a giant harpy-like creature-- doesn't scuttle the whole film. Profiting from THEM's example more than does NIGHT OF THE LEPUS, director Fred Sears builds tension for the first half-hour as the winged predator swoops down on Air Force jets and civilian planes alike, seeming like a phantom because it's immune to being detected by American radar. (As I recall the beast never menaces any area beyond North America.) When fighter jets finally do encounter the beast, they find that it possesses a naturally-generated shield of anti-matter, rendering it both invulnerable and untraceable.

No doubt the sci-fi doubletalk justifying the bird's force-field amounts to hogwash in the world of real science. Nevertheless, the heroes have to do a lot of heavy thinking to figure out how the bird operates (absorbing its victim's energies rather than actually eating their flesh), what it means to do on Earth (it's building a nest for a lotta little predators), and how to penetrate that force field by bombarding the creature with "mu-mesons." The principal characters are well-drawn stereotypes, and the action is always brisk, especially when the bird swoops in too quickly for the camera to focus on its overall appearance. Sears' best-directed scene may be the one in which a group of joy-riding teens violate their curfew and fall victim to the bird's attack, just moments before they joke about "putting salt on the bird's tail." Neither the Cold War nor nuclear brinksmanship are directly referenced, though the opening narration emphasizes the work of "free men" to combat evil. There's little doubt that "La Carcagne" embodies, like all good monsters, many of the period's anxieties. Is it a coincidence that the lead female is one of Those Professional Women, yet the Giant Claw is a "traditional mother?"