Conflating the Western, horror and teenage movie genres as it does, "Teenage Monster" (1957) is a unique experience indeed. It also features the most frightening monster in a late 1800s Western setting since Mercedes McCambridge stalked through the plains of "Johnny Guitar" (1954). In this film, a meteor that looks like a July 4th sparkler crashes near the mine of the Cannon family, killing Paw and turning young Charles into a mutant of sorts. Seven years later, Charles is the eponymous teenage monster, killing cattle and the occasional passerby, while his Maw must hide him from the townsfolk and deal with her new blackmailing hussy of a housekeeper. Charles, as a teenager, looks like nothing more than a long-haired and long-bearded hippie with bad teeth (I've seen worse walking the streets of the East Village!), despite the makeup work by Jack "Frankenstein" Pierce. His garbled, whining attempts at speech are reminiscent of a constipated canine and are quite pathetic, but still had me cracking up somehow. Anne Gwynne, who was featured in any number of 1940s Universal horror films, is fine as Charles' sacrificing mother, and, actually, their relationship is kinda sweet. Still, the film, fun as it is, is patently ridiculous, and with a very rushed ending to boot. Even my revered "Psychotronic Encyclopedia" calls it "awful." My tastes must be getting more and more dubious, though, because I did have a good time with this unique little quickie.
