The Milpitas Monster

Pollution yields a winged gargantuan beast which proceeds to de-populate the community of Milpitas, California.

The general consensus on this flick is pretty reasonable...a grassroots love-letter to 50s era monster movies, funded with pocket change. Now...consider that production of this movie initialized as a high school project involving complete amateurs in every aspect of its penny-ante construction, and the results begin to look pretty darned good. Miniature sets are efficiently overseen, the monster is uniquely designed, and the various technical parts and parcels of filmmaking are roundly on the beam. It's high camp fun with a likable regional charm, and being observably rough around the edges only makes it that much more appealing.

There's a world of movies made by "professional" low-budget filmmakers that are far less enjoyable than this giddily ambitious curio. The median mainstream movie viewer will probably have a tough time with THE MILPITAS MONSTER, but it's pretty unlikely that they'd ever merge with it in the first place. For those among us with an interest in cinematic novelties with unusual production backstories, this should manage to entertain, and occasionally even impress, if accepted on its own realistic terms.

A+ for effort.

It is real easy to toast, roast, flay, and otherwise burn this film for all of its abundant flaws. It was made by high school students and faculty and a whole community; it shows! Sure, I could examine the script which is just ridiculous. A monster created from the garbage of a growing Californian city starts eating garbage and taking garbage cans all over the city. Soon this huge beast with wings no less begins to destroy buildings and even plays the "beauty and the beast" act with a young high school girl. Fortunately for her there is a gang of guys, her former boyfriend nicknamed "The Penguin," and the town drunk out to help her. The direction is awful, the production values just dreadful, the acting non-existent, and the pace sluggish. The movie is hard to sit through - period. However, that being said, it is also a miracle of a film when you consider that this thing was crafted by an entire community. You can see all the collective effort from the actors, the actual mayor and actual firemen and policemen, to the area location shots used. I also was really amazed at all the local businesses credited at the film's end with helping to finance or contribute in some way to the film. When you look at the film from that perspective, it is indeed quite an achievement. I didn't know anything about it before I sat down and watched it. Now that I have found out something about it, I am impressed. But make no mistake - I have no...NO...desire to sit through it again.

And that's not necessarily a good or bad thing.

Let's face it: The Milpitas Monster is a cheapie...in fact it's the kind of movie that Frank Zappa immortalized in the song "Cheepnis", only a couple of decades removed. This movie rode the tips of the coat tails of the brief monster movie revival of the seventies (Octaman, The Crater Lake Monster, APE) that occurred right before the advent of Star Wars and the plunge of science fiction into the mainstream.

But it has its points. I actually like some of the stop-motion animation in this one, primitive though it may be. There are a lot of interesting camera angles that one wouldn't normally see on such a film, and the lighting is for the most part adequate (the movie, especially during most of the special effects sequences, is kept rather dark).

I even enjoyed the story up until the introduction of the stupid "odorolla" tracking device, and the particularly stupid way that was used to lure the monster to its death. I don't mind a "bad" script, but I hate a stupid one.

The Milpitas Monster is worth a look if you are a fan of the giant monster genre, or if you just like cheap movies in general. A film that has Paul Frees do the narration can't be all bad.

My review was written in March 1985 after watching the movie on VCI video cassette.

Reviewed for the record, "The Milpitas Monster" is an amatuer horror film completed in 1976, theatrically unreleased and now available via home video (presented by "Le Bad Cinema"). Distrib VCI includes a disclaimer that pic "may insult your intelligence", but as usual, caveat emptor.

Premise is a huge monster (portrayed alternately by stop-motion animation and a guy in a felt suit) spawned by limitless garbage dumped in the little town of Milpitas, 40 miles from San Francisco. Between scenes of failed comedy relief concerning the town drunk George Keister, monster attacks a dance at the local high school and is finally fried when it climbs up the town's transformer tower in emulation of "King Kong".

Non-actors and incompetent film technique reduce this one to the unwatchable category. Sole point of interest is credit for (much-needed in view of the shoddy sound recording) sound effects by young wiz Ben Burtt, late an Oscar-winner for "Star Wars" and key contributor to many other recent fantasy films.

B-movies, either you love them or you hate them. Right? I'm not so sure. I believe there are exceptions. I just cannot except how anyone in their right mind, could hate this movie. And by the way, this hilariously inept pile of garbage ain't no B-movie. I'm talking about genuine Z-grade. I'm talking about some of the worst acting you'll ever see, even if you happen to like this type of thing. I'm talking about an incoherent, pointless movie which drags the term "Z-grade" to new lows. This is The Milpitas Monster. This avenger was toxic before toxic was cool. Actually, this guy isn't much of an avenger, he sorta wants to kill everybody. Years and years of garbage build-up, and an accident, involving the town drunk has somehow created a giant, pollution monster, who, like I said, wants to kill everybody, or at least walk around and scare the hell out of everyone, and destroy stuff, and leave giant footprints everywhere. That's basically it. No character development, or anything like that. I don't think that anyone even says anything remotely clever. Not the brightest bunch, I guess. The phrase "so bad, it's good" never made so much sense. An enthusiastically produced, feel-good, schlock-fest, from a better time. I would say how they don't make them like this anymore, but the truth is, they didn't then either. The giant monster thing was done a million times over in the 50's and the early 60's. Just one more thing to add to the clueless oddity that is The Milpitas Monster. I suppose this movie could have used a little gore, like other stuff from this era, but it ain't about shock in Milpitas, California, it's all about the schlock... or at least that's how things ended up. For all I know, these people could have been going for a masterpiece, although, I sincerely doubt it. Just try to remember, The Milpitas Monster meant well. 8/10