Deliciously bad, this has a few thoughtful moments where reporter Peggie Castle declares in her cynical manner that you never get used to seeing the aftermath of disaster, and in this film, she gets to see her share of horror too with men bigger than her being eaten by the likes of Jimminy Cricket! There's no wishing upon a star for survival here because these giant grasshoppers/locusts/crickets (whatever you want to call them) have an outrageous appetite and are now flooding the south side of Chicago. But before you break into the Ray Price song or "Bad Bad, LeRoy Brown", check out this ultra campy 1950's B science fiction anti-nuclear power horror film where the ideals of giant strawberries and tomatoes created by nerdy scientist Peter Graves lead to the creation of giant blood thirsty creatures. When first seen, the giant cricket comes upon its unknowing victim and gets the audience's attention, not because it is scary, but because its poor victim is so pathetic and lovable. But as lovable as the victim is, that doesn't make this movie any better as the army of crickets stalk the army of man, not leaving any trace of them, just as they had done with the town first attacked by them that has the over crowded population of 132.
While I can see some people putting this on their list of the worst movies ever made, I call this one a guilty pleasure, which up there with the atomic turkey in "The Giant Claw" is one of the silliest looking movie monsters ever. Photos of Chicago buildings (one of which looks like downtown Manhattan's Municipal Building) with the bugs walking on them are so blurry that the so-called special effect is entirely obvious. While I expected to see one of the bugs walk off of the building altogether, there was only a hint of that. There is the repeated shot of the crickets falling off of the building after being shot at, the panic in the streets and parks as public announcements are made of not to panic, interrupted by the loud chirping and sudden arrival of the big pesky bugs. Certainly, the producers and director knew that this would be panned and considered one of the worst movies of the year (or ever), but they knew that they could make a quick bug, oops, I mean buck, and even today, it is deliciously funny even if there was a panic of how nuclear power and other discoveries of the time could have major impacts on things on our planet we take for granted. When this is all said and done, it is an enjoyable guilty pleasure, leading to a clinch for the leading man and lady that prior to that fade-out had not even been hinted at.
While I can see some people putting this on their list of the worst movies ever made, I call this one a guilty pleasure, which up there with the atomic turkey in "The Giant Claw" is one of the silliest looking movie monsters ever. Photos of Chicago buildings (one of which looks like downtown Manhattan's Municipal Building) with the bugs walking on them are so blurry that the so-called special effect is entirely obvious. While I expected to see one of the bugs walk off of the building altogether, there was only a hint of that. There is the repeated shot of the crickets falling off of the building after being shot at, the panic in the streets and parks as public announcements are made of not to panic, interrupted by the loud chirping and sudden arrival of the big pesky bugs. Certainly, the producers and director knew that this would be panned and considered one of the worst movies of the year (or ever), but they knew that they could make a quick bug, oops, I mean buck, and even today, it is deliciously funny even if there was a panic of how nuclear power and other discoveries of the time could have major impacts on things on our planet we take for granted. When this is all said and done, it is an enjoyable guilty pleasure, leading to a clinch for the leading man and lady that prior to that fade-out had not even been hinted at.