My Hollywood Part IV: My Ten Most Monstrous Hollywood Monsters

It goes without saying that Hollywood monsters are a breed all their own. Going well beyond the dictionary definition of a creature simply displaying a bizarre or frightening shape or appearance, Hollywood’s movie monsters create bloody one-on-one mayhem or inflict carnage on a massive scale.

These sinister Caesars of our sub-conscious enjoy a reign of terror extends all the way back to the times when humans ranked no higher than rodents on the menus of ferocious prehistoric cats, voracious primeval reptiles and rapacious primordial birds� or even cannibalistic humanoids.

Brandishing teeth and claws and fangs and talons and raw, bone-crushing muscle movie monsters are incarnations dredged up from our deepest, darkest primal fears. Greek minotaurs, Chinese dragons, Norse giants, English griffins all have their counterparts in real-life ancient horrors as well as in modern day horror movies.

They reign as king in the deepest, darkest recesses of our minds and come in a myriad of indescribable sizes, shapes and colorsâÂ?¦ Some of the most adept at sending chills up your spine are the smaller to human-sized, anthropomorphic or zoomorphic ones. Perhaps âÂ?¦ it’s their ability to invade our most intimate spacesâÂ?¦ walk through our bedroom doorâÂ?¦ crawl under our bedâÂ?¦ attack our safe zonesâÂ?¦ open our closet doorâÂ?¦ give us nowhere to hideâÂ?¦ even invade our bodiesâÂ?¦

Or, there is the invisible apparition that walks through walls and overwhelms us in the dark. The ironic curse, the flipside of our superior intelligence, for eons we understood all too well there was a definitive difference between the living and the deadâÂ?¦ but we’re still not absolutely sure just what.

Then there are those who exist at the opposite end of the spectrum. They’re gargantuan. Unstoppable Juggernauts. They smash our indestructible machinesâÂ?¦ They demolish city blocks at a timeâÂ?¦

Why do they affect us the way they do? Why does every fiber of our being react when we know its just make-believe? The best have been known to change lifestyles. Boost the bank accounts of many a psychoanalyst.

How intellectual information is internalized, converted and passed on as genetic information is perhaps ‘the’ unsolved variable of the evolutionary equation. Curiously, a key discovery that may play a part in unlocking that puzzle may be uncovered in studies, conducted in pursuit of an explanation for the pervasiveness of dragon myths and legends and ornithophobia as a result of early humans possibly falling prey to large African eagles, such as those studies that have revealed that it is plausible for instinctive fears to have been bred into certain populations over several generations. (Each of us can recall the Darwinian observation: “Galapagos [animals] were so approachable because they had not ‘learned’ the fear of manâÂ?¦” i.e. the demise of the dodo bird.)

Typically designed to test our intelligence and inert will to survive rather than our intellect, they seldom pose any ponderous sociological quandaries, however there are notable exceptions to even this rule. What awaits the human race in that capacious expanse called space? Are we ready for it? If we continue to abuse our ‘mother-ship’, will we even survive long enough to take the first bona fide step?

What qualities filters out the oh-so-rans and defines the best of the best? The scariest of the scary?

Foot-pounding hulks thrashing around on the screen like an avalanche of dead logs just won’t do. Even when the craft was in its nascent infancy, special effects crews were forced to push the envelope to satiate audiences who have always appreciated monsters that actuated beyond the subsistence of a mere prop or computer generated automaton and generated palpable human-like qualities, (the more ill-natured the better).

World-class originals, even if a reprise of a previous classic, like heroes, villains and anti-heroes, are a result of a confluence of the talents of a prescient Director, an imaginative Writer, many times a gifted Actor and, always, the additional intellectual assets of innovative Artists and Special Effects Teams.

Even though not human, without a doubt often quite inhuman, movie monsters must embody definitive attributes, but with these guys the superlatives take a certain ‘monstrous’ turn. Though not always necessarily original, they always press the limits of the creative imagination and cinematic technology. They are timeless.

Stage presence and body language is always a major factor with any character, but this is exponentially true of the movie monster. More often than not [it] has no lines and even when they do�. The less the better. (Or what would their creators have them do� talk us to death?) With the movie monster physicality is everything. (If we are not in serious mortal danger� is it really worth our popcorn?) The good ones establish a real crisis factor. Assault our sense of security to the very core.

Next, the Difficulty factor. By virtue of what they, where they are or both, they present a real nasty dilemma in seeking to neutralize their threat. It takes everything our hero has to defeat them (or fight to a desperate draw and manage an escape from them.

Such notables and timeless classics come to mind as Dracula, Michael Myers of Halloween and Halloween II, the Wolf Man, the Werewolf in London, Godzilla, the Dragons of Dragonslayer and Rings of Fire and Lord of the Rings, Mr. Hyde of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the Sharks of Jaws and Deep Blue Sea, the Bears of Grizzly and The Edge the razor-toothed subterranean Worms of Tremors, the T-Rex, Velociraptors and Spinosaurus of Jurassic Park, the Martians, ”War of the Worlds 1953 and 2005 and certainly last, but not least, the Zombies of Night of the Living Dead. I would like to give special mention, also, to George Lucas’ great monsters with small bit parts like the Rhino, Mantis and Tiger of Attack of the Clones and the Rancor of Return of the Jedi.

So, each of them being an original in its own right and a superb manifestation of the creative mind, with much enthusiasm I present the following as the favorites of my favorites. My most monstrous Hollywood monsters:

The Xenomorphs
Director Ridley Scott and Writers Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett, Special Effects Team and Swiss Artist H.R. Geiger produced the Xenomorphs of Alien 1979, Aliens 1986 and Alien III 1992. From parasitoid face-hugger to embryonic chestbuster to adult Internecivus Raptus, these creatures are a virtual slithering hall of nightmarish horrors.

Pazuzu
Director William Friedkin, Master Writer William Peter Blatty, Actress Linda Blair, Special Effects Team and Make-up Artist Dick Smith quicken Pazuzu of The Exorcist 1973.

Perhaps you are old enough to remember the lines at box office that stretched for blocks night after night in city after city. Perhaps you were in the theatre when someone became ill or fainted or ran out of the theatre in fright and tears. There are reports of people being institutionalized and one very disturbing report of a miscarriage in connection with the viewing of this film.

My personal experience resulted in an all-night, all-lights-in-the-house-on vigil only interrupted by a mad dash to the garage and to the basement to make sure that those lights were on too. What started out as a joke left me genuinely shaken and asking questions that I have only recently resolved.

Questions that cut to the very core of our existence.

Were we created by a benevolent God?

Were we bedeviled by a malevolent spirit being?

The Yautja
Director John McTiernan, Writer Jim Thomas, Writer John Thomas, Actor Kevin Peter Hall and their Special Effects Team created the Yautja of Predator 1987. When we contemplate future encounters with alien life-forms we have obvious concerns. Predator does nothing to alleviate those fears. Commandos, heavily armed� elite, rendered as helpless as children with pea-shooters and dropping like flies. Things were scary enough when the invader was invisible, the fright factor went up exponentially when his crustacean-like identity was finally unmasked.

The Terminator
Director James Cameron Writer James Cameron Writer Gale Anne Hurd Arnold Schwarzenegger Special Effects Team machinate the Cyberdyne Systems Model 101 800 Series Terminator of Terminator 1984. It knows no pity. It knows no pain. It knows no fear. It will not stop until it rips you’re heart out of your chest and you are dead. The terminator evolved right before our eyes. From a lethal naked human form, to clothed armed-and-dangerous, to a man of murder made of hard-wired circuits and metallic skeleton, we all subconsciously experienced our past, present and most dreaded anticipation of the future. The future where the [Artificially Intelligent] Frankenstein finally gets out of the box and life as we know itâÂ?¦ is over in a flash.

The Thing
Director John Carpenter, Master Writer John W. Campbell Jr., Writer Bill Lancaster and their Special Effects Team bring to life the Thing of The Thing 1982. Perhaps the most horrifying visage I have ever witnessed in film. The quintessential shape-shifter. Able to mimic the physical characteristics of any life-form, or assume grotesque configurations you would only encounter at the wrong end of a berzerkoid meat grinder. At the same time “intelligent enough to pilot a spacecraftâÂ?¦”, this ‘thing’ proved more than a formidable adversary and once again a disturbing look at the future possibilities of alien encounters. (Imagine if this thing had a James Bond like mission and successfully infiltrated the government of a nuclear powerâÂ?¦ or how much fun he would have been at a nudist colony.)

The Borg
Director Rob Bowman, Writer Maurice Hurley and their Special Effects Team bring to life The Borg of Star Trek: The Next Generation: Q Who? 1989. I’ll never forget the look on the face of those first two Borg that invaded the engineering section of the Starship Enterprise. To say that they ignored the crew would not be entirely accurate. They seemed to be well aware of their presence. The crew just didn’t matter to them. The way an ant doesn’t matter when you are walking down the street. Less than an antâÂ?¦ a leaf.

There are several disturbing things about the Borg. They’re body snatchers. But they don’t kill you. They part you out like an old Toyota. Reminiscent of the Zombies of Night of the Living Dead, they just keep coming in droves.

“âÂ?¦A taste of [our] future[?]…a preview of things to come[?]…The hall’s been rented, the orchestra engaged…it’s time to see if [we] can dance.”

“You can’t outrun them. You can’t destroy them. If you damage them, the essence of what they are remains…they regenerate and keep coming. Eventually, you’ll weaken. Your reserves will be gone. They are relentless.”
In the movie ‘Contact’, Michael Kitz asks Dr. Arroway: “Why is it the default position of the egghead set that [extraterrestrials] would always be benign?” But if we encounter extraterrestrials anytime in the next century or two, isn’t the likelihood more probable that we may experience a Borg-like encounter. Beings that view the human race with less regard than Europeans viewed Native Americans? Even worseâÂ?¦ with less regard than were viewed the plains buffalo? Or the Mauritius Dodo bird?
“Resistance is futileâÂ?¦”

The Anneloid
Writer/Director Stephen Sommers and his Special Effects Team masterminded the snake-like Anneloid sea creature from Deep Rising 1998. If the mere sight of a snake strikes terror in the hearts of millions of people. This is Ophidiophobia in super-overdrive. With studies suggesting that such fears have been shaped by evolution, stretching back to a time when early mammals had to survive and breed in an environment dominated by deadly reptiles, this beast does nothing to quiet our trepidation. Inflicting a hideous fate these multi-hydran serpents are enormous, lightning quick, lethal. There’s also something especially unnerving about super sensory perception despite the eerier absence of eyes.

The Great Machine of Altaire IV
Director Fred M. Wilcox, Writer Irving Block, Writer Allen Adler and their Special Effects Team create The Id of Forbidden Planet 1956. In the midst of haunting questions centering on the wise use of advanced technology is the haunting confrontation with a giant invisible creature with the power to melt through two-foot thick hardened-metal doors. The Id, produced by a collaboration of the subconscious mind and the Great Machine of Altaire IV, a nuclear complex two miles high and twenty miles long, is at the same time stealthy enough to slip up a guarded flight of stairs to rip a human body into fragments. In fact, this deadly duo destroyed a super-race of billions in a single night of unfathomable terror. Light years ahead of the catastrophic implications portrayed in so many A.I. themes.

The Lions
Director Stephen Hopkins and Writer William Goldman recreate the homicidal Lions of The Ghost and the Darkness 1996. The thought of an apex predator displaying the human-like characteristics of a determined serial killer is just as disturbing as the anticipation of a demented serial killer demonstrating animalistic predatorial cunning. Add to this the fact that, set in 1898, this movie is based on the true story of two lions in Africa that killed and ate over 130 people over a nine month period.

Arachnids
Director Paul Verhoeven, Master Writer Robert A. Heinlein, Writer Edward Neumeier and their Special Effects Team spawn the Arachnids of Starship Troopers 1997. Arachnophobia is one of the most common of phobias. A survival edge given over thousands of years to its sufferers and their progeny to ensure their perpetuation. The majority of mankind manifests this fear to a healthy degree, but for millions the mere thought of a spider thoroughly ‘freaks them out’.
Imagine, then, the site of swarming thousands of giant arachnoids spewing over the horizon like an abyssal wave of ripping, machine-like jaws and slashing arms. Ferocious. Merciless. Wave after wave of butcherous, gigantic insects capable of literally dismembering and shredding a full-grown man like you could a chicken with a buzz-saw. Hit one with hundreds of rounds from high-powered automatic weapons and it just keeps coming as long as it can get in just one blow to disembowel you with one powerful slash or lash out with one last decapitating bite. Now multiply that horror in multiples of thousands. Whew!

The Hessian Horseman
Director Tim Burton, Master Writer Washington Irving, Writer Kevin Yagher, Actor Christopher Walken and their Special Effects Team inspirit The Hessian Horseman of Sleepy Hollow 1999. I really enjoyed this reification of Washington Irving’s Headless Horseman and appreciated the motion picture staff supplying him a believable and interesting history. The Horseman himself was a pretty scary dude even before he lost his head and really got pissed off. I truly believe it was only out of respect for The Legend of Sleepy Hollow’s place in the pantheon of great American literature, which is a commendable gesture, that the Horseman was not franchised. This movie gave him one hell-u-va introduction to modern audiences.

In conclusion:

These are forty of my favorite on-screen personas. I hope you enjoyed these selections as much as I enjoyed reviewing them with you. Perhaps there are a movie or two that you may not have had the pleasure of viewing as of yet or perhaps you are inspired to re-visit a film that’s been on the shelf for a while. In either event, I must say that I thoroughly enjoy the escapism that talented motion picture professionals provide and thoroughly immerse myself in the moment, especially when the cast and crew have exceptionally executed their art and enrich our lives with such unforgettably heroic heroes, villainous villains, anti-heroic anti-heroes and monstrous monsters. After all… that’s what the movies are for!