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Back to the Feature: The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)

Everybody’s heard of but I suspect not a lot of people have seen The Creature from the Black Lagoon. Among the classic Universal movie monsters, the Gill-Man is as recognizable as the Wolf-Man and the Mummy (just a little behind Dracula and Frankenstein’s Monster), and yet the 1954 movie that birthed him is relatively obscure. Perhaps it’s because the movie is a little less classy, it doesn’t have the literary origin of some of those other films -and in multiple respects is closer to a B-movie, even by the standards of the Universal monster fare. But the Gill-Man took off, fulfilling an aquatic niche in that roster while also being a damn good design. He proved very influential -probably most specifically on Guillermo del Toro, who twice used him as a model for creatures in his own films, Abe Sapien in the Hellboy movies and of course the nameless Creature of The Shape of Water. Having played both, Doug Jones owes this movie a debt of gratitude.
Spawning such a classic creation and one of the great special effects of classic movie history, The Creature from the Black Lagoon cannot then be a wholly uninteresting movie. And indeed it does have a certain charm, if still far removed from those movies of the early 1930s. This was after all not the enterprising environment of James Whale and Tod Browning, pushing the spectacle limits of the then-infant sound cinema medium; it was the era of empty ideas, of Abbott and Costello meeting everybody. The Creature from the Black Lagoon being a new, non-crossover monster horror film had to mean something.
Of course, it wasn’t so original a story. The premise, when you get right down to it, is mostly a recycling of King Kong, with the creature discovered in a remote corner of the world by an expedition, and who is fatally attracted to the one woman in that party -endeavouring to kidnap her before a tragic end. This movie however spends much more time with its human cast, developing them more thoroughly than in King Kong and centring them as more natural protagonists to the Gill-Man’s antagonist. They are a team of archaeologists and marine biologists tracing the roots of a fossilized arm with webbed fingers believed to be some possible Devonian-era Missing Link, along the Amazon to the mysterious Black Lagoon that few have ever returned from. They didn’t need to bother really, as the Gill-Man discreetly in the water, follows the course of their whole journey from where the skeleton was found to the deep reaches of the Amazon.
For a decent chunk all we see of the creature is its extended arm -long, flabby, and webbed, but humanoid like no aquatic animal. Eventually we do get a better glimpse, before the characters do, as it watches two of the expedition, the scientist David (Richard Carlson) and the hunter Mark (Richard Denning) on an exploratory dive, though keeping hidden from both. The Gill-Man is a great design, notwithstanding the certain effects limitations of the era. With its wide focused eyes and its gasping mouth, the fins all along its head, it really looks like the best approximation of a ‘fish man’, and in some respects has retained a creepiness. In shots that obscure him behind weeds or even just the way he rises from the water, a certain vital alien-ness is captured. If you don’t count It Came from Outer Space (which isn’t quite the same thing), this film was director Jack Arnold’s first creature feature, and he demonstrates a good instinct for how to shoot his monster. Though I imagine the fact of this movie’s 3D gimmick was a motivating factor behind some of his choices.
The swimming scenes are particularly impressive, and suspenseful in a way that shows it had more than a little influence on movies like Jaws decades later. Where the Gill-Man is closing in underwater on an unsuspecting swimmer from the team, or in the case of Kay (Julia Adams), mimicking her movements and coming so close to touching or grabbing at her -it is both entrancing and intense. The underwater scenes of this movie were somewhat revolutionary, especially given the no doubt heavy and elaborate costume stunt performer Ricou Browning had to wear while playing the creature through these sequences. There is even a kind of grace to be found in it, again with respect to how he regards Kay when she goes for a swim alone, never once spotting him below the surface. One of only two sequences in the movie that expresses some level of sympathy for the creature, and which is the direct ancestor of those even more gracious scenes in The Shape of Water -a movie that it must be remembered exists because of del Toro’s empathy for the Gill-Man.
But just as often the Gill-Man represents the horrors of the deep as he comes to the surface and attacks people, although curiously off-screen or obscured in most instances. A likely limitation of the special effects’ inability to convincingly portray the creature’s capacity to terrorize (though more charitably, a choice to leave more to the imagination). The effects of its terror are played dramatically, particularly on the terrified Kay and the obsessed Mark, with David and mission leader Carl (Antonio Moreno) representing the scientific outlook of studying the creature as opposed to just immediately killing it (considering The Shape of Water again, I like how the supposed noble option here is the one that del Toro makes sure to cast as vile for his movie). David however is flexible ultimately -he is meant to be the foundation and audience surrogate for the men -the smart and nice guy in contrast to Mark’s impulsiveness and sliminess. Kay meanwhile is thrown into a damsel role she doesn’t deserve -and not in the way that the damsel itself is so problematic; but unlike for example Ann Darrow of King Kong who is paper-thin anyway, Kay is intelligent and charming and not quite so dependent on her male colleagues. They are in fact colleagues, which on its own is something astonishing. Yet she is reduced by her encounters with the Creature, and by the end is little more than the screaming victim unable to do anything herself. It’s not a surprise really, but it is disappointing given how she was built up prior to the encounter.
There’s nothing particularly noteworthy about the love triangle between her, Mark, and David -except that Mark is clearly the shallow asshole. Of the human characters, Carl is perhaps a little more interesting, and Captain Lucas (Nestor Paiva) designed to be a scene-stealer -as the crusty local Amazon sailor who knows these waters and the lore behind them. Naturally, he is one of a handful of characters spared by the end, as the Gill-Man works his way through killing off the crew -Mark included. Though Mark is ultimately vindicated, as David, Carl, and Lucas resort to killing the Creature exactly as he wanted. The film’s prevailing attitude thus seems to endorse his methods, just not his attitude. The Gill-Man fight scenes are certainly corny, not helped by the fact that the Gill-Man’s musical motif that follows him around and into these fights is very similar to the interstitial music in the original Star Trek, evoking that show’s own cheesy costumed monsters for Captain Kirk to fight. The Gill-Man is certainly more detailed, but wouldn’t be out of place there.
That vibe of course can’t really be helped (though the music could have been more effective -I think of something like the enigmatic theremin score from its contemporary The Day the Earth Stood Still). It's perfectly expected for a 1950s creature feature far from the genre's golden era released with a then-novel 3D gimmick (which honestly doesn't seem all that apparent in the movie without) as a sideshow to something better. As B-movies of this variety go, with all of the typical shortcomings of story, performance, and technique, it's one of the better ones; setting up a smart context and utilizing well its distinct visuals and special effects, fostering in its best moments some real tension and curiosity. The Gill-Man does stand out as an interesting and unique monster, and would of course star in his own subsequent series of films. It's totally understandable why The Creature from the Black Lagoon is more obscure among its genre cohorts, but for the Creature from the Black Lagoon, it may be worth seeing anyways.

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