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Science Moment by E.C.McMullen Jr. |
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USA Release: June 1, 1957 Gramercy Pictures / United Artists Rated: N/A |
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EUREKA!
 SCIENCE MOMENT BY E.C.MCMULLEN JR. |
The explanation given for the monstrous varmints is that they are an unknown branch of the mollusk family.
Now THAT'S how you do science in a movie!
Why?
Because when you don't know something, "I Don't Know." is the best scientific explanation there is. It's not rational or reasonable to pretend you have an answer for everything or anything when you don't.
We don't know what happened, so it's obviously the unseen hand of Dyzan! And it has to be Dyzan because the very idea of there being any other god but Dyzan is superstitious nonsense!
An honest "I don't know." is always better than leaping to a conclusion of "It's radiation!" "It's pre-cambrian!" "It's nanobots!" "It's vaccines!" "It's GMO-O-O-OOOzzz!"
Where did these giant snails come from? According to this movie's Head Scientist Dr. Rogers, I don't know!
Based on what he DOES know, they MAY have been in dried out eggs from prehistoric times (we don't know) that MIGHT have been buried / preserved by a mud slide brought on by volcanic activity some time in the prehistoric past (we don't know). There's no precedent for this specific creature, so Dr. Rogers admits that he can only make an educated guess as he has no way to be sure.
TRIVIA 1. But why would kindly Dr. Rogers think that something as nutty as that may have happened? Because in 1955 it did, and that's what inspired screenwriter David Duncan (RODAN) to write this movie! Science: Shrimp in the Desert |
Based on what he does know, Rogers thinks that a recent earthquake MIGHT have broke the mud covering of the dry and ancient eggs, exposing them to the water of the Salton Sea (no evil atomic bombs!).1
The east side of the human created Salton Sea has an active area of seismic activity even now, where bubbling volcanic mud-pots fart carbon dioxide and methane day and night.
It is also known that some shrimp and snail eggs, buried by nothing more than sand, can remain dry (I'm talking completely dried out - dessicated) and dormant for centuries at least, then hatch into living, breathing, eating, multiplying creatures when exposed to enough moisture. THE MONSTER THAT CHALLENGED THE WORLD, stretches those many centuries into a mess o' millennia for the monster's eggs.
Quite a stretch of belief? Yes, but not to the breaking point.
And the radiation? The level is unusually high for a human, but not fatal. For the mollusk monster, the level may be a natural part of its metabolism. Dr. Rogers radiation experiments may have warmed an area of water, providing some manner of incubation, but the radiation itself didn't create the varmints.
What's more, the monsters aren't growing into giants because of radiation, they're just natural giant mollusks. And they're not really out to challenge the world. Explainable circumstances injected them into a period where their own natural predators are extinct, leaving their potential population explosion unchecked - so long as they have... food!
This review copyright 2007 E.C.McMullen Jr.
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