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Man Beast

(1956)

I am not related to Jerry Warren, the auteur of Man Beast and other even worse films. His credo seems to be that no matter how terrible his previous film was, his next will be worse. Man Beast is one of his earliest, so it is somewhat less rotten than the others, but it's not likely anyone ever liked this murky, turgid bore-except by comparison with Warren's other films.

Connie Hayward (Virginia Maynor) and Trevor "Hud" Hudson (Lloyd Nelson) form an expedition to the Himalayas to look for Connie's brother, who had recently headed into the mountains with a previous expedition looking for the Abominable Snowman. In the movies, all expeditions in the Himalayas looking for the Abominable Snowman find him. Or them. In real life, the Yeti is more elusive.

After they meet at a mountain village, Steve (Tom Maruzzi), a guide, takes Connie and party up the mountains, where they meet Dr. Erickson (George Wells Lewis). He has a theory that Yeti are primitive men and is determined to prove it. They find Connie's brother's camp, but the only survivor is his mysterious guide, Varga (George Skaff). Varga, who seems rather European, claims he's never seen any sign of the Yeti.

Eventually, we see a Yeti hiding behind a rock; it's white and hairy with a black face. Soon, the creature or creatures are stalking Connie's expedition, emerging from under the snow, or creeping around the tents (small outside, cavernous inside). Armed with a club, one advances on the camp only to be quickly sent away by Varga.

Separated from the others, Hud is chased off a cliff by a Yeti, falling to his death. In one of several long, repetitious dialogue scenes, Varga tells the others his mother was from Calcutta, but couldn't stand the heat and came to the mountains. An avalanche apparently kills Steve. Varga orders Erickson into a cave and, removing his shirt, reveals he's part Yeti himself-his chest is covered in long white hair. (Around this point, his eyebrows become white and bushy.) His plan is to breed the Yeti strain out of his people-though he doesn't explain why this would be an advantage. I suppose so they can go down the mountain and get jobs as guides, or act as extras in films. The movie gives no motivation for this strange goal of racial suicide.

Because of Varga's treachery and the Yeti's violent attacks, eventually everyone has been killed except Connie, who discovers Steve is still alive. As Varga slithers down a rope after them, the rope pulls loose and Varga falls to his death. Connie shrieks at her new-found love, "Take me away from this, Steve, take me away." Audiences could only concur.

Jerry Warren assembled his later films out of bits and pieces of other movies, usually of Latin American origin. Man Beast also uses a great deal of stock footage mixed with original location work. Co-star Lloyd Nelson (billed here as Lloyd Cameron) told an interviewer, "They bought stock from a Mexican picture that never was finished, so they wrote the script around what they had." However, the extensive, well-photographed borrowed footage looks more European than Mexican, with the climbers in Tyrolean hats and lightweight clothing. Bri Murphy, who worked on the film in several capacities (including sometimes as the Yeti), told the same interviewer (W/Monsters), Jerry Warren "had gotten a hell of a deal on stock footage of people climbing in the Himalayas." The cast was chosen for their resemblances to those in the stock footage.

Rock Madison is top-billed but does not appear in the movie-because he never existed. Warren considered billing actor Tom Maruzzi as Madison, but instead billed him under his real name. "Lon Raynor," the role name applied to "Madison" in the pressbook does not appear in the movie. Warren resurrected the name for a later film, but there was no Rock Madison in that one, either. Some of the actors who do exist, particularly George Skaff, aren't bad, but the dialog is slow-paced, repetitious and boring. And there's a lot of it.

The Yeti are crudely but not unimaginatively done. The one Yeti we see occasionally interacts, sometimes effectively, with the other actors. Murphy told her interviewer the Yeti suit was a white gorilla suit rented from a costume company. (Possibly that used in White Pongo and/or The White Gorilla [both 1945].) As Warren didn't hire anyone to wear the gorilla suit, when they reached the mountainous locations, he insisted Murphy wear it. This tended to look peculiar, as the heavy material of the suit folded over at her breast line, so several other actors alternated wearing the suit. "It was an actor named Jack Haffner most of the time," she admitted. One of those who substituted for her was cinematographer Victor Fisher. As she continued to work in movies, usually billed as Brianne Murphy, she became increasingly involved in cinematography herself, leading to being the first woman ever to shoot a Hollywood movie, Fatso (1980). She directed two films, Blood Sabbath (1972) and To Die, To Sleep (1994), and told the interviewer of a third, Virgins from Venus, not included in the Internet Movie Database. She won a scientific and engineering Oscar and was president of Columbia College, Hollywood. She also shot for television, resulting in several Emmy nominations, and one win, as cinematographer. She died in 2003.

As for Man Beast, she told her interviewer that she had no idea who the B. Arthur Cassidy credited for the screenplay really was. It might have been Jerry Warren himself, though the dialogue is a shade better than in the films for which he takes a writing credit.

To obtain the scenes of the Tibetan village, Warren and his team literally climbed over the fence at a studio and quickly shot their scenes on an existing exterior set. No permission was obtained, and of course no money was paid. (The interview with the salty, forthcoming Murphy is well worth seeking out.)

Some mountain climbing scenes are effective, likely from that older film, though the real cast is occasionally seen in mountaineer gear in scenes shot in the Sierras outside Lone Pine, California.

Virginia Maynor is Asa Maynor, with her first name changed in hopes of making potential customers think she was Virginia Mayo. She continued acting for several years under her original name, then became a TV executive, and later a stockbroker. As Lloyd Nelson, Lloyd "Cameron" also acted for many more years, including in other Jerry Warren movies, while also working as dialogue director on the Lassie TV series (no, he didn't work on Lassie's accent), as well as script supervisor on TV series and movies, often on Clint Eastwood projects.

"Neal" in Variety was generous to the film: "exploitable, but just fair entertainment-wise." Motion Picture Exhibitor was nearer the mark: "hardly more than filler for the lower half." The movie benefits from good use of the plentiful stock footage and the several sequences Warren shot on real mountainous locations, and deserves a point or two for its part-human, part-Yeti villain. But it's slow going, with tedious dialog and static direction.

Credits: Producer-director Jerry Warren, Script B. Arthur Cassidy, Art director/Associate producer/Second unit director Ralph Brooke, Photography Victor Fisher, Sound Jim Donovan, Editor James R. Sweeney, Editing by Ashcroft Film Service, Music direction Josef Zimanich, Production supervisor Richard George, Script supervisor Brianne Murphy, Set supervisor Ray Guth.

Cast: Steve Cameron Tom Maruzzi, Connie Hayward Virginia (Asa) Maynor, Varga George Skaff, Dr. Eric Erickson George Wells Lewis, Trevor "Hud" Hudson Lloyd Cameron (Nelson), Kheon Jack Haffner, Trader Wong Sing, The Yeti Brianne Murphy, Jack Haffner, Victor Fisher, George Wells Lewis.

Note: The on-screen cast is headed by Rock Madison in the role of "Lon Raynon." There is no character of that name in the film, and Rock Madison never existed.

Associated Producers production; released in California by Favorite Films of California; States-rights release elsewhere. Black and white' 68 minutes. Released December 5, 1956 (date of release in Los Angeles). It's possible that as with some of Warren's later movies, he drove prints from town to town, personally booking screenings.

This movie has been released on home video.

(c) 2008 Bill Warren