One of the few actual "monster" movies to be released in this year's batch of Sam Arkoff DVDs from DVD UK, Ltd. in England (region 2), TEENAGE CAVEMAN proved a surprise on all counts. Sure it's cheap and cheesy, but if give it a chance you'll find it actually has a brain and anticipates the "restless youth" pictures of a decade later.
(25-year-old) Robert Vaughn is the teenage son of the leader of a prehistoric tribe, a tribe that lives in a cave on a mountainside. Although their turf is surrounded by rivers and lush forests, the tribe is prohibited by the Law passed down for generations from occupying greener pastures. Vaughn looks beyond the tribal rituals and religious taboos and longs to explore the outside world. But his youthful rebelliousness (The Law is old, but age is not always truth!) could shatter the tribes unity and lead to death for all in the jaws of a murderous mutated beast from beyond the mountain.
Filmed in only ten days on a budget of $70,000 (skimpy even by AIP standards), TEENAGE CAVEMAN garnered surprisingly positive reviews (Despite its 10-cent title, this is a good picture, said the L.A. Times) and remains a favorite of science-fiction fans for its earnest vision of a different time that is part historical fact and part apocalyptical warning.
Trivia:
·        Corman wanted to call the picture PREHISTORIC WORLD, but Arkoff and Nicholson insisted on TEENAGE CAVEMAN to cash in on the earlier success of I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF and I WAS A TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN. In England, the picture was known as OUT OF THE DARKNESS
·        The dinosaur footage used in the film was created for the screen classic ONE MILLION B.C. (1940), while the monster that menaces the cave people is left over from NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST (1958).
·        Youll find the usual array of familiar Corman stock actors, including Jonathan Haze, Barboura Morris, and Beach Dickerson, the latter of whom plays three different characters and is killed three times!
·        Believe it or not, theres some Academy Award-level talent at work here. Cinematographer Floyd Crosby won an Oscar back in 1931 for TABU, while writer R. Wright Campbell was nominated in 1957 for his screenplay for the Lon Chaney biography MAN OF A THOUSAND FACES.
·        TEENAGE CAVEMAN was originally released by AIP as a co-feature with HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER.
TEENAGE CAVEMAN can be ordered on DVD from www.amazon.co.uk.
