Die, Monster, Die! is a title in search of a much better film. Loosely based on H.P. Lovecraft’s The Colour Out of Space (although not as loosely as the 2019 effort starring Nic Cage), this 1965 version (filmed under the working title The House at the End of the World) is largely notable for its opportunity to see the great Boris Karloff enjoying himself enormously in a late-career role from the period where he was living and working in the UK.
American scientist Stephen Reinhart (Nick Adams) travels to the slightly creepy English village of Arkham (featured in many Lovecraft stories) to visit his fiancée Susan Witley (Suzan Farmer), living at the eerie, ominous Witley estate with her ailing, bedridden mother Letitia (Freda Jackson) and her suspicious, hostile father Nahum (Karloff). Stephen is intrigued by a blackened, flattened patch of land near the estate, and although Nahum passes it off as damage caused by a fire, no one is really able to explain what actually happened properly. Mysterious hooded figures, strange noises in the basement, and a weird glowing light from the locked greenhouse lead Stephen and Susan to discover plants that have grown to an abnormally large size and fragments of a meteorite emitting radiation.
Die, Monster, Die! sadly isn’t as lurid as its title suggests. It’s a fairly routine and unexceptional mid-’60s horror that’s heavy on atmosphere (director Daniel Haller works hard to generate some suspense in a story sadly lacking in much of either) but light on excitement or genuine tension. Nearly scuppered by a bland performance by troubled star Nick Adams, the film is lifted enormously by both Karloff as Nahum and Freda Jackson as the disfigured Letitia, who give the story a much-needed sense of urgency and dramatic dynamism. The film itself is an interesting but unexceptional footnote in the history of British horror films, running to just under 80 minutes, and it’s been lovingly restored in HD for this new BFI release. The film is supported by comprehensive new special features, including a commentary from historians Vic Pratt and William Fowler, a fascinating 19-minute consideration of the film by Karloff’s biographer, a brief feature on Nick Adams, a slightly embarrassing staging of a couple of scenes from a never-made proposed fantasy film about the life of Nick Adams and a chat with the film’s unit publicist Tony Tweedale.
DIE, MONSTER, DIE! is released on Blu-ray on July 22nd.
