Watch Monster on the Campus For Free

Please don't spend money on this.

Lack of good storyline.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Spoilers abound: I've only seen Monster On the Campus a couple of times, find it entertaining and competently made. It's a nostalgic trip to the old Universal back lot of what's now a half-century ago, thus a lot of the sets are familiar to film buffs of the Hollywood of an earlier time.Arthur Franz plays the title character well and without a whiff of condescension. He's a better actor than the material requires, gives his all. Whit Bissell, like Franz, was also an old hand, a veteran of science fiction pictures of the period. Both actors had played professor-scientist types before, and both were good at it.The actors in the film consist of familiar faces and a few familiar names, most notably soon to be teen heartthrob Troy Donahue. Joanna Moore is the leading lady and, like Franz, does nicely with what she's given to do. Overall, the movie is a solid professional job, as director Jack Arnold had made a number of films like it before.My only complaint, and it's a minor one, is that the movie cues the viewer how it's going to end on the last leg of the journey, when the professor spends what's supposed to be down time in a mountain cabin. There are shades of earlier Universal films in Monster On the Campus, whose main character is not unlike the Invisible Man; and his fate is rather similar to that of the Wolf Man, with a needle instead of an autumn moon, but no matter.Those old, easy to guess plot twists,--it's pretty easy to guess who's going to "get it" next--were, to me, reassuring, and I think they would be for most viewers. The absence of much in the way of surprise in the story doesn't really hurt the movie, a road well traveled by those most likely to want to watch a film with a title that, well, says it all.

Monster on the Campus (1958) *** (out of 4) Entertaining Universal Sci-Fi about a college scientist who turns into a monster after his blood is mixed with that of a prehistoric fish. I've been wanting to see this for quite some time but never got around to buying the VHS since it was released just as I was jumping on the DVD format. The wait was certainly worth it even though the film isn't really anything other than your typical Jekyll and Hyde story. The film goes by at a very quick pace and the monster looks great, although it's a shame we only get to see him twice. I was somewhat shocked at the rather violent third death scene. The film also contains one of the dumbest girlfriends in sci-fi history.

To begin with, I had missed out on this one a couple of times on Italian TV in the past – so I was glad to finally get around to watching it for the first time via the Universal DVD as part of their "Classic Sci-Fi Ultimate Collection" set.While a lesser effort overall coming from Arnold, this slow-starting, then thought-provoking film references several well-worn horror formulas – particularly of the Wolf Man/Jekyll & Hyde variety (with the prehistoric amphibian element, presumably, a nod to the director's own earlier Universal success CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON [1954]!) – and even takes care to include an anti-Nuclear message. Despite being lensed by renowned cinematographer Russell Metty, the film's look isn't especially interesting – nor is the monster one of the most memorable creations of the sci-fi era (though it's received a fair degree of exposure in the various books on the genre I own, frankly, the monster looks better in stills than it does on film).The catchpenny title suggests a teen-oriented venture, but the only such character to get a considerable amount of screen-time is heart-throb Troy Donahue. In fact, protagonist Arthur Franz' role here is perhaps the most substantial of its type that he played – doing well enough as both the obsessed scientist and the 'throwback anthropoid' he inadvertently turns into (especially effective in the scene where it dawns on him that he's the monster everyone's looking for). His girlfriend, played by Joanna Moore, is slightly above average as vintage sci-fi leading ladies go – while solid support is provided by Judson Pratt as the heavy-set police detective and the ubiquitous Whit Bissell as a conservative medic.An interesting point regarding the metamorphosis is that it only happens after exposure to the blood of an extinct fish that had been subjected to radiation – which rather makes the situations behind his subsequent 'regressions' not a little contrived! The climax can't resist having the monster run off with the leading lady a' la the Gill Man from the "Black Lagoon" films; besides, the final transformation (which Franz does in order to prove his point – clearly in direct imitation of the Jekyll/Hyde prototype – that a Neanderthal man is responsible for the killing spree which has gripped the campus and the surrounding area) does feel, perhaps, like one too many trips to the well…and it's further marred by the heroine idiotically remarking at one point that the monster is wearing Franz' clothes!! I've yet to watch German émigré director E.A. Dupont's solitary horror effort on similar lines, THE NEANDERTHAL MAN (1953); that said, the intermittent presence in MONSTER ON THE CAMPUS of mutant animals (namely, a vicious dog and a giant dragonfly) also reminded me of the fact that it's high time I reacquaint myself with the likes of THE FLY (1958) and THE ALLIGATOR PEOPLE (1959) – the former is supposed to be re-issued by Fox around Halloween as part of a Box Set (along with its two inferior sequels), while the latter is available on a bare-bones but affordable DVD (incidentally, also from Fox). By the way, I'm now left with only THE SPACE CHILDREN (1958) to catch up with from Arnold's numerous genre outings...

A previous commentator writes that: "The story is totally ludicrous and a feeble, shameless attempt to promote evolution. Only a leftist loony would believe this stuff."Just to set the record straight, the concept of "evolution" promoted by the film is a gross distortion of actual evolutionary theory, suggesting as it does that evolution involves some sort of mystical forces and that certain so-called "living fossils" contain some sort of substance which somehow counteracts these forces. None of this actually makes in any sense, however, in terms of the actual science. To sum up, evolutionary theory is perfectly valid science, and there's nothing particularly shameful about promoting it as science, contrary to what the above poster might think. OTOH, the movie's conception of what evolution actually means is just plain silly.