The horror films of the 1950s are often relegated to two categories: space invaders and giant bugs. There is some truth in that generalization, but the reality is far more subtle with deep ties to the past along with the political climate of the decade itself. Both these categories can trace their lineage, at least in American film, back to two quintessential classics of the genre—Dracula and Frankenstein, but removed from spooky castles and unspecified European locales and placed squarely in the suburbs and cities of Cold War era America. Like Dracula, the alien invasion film examines the fear of “the other.” The so-called giant bug movies are really “science gone awry” movies and Frankenstein has been the template and ultimate expression of that idea since its publication in 1818. By the 1950s, the great scientific fear was nuclear power, specifically in the form of the atomic bomb and the radioactive fallout left it its wake. Them! remains one of the best and most enduring expressions of those fears.
Them! began as a short story by George Worthing Yates about giant irradiated ants in New York’s subway tunnels before finding its way to producer Ted Sherdeman, who sold it to Warner Brothers. According to David J. Skal’s book Screams of Reason: Mad Science and Modern Culture, news of the bombing of Hiroshima made Sherdeman, who had served under General Douglas MacArthur during World War II, physically ill, causing him to throw up in reaction. The original Yates script was deemed unfilmable due to budget considerations and Sherdeman transplanted the story to the New Mexico desert and the storm drain system beneath Los Angeles. Sherdeman’s screenplay was approved and handed over to director Gordon Douglas and producer David Weisbart with an intention to film it in 3-D and color, but by the time Them! went before the cameras, it was scaled back to 2-D black and white. Douglas described the original look of the giant ants to Skal saying, “I put green and red soap bubbles in their eyes[…]The ants were purple, slimy things. Their bodies were wet down with Vaseline. They scared the bejeezus out of you.”
Though the change to black and white disappointed its director, it was probably for the best as the black and white photography gives the film a grittier, more reality-bound immediacy than the Warner color system of the time would have provided, allowing the film to stand the test of time to a greater degree. There is no doubt that, to modern eyes, the monstrous insects have lost some of their impact in light of advances in creature creation over the decades, but color may well have made that even more noticeable. Despite the limitations of the era, the film holds up remarkably well, less because of its monsters than due to its tight script, the gravity of its subject matter, and the effectiveness of its characters. Watching Them! for the first time in a very long time (so long that it practically qualifies as a first viewing), I was struck by how engaging the film remains throughout the entirety of its runtime. The intrigue and suspense of the story is ratcheted to a level that rarely lets up and holds the viewer firmly in its grasp.
The film begins as a mystery when two police officers, Sgt. Ben Peterson (James Whitmore who would claim latter-day notoriety for his roles in films like The Shawshank Redemption and The Relic) and his partner Ed Blackburn (Chris Drake) discover a little girl (Sandy Descher) in a state of catatonia wandering alone through the New Mexico desert near White Sands. Their investigation leads them to a travel trailer that has been ravaged by something large and savage that has left behind a footprint that neither man can identify. As they search the premises, a bizarre, high pitched chirping sound emanates from the desert. They also come across the ruins of the general store, its proprietor has been killed and thrown into the cellar. In both cases no money or belongings have been taken, only sugar. Left behind to guard the store while Ben takes the little girl back to town, Ed again hears the high pitched whine before being killed offscreen.
Of course, anyone who had seen the trailer or even the poster for Them! already knew the culprits were giant ants but this setup is remarkably strong. It is soon discovered that the little girl is the daughter of an FBI agent who had been vacationing with his family and FBI Agent Robert Graham, played by James Arness who had previously played the creature in The Thing and would soon go on to his greatest fame as Marshal Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke, is called in to join the investigation. Also joining the core cast are Dr. Harold Medford (Oscar winner for Miracle on 34th Street Edmund Gwenn) and his daughter Patricia (Joan Weldon) who arrive from the Department of Agriculture to examine a scientific theory that is not immediately disclosed. This is where the seeds of the underlying environmental and scientific responsibility message of the film begin to be sown. The elder Medford asks where the first atomic bomb tests were made. He is told that they were performed in the White Sands desert area where the little girl, the smashed trailer, and the ravaged general store were found.
The first appearances of the giant ants in the desert are among the most indelible in 1950s horror. The first sees our small band all wearing safety glasses to protect their eyes from the whipping sand and one of Them rising over a dune above Weldon’s Dr. Pat Medford followed by her inevitable scream. The second is even more powerful with a giant ant holding a ribcage in its mandibles and releasing it onto a pile of bones that have gathered on the side of a gigantic anthill. The Fay Wray-ish scream that Pat lets loose in these early moments is perhaps a necessary, for the time, nod to the damsel in distress trope ubiquitous to most horror films of the era, but that soon gives way to her true character. After the discovery of the nest that is soon after barraged with missiles by Peterson and Graham, Pat takes control of the situation. She is a modern, take charge, professional woman who feels no need to explain herself to the men involved in the attempts to stop the ants. Her experience and expertise is invaluable to the success of the mission and she repels down inside the nest along with the small all-male crew despite Agent Graham’s chivalrous protests.
The sequence inside the nest is one of the film’s best set pieces and fans of James Cameron’s Aliens (1986) will undoubtedly see the influence Them! had on that film. This is particularly true when the team discovers the queen’s chamber filled with eggs, some of them already hatched, and use flamethrowers to set them ablaze. This confirms the doctors Medford’s worst fears, that the gigantism of the ants was most likely “caused by lingering radiation from the first atomic bomb” and the giant ants have multiplied, producing more queens that will migrate to other areas and create more colonies, eventually taking over the world. Back in Washington, D.C., it is confirmed that, if they are not stopped, this will lead to the extinction of the human race within a year.
Despite its expansion to a national scale, the film continues to tell its story through its small group of central characters. This is an extremely effective way to tell the story as it allows the film to remain personal and emotionally connected despite the global nature of the crisis. The climactic sequence in the Los Angeles storm drain system is all the more effective because our heroes, along with a large contingent of the U.S. Army, are searching for Mrs. Lodge’s (Mary Alan Hokanson) missing boys. As was often the case in the post-World War II, pre-Vietnam 1950s, the U.S. military is depicted as the ultimate in heroism and are the ones who save the day. Ironically, however, this was all caused by a weapon of war in the first place.
The final moments of the film once again underscore the message wrapped up inside this entertaining package—the very real fears of nuclear weapons. As the nest adjacent to the L.A. River is being eradicated, Graham speculates to the younger Dr. Medford, “Pat if these monsters got started as a result of the first atomic bomb in 1945, what about all the others that have been exploded since then?” Pat can only answer, “I don’t know.” Her father, however, has a more philosophical and foreboding answer: “Nobody knows, Robert. When man entered the atomic age, he opened a door into a new world. What we’ll eventually find in that new world, nobody can predict.”
For fans of science fiction and horror, it led to an unprecedented number of giant bug, human, and radioactive monsters. Following Them! came Tarantula (1955), The Deadly Mantis (1957), The Monster That Challenged the World (1957), Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957), The Amazing Colossal Man (1957), Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958), The Spider (1958), and of course the greatest giant atomic monster of them all Godzilla. There were other variations as well like The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957) which as the title suggests reversed the formula and The Fly (1958), another science gone awry parable that finds a scientist fused with a housefly during an experiment in teleportation. And its influence didn’t end with the 50s inspiring directly and indirectly animal attack and giant creature features for decades to come.
But messages and influence aside, Them! is just a damned entertaining movie. It moves like lightning and maintains its urgency from beginning to end. It crackles with energy and excitement, great characters and performances, and cool monsters, not to mention that iconic whining sound effect. Seventy years have passed since its release but even now, nothing seems to be able to stop Them!.
In Bride of Frankenstein, Dr. Pretorius, played by the inimitable Ernest Thesiger, raises his glass and proposes a toast to Colin Clive’s Henry Frankenstein—“to a new world of Gods and Monsters.” I invite you to join me in exploring this world, focusing on horror films from the dawn of the Universal Monster movies in 1931 to the collapse of the studio system and the rise of the new Hollywood rebels in the late 1960’s. With this period as our focus, and occasional ventures beyond, we will explore this magnificent world of classic horror. So, I raise my glass to you and invite you to join me in the toast.
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