# Question about Giant or Marauding Insect Movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 1, 2017, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892 "2017-06-01T22:25:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![dzeiger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@dzeiger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzeiger)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/21 "2017-06-02T01:39:17Z")
Didn’t most of the old-time “Giant Monster” movies get their effects by letting the real thing roam around on a miniature set and filmed really close up? That’s easy enough with spiders or grasshoppers, not so easy with mosquitoes. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/22 "2017-06-02T01:49:48Z")
> [@Two\_Many\_Cats](#): > > Mosquitoes had to wait until 1995 to get a movie?? What kind of agent do they have? [_Skeeter_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108154/?ref_=nv_sr_5) came out in 1993. > [@](#): > > As the result of a corrupt businessman’s illegal toxic waste dumping, a small desert town is beset by a deadly swarm of huge bloodthirsty mutant mosquitoes! ---
**Author:** ![mind\_the\_gap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ea666f/32.png) [@mind\_the\_gap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mind_the_gap)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/23 "2017-06-02T02:04:11Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Alaska, where a mosquito once landed at Lake Hood and the ground crew pumped 50 gallons of avgas into it before they discovered it wasn’t a Cessna. I just sprayed half a mouthful of perfectly good cider all over the deck. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the laugh of the day! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/24 "2017-06-02T02:37:12Z")
> [@mind\_the\_gap](#): > > I just sprayed half a mouthful of perfectly good cider all over the deck. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the laugh of the day! 😃 It’s funny because it’s true. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/25 "2017-06-02T03:05:52Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Is that in Minnesota? They’re Minnesota’s state bird. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/26 "2017-06-02T03:33:02Z")
> [@Battle\_Pope](#): > > [Slugs](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093995/) has gastropods covered (not giant, but pretty big ones). [The Monster That Challenged the World](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050722/) features giant mollusks coming out of the Salton Sea vs Hans Conried. ---
**Author:** ![X.L.Lent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/a5b964/32.png) [@X.L.Lent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/X.L.Lent)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/27 "2017-06-02T06:10:02Z")
How about the made for T.V. movie [Bug](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072750/) which features large fire-starting cockroaches released by an earthquake. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 7:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/28 "2017-06-02T07:04:32Z")
> [@Two\_Many\_Cats](#): > > Cockroaches get shorter shrift. There a sequence about killer cockroaches in _Damnation Alley_, and the last story in the anthology _Creepshow_ has a memorable roach attack. The only full movie I can think of about sentient roaches is _Joe’s Apartment_, and they were the good guys. I was going to say _Mimic_, but then remembered the Judas Breed were a termite-mantis mix. Does _Team America: World Police_ count for sentient roaches? ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/29 "2017-06-02T11:58:44Z")
The circa 1960 _Mars Attacks!_ cards weren’t fastidious about species, but DID feature several cards with Giant Insects attacking people. In particular, number 38, _Victims of the Bug_ features a giant blood-sucking insect of some kind sticking an absurdly large proboscis into a soldier’s chest: [![](http://www.tkinter.org/Stuff/MarsAttacksCards/images/38.jpg) ](http://www.tkinter.org/Stuff/MarsAttacksCards/images/38.jpg) So mosquitos didn’t make it into the movies until pretty late, but they were in other media early enough. Incidentally, there are plenty of huge mosquitos in folklore, much of it predating the 1950s Giant Bug craze. There was an Alaskan Tall Tale about an Air Corps crew that refueled a mosquito. even earlier is the Tuscarora legend of Great Father mosquito: > **[The Great Father Mosquito - A Tuscarora Legend.](https://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Legends/TheGreatFatherMosquito-Tuscarora.html)** > > One of our 1400+ Native American Legends - The Great Father Mosquito (Tuscarora). ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/30 "2017-06-02T12:38:07Z")
Well, there was 1957’s _Attack of the Crab Monsters_. A-bomb (of course) creates giant killer crabs. Pubes are infested bigly. Etc. Although I might be mis-remembering something. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/31 "2017-06-02T12:49:00Z")
_The Naked Jungle_ is still my favorite insect movie. Charlton Heston battling vast armies of marauding ants, [a sexy mail-order bride](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtdCN-Vkg7k)…what more could you ask? ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/32 "2017-06-02T13:07:17Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > _The Naked Jungle_ is still my favorite insect movie. > > Charlton Heston battling vast armies of marauding ants, [a sexy mail-order bride](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtdCN-Vkg7k)…what more could you ask? Interesting flick, for several reasons: 1.) Produced by George Pal and Directed by Byron Haskin, both of whom did a lot of science fiction films (although this isn’t one) 2.) There had already been a radio adaptation of _Leininger and the Ants_ (which this is based on), starring William Conrad. Conrad was a big name in radio acting, and had originated the role of Matt Dillon in _Gunsmoke_ on the radio. Unfortunately, TV and movie execs thought he was too – uhh – portly to be considered a hero in visual media. So when _Gunsmoke_ moved to the tube, James Arness got the role, with Conrad nowhere in sight. When they made _The Naked Jungle_, Charlton Heston got the lead. But at least Conrad got another role in the movie, this time. 3.) George Pal re-used some of the army any scenes in his flick _Atlantis, the Lost Continent_. They were scenes of the ants crossing streams. In Atlantis, I think they were supposed to show that the ants, like other animals, were fleing the doomed Atlantis, fated to sink. Although the mind boggles at the thought of army ants attempting to cross the _OCEAN_. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/33 "2017-06-02T13:11:39Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > Well, there was 1957’s _Attack of the Crab Monsters_. A-bomb (of course) creates giant killer crabs. Pubes are infested bigly. Etc. > > Although I might be mis-remembering something. Not the only movie with giant crabs. (And it was a pretty stupid-looking one in this film, too. Whaddaya expect? It was a Corman film). There was a better Giant Crab in _The Mysterious Island_. There were better giant scorpions in **The Black Scorpion** (as well as in both versions of **Clash of the Titans**. Attack of the Crab Monsters is also notable as yet another case where Russel Johnson played a scientist, just as in _This Island Earth_, _Space Children_, and two episodes of _The Twilight Zone_. You can see that the Universe was setting him up to play The Professor on _Gilligan’s Island_. ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/34 "2017-06-02T13:36:56Z")
> [@dzeiger](#): > > Didn’t most of the old-time “Giant Monster” movies get their effects by letting the real thing roam around on a miniature set and filmed really close up? That’s easy enough with spiders or grasshoppers, not so easy with mosquitoes. Surprisingly few, actually. Offhand, I can think of _Tarantula_ and _Beginning of the End_ that used that technique. The first is a pretty good movie. The second isn’t. More common was the use of full-sized mechanical models, as in _Them!_, _The Deadly Mantis_, _Attack of the Crab Monsters_ or _The Monster that Challenged the World_. Occasionally they used stop motion animation (_The Black Scorpion_), or a combination of stop motion and full-sized models (_Monster from Green Hell_). _Rodan_ had giant insect larvae that showed up in a mine, and were eventually eaten by the newly-hatched Rodan. And speaking of _kaiju_ films, what about the greatest Giant Insect of them all: [_Mothra_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothra)? ---
**Author:** ![TCMF-2L](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tcmf-2l/32/16553_2.png) [@TCMF-2L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TCMF-2L)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/35 "2017-06-02T14:16:14Z")
Now you mention bug movies, just last week I watched **Stung** - movie about giant wasps. Made as recently as 2015 it is OK, neither a good movie nor so rubbish it entertains as ‘car crash’ TV. It has a slumming **Lance Henrikson** and the (minor novelty) of being set in America but actually filmed in Germany. TCMF-2L ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/36 "2017-06-02T14:23:22Z")
> [@MrAtoz](#): > > Surprisingly few, actually. Offhand, I can think of _Tarantula_ and _Beginning of the End_ that used that technique. The first is a pretty good movie. What’s wrong with just tossing a few grasshoppers [onto a postcard?](https://grandoldmovies.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/grasshoppers-chicago.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/37 "2017-06-02T15:03:48Z")
_Earth vs The Spider_ Giant spider in a cave is knocked unconscious and brought to the local high school auditorium by the dumbest town-folk in history. Wakes up, escapes, lays waste to town, heads back to its home where it is ruthlessly murdered by the numb-nuts. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/38 "2017-06-02T15:21:29Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > _Earth vs The Spider_ > > Giant spider in a cave is knocked unconscious and brought to the local high school auditorium by the dumbest town-folk in history. Wakes up, escapes, lays waste to town, heads back to its home where it is ruthlessly murdered by the numb-nuts. Wonderfully bad flick. It used a photographically blown-up Tarantula as its bad guy. The movie was effectively skewered on MST3K, one great line being "Gee, that Giant Spider is something, but look at what;'s over _THERE!_, said by the 'bots when the guys in the movie were supposed to be looking at the Spider, but the sight lines didn’t really line up with the SFX spider. The poster for the movie said “It must eat you to Live!” [![](http://www.monsterbashnews.com/front/spider.jpg) ](http://www.monsterbashnews.com/front/spider.jpg) I’ve become more mellow towards such cheap flicks as I age. I now see how they did all sorts of things to save money – making the kids appear to be in a cave by matting in a couple of stalactites in a scene shot on a completely dark set, for instance. I was impressed that they actually went to the trouble of making up a dessicated dummy to show the effect of the Spider draining the fluids out of somebody and, rather than lingering on it, the shot lasted only a fraction of a second onscreen. Here it is: [https://www.google.com/search?q="Earth+vs.+the+Giant+Spider"+dead+body&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiWhpLeuZ\_UAhWIyyYKHaeVCV8Q\_AUIBigB&biw=1440&bih=680#imgrc=GuZxh364S3JfqM:&spf=1496416466584](https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Earth+vs.+the+Giant+Spider%22+dead+body&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiWhpLeuZ_UAhWIyyYKHaeVCV8Q_AUIBigB&biw=1440&bih=680#imgrc=GuZxh364S3JfqM:&spf=1496416466584) in any event, there were lots of flicks with insects and other beasties on miniature sets or photographically enlarged: \*\*Tarantula Beginning of the End Earth Vs. the Spider Killers from Space Have Rocket Will Travel The Cosmic Monsters\*\* (In Britain, it was “The Strange World of PLanet X”. I’m convinced that Stephen King stole “The Mist” from this film \*\*The Giant Gila Monster King Dinosaur Journey to the CEnter of the Earth The Lost World\*\* (Not just lizards – there’s Giant Spider, too. David Hedison gets to shoot it, thereby getting revenge for the end of “The Fly”) I’m not including much later films (Like the much-derided **Night of the Lepus** ). I observe that even he Ray Harryhausen film **One Million Years B.C.** has a shot of an enlarged lizard among the animated models, apparently to stretch out the budget. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2017, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/39 "2017-06-02T15:47:30Z")
The spider in **The Incredible Shrinking Man** _still_ spooks me. Yeah, the desiccated dummy sequence actually showed some film-making talent! Who’d’ve guessed? I think they used several different spiders: ISTR at one point it was almost totally white (gray?) and at the end, it wasn’t a tarantula at all (some hairless spider–it’s been a long time; I could be mistaken). **Tarantula** is pretty darn good. And prophetic: when things go balls-up, you send in Clint Eastwood to take care of business. And I’m actually impressed with the grasshopper effect at the end of **Beginning of the End**. Bad eyesight helps. ---
**Author:** ![Asuka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@Asuka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asuka)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2017, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892/40 "2017-06-03T21:17:44Z")
The Roger Corman film “The Nest” is about killer cockroaches which start normal sized but eventually mutate to dog sized. The video games series Fallout also features giant insects mutated by post-nuclear war radiation, which include giant cockroaches, giant scorpions, giant mosquitos, giant wasps, giant flies, and giant mantises. If you ever wanted to take a tire iron to a scorpion the size of a car, this is your game. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-giant-or-marauding-insect-movies/787892.md?page=3)