Spoonatects Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

Stoutor It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

carlvistisen At the world expo in Shanghai Denmark chose the little mermaid to be the representative of Denmark and Danish culture. This was a mistake! A mistake only comparable to the Danish military effort during the battles in 1864. Reptilicus is not only the best danish movie ever made, but also the greatest thing ever to be made in Denmark. The reasons why it was no exhibited at the expo remains unknown for surely even a simpleton would be able to see the greatness of this movie. To label this as a movie is inaugurate for this is not only art, this is the product of the human race, all lives lived led to this movie. Reptilicus represents more than just perfection, it represents hope, that in our otherwise meaningless and painful existence there is meaning. Reptilicus is the lighthouse that with a beacon of hope shines in the fog of existence. You can simple not make movie without inspiration from Reptilicus whether it is a conscious decision or not.

ferbs54 I never got to see the 1961 monster outing "Reptilicus" when I was a child, and so have nothing in the way of nostalgic attachment as regards the film. Thus, when I watched the movie for the first time a few nights back, it was with the cold, hard objectivity of an aging baby-boomer adult. The result was an entertaining evening, but one that would have been infinitely more enjoyable had I been watching within the pleasant aura of a fondly remembered youth. "Reptilicus" is today perhaps best known as the only giant monster movie to have ever come out of Denmark, of all places. As it turns out, the picture is decidedly inferior to the giant monster movies that had been all the rage ever since the U.S. released the granddaddy of all such films, "The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms" (one of this viewer's all-time faves) in 1953, and Japan released the seminal "Gojira" the following year. Whereas "Beast" had featured stunning stop-motion animation from the great Ray Harryhausen, and "Gojira" had spotlighted director Ishiro Honda and Toho Studios' artful way with what would soon be an entire subgenre, the "kaiju eiga" film, "Reptilicus" gives us a monster that is brought to life with very inferior FX (basically, the monster here is a clunkily moving puppet). Still, the picture DOES yet have something to offer to fans of this genre.In the film, a Danish copper miner working in Lapland, Svend (hunky blonde dude Bent Mejding), manages to drill up the bloody remains of a dinosaur tail that had been buried deep below the frozen tundra. The prehistoric fragment is brought to the Danish Aquarium in Copenhagen, where Professor Martens (Asbjorn Andersen) and his assistant, Dr. Dalby (Poul Wildaker), begin to study it. After an accident of casual stoopidity, the tail gets unfrozen and begins to regenerate and grow. Ultimately, an entire new creature manages to be reborn, which easily escapes from the aquarium and begins to do what giant monsters do best: terrorize the populace and lay waste to the surrounding area! The monstrous threat is combated by not only the professors, but by granite-jawed, growly-voiced American general Mark Grayson (Carl Ottosen) and the entire might of the Danish Army and Navy. But can all their guns, flamethrowers and bombs avail against the menace...especially when that menace can regenerate itself from any pieces that are blown off of it? How do you say "What a conundrum" in Danish?"A laughable sub-Japanese monster" is what my beloved "Psychotronic Encyclopedia of Film" calls Reptilicus, and it is indeed very difficult for any viewer to argue with that assessment. Unlike the Beast and Gojira, this monster reveals very little in the way of personality and is decidedly unmenacing, despite the green "acid slime" that it is apt to belch out when annoyed. When the Beast looked directly into the camera, it was chilling; when Gojira appeared in close-up, it was intimidating and awesome. Reptilicus, unfortunately, engenders no such emotions; only giggles. The film itself is only 90 minutes long and yet comes padded with goofy comedy segments (provided mainly by dopey aquarium guard Petersen, played by Dirch Passer; get a load of him as he sticks his hand into the electric eel tank!), a travelogue around Copenhagen (which does admittedly look like a gorgeous city to visit) that might just as well have been put together by the Danish Tourist Board, AND a musical number by real-life chantootsie Birthe Wilke, singing "Tivoli Nights" in a swanky nightclub. The monster here is not shown until a good 40 minutes into the picture, which delay would have infuriated me no end as a child (in "Beast," we get to see the monster after only 10 minutes of screen time). The acting in the film is pretty lousy, and is hardly abetted by producer/director Sidney Pink's uninspired staging. Besides the lackluster creature FX, there is also some bona fide animation to be had here (the green slime; the sight of one victim being scooped into Reptilicus' gaping maw)...of a very low-grade order, unfortunately. Perhaps worst of all, we never get a good, solid, establishing shot of the monster in question; I still don't know if Reptilicus has legs or not, or if it merely slithers along the ground.Fortunately, there IS some good news to be had here. The film provides the viewer with some nice eye candy in the form of no fewer than three lovely ladies: Martens' two daughters, Lise (Ann Smyrner) and Karen (Mimi Heinrich), not to mention UNESCO representative Connie (Marla Behrens). The segment in which the fleeing populace of Copenhagen runs over the slowly opening Langebro Bridge, and several fall into the water below, looks absolutely fantastic and realistic; a fairly awesome display! Actually, the entire picture looks terrific, and only the scenes with Reptilicus itself look phony and disappointing. I also liked the film's final, ominous shot, predictable as it may have been. Bottom line: This is a fairly likable film, unquestionably subpar when compared to many others of the era, but still perfect fare to watch with your 8-year-old nephew. And if Reptilicus itself doesn't go into the pantheon of greatest screen monsters of all time, it remains at least the greatest DANISH monster of its era...until, of course, Torben Bille appeared as the monstrous little-person Olaf in the 1973 Danish sleaze classic "The Sinful Dwarf." But that's another story entirely....

MisterWhiplash The monster Reptilicus (I forget if and how often the monster is referred to as this in the movie, but let's run with it and say it is for the sake of the world's entertainment) is a wonder to behold. In what was Denmark's one and only monster movie, how the monster becomes what it is is one thing - it's practically formed through scientist neglect as a guy sleeps on the job and he (or it, not sure if it's a she) un-thaws in a much smaller form of basically a reptile-loaf. Then it reveals to the scientists the next day a small crater-sized wound that is healing itself. And then, you know, one thing leads to another and then BOOM there's a giant reptile-snake thing that looks like a deformed 3 year-old's attempt at a monster creation in the Jim Henson shop, crawling around eating poor unsuspecting people (or at least one guy) through the magical power of horrible special effects (seriously, there's a moment where the monster eats a human that's clearly there through the power of badly placed matte-lines).The monster is so gloriously stupid that it's only a wonder that it took so long for the Mystery Science Theater guys to get around to it upon the revival 18 years after the end of the show. This movie is prime-cut MST3K action, full of wooden actors - and some, like the inimitable Dirch Passer as Peterson (like a less subtle but less intentionally funny Kramer from Seinfeld) who are completely goofy, with the director Sidney Pink trying for real laughs like when he puts his hand in an eel tank - and that monster of the title. You almost can't believe when you first see what Reptilicus looks like and that he/she/it is going to be what we're getting; no amount of commentary can make one not laugh at it, and it's one of the pleasures of bad movies to see it there on the TV screen.Did I mention this is a monster movie from Denmark? Some may not notice if one is only paying attention to the redubbed voice-work from AIP, though this creates an odd feeling as Pink had his actors and actresses speaking *in* English, so it has that effect of knowing the actors aren't speaking with their voices, but they don't have that Japanese or Italian style of dubbing where they try to match their mouths. This coupled with the usual lot of types of stock characters, whether it's the stern-faced scientists or the stern-faced military-men (oh those maps they look at where they don't seem to be pointing at anything) and the women who have the same serious but smiling expressions (yeah sounds like a contradiction, just watch), makes for a sit that is hilarious but also occasionally quite boring. Oh, the dialog certainly helps to bring some laughs, but it's telling that the new MST3K characters have to do a lot of work, particularly in the second half, to make it watchable at all.I mention the second half, which is actually where the majority of the action takes place (most of the first half is set-up, with the scientists unearthing this reptilicus at some construction site that, as the MST3K guys says, is like a place out of the end of the Wicker Man, and then how it forms and remolds and grows in the lab). The problem is mostly one of pacing; there's a first attach by Reptilicus that is a lot of fun, and then it goes into the water after it burns to heal. Then the military tries to strike it with some stock-footage navy ships, and this only reveals it that when it's broken apart it grows *new* Reptilicuses (or Reptilicii, I don't know the plural of a made up monster). And then this new Reptilicus attacks a city, with crowds of Danish folk running all amok (many of them smiling, naturally, since they know they're in a cheesy monster movie as opposed to *real life*), and yet this last part feels so connected to the section set in the ocean that it drags. A lot.Sure, criticizing this movie seems like a moot thing to do, but I thought it might be worth pointing out; part of this is that one or two of the jokes by the crew don't hit every time, so one is left watching this dopey nonsense. But at the least Pink's movie is a glorious bit of nonsense, all summed up by the creature with its (sometimes) green slime or fire or whatever coming out of its matte-lines near the mouth, and some of the 'acting' is so stone-faced it's impossible not to chuckle when they go about plodding through the exposition. It makes for a grand return to form for cheesy/worst movies, though among the worst this isn't so bad.

gavin6942 After copper miners discover part of the frozen tail of a prehistoric monster in Lapland, scientists inadvertently bring it back to life.The American version, which is in English with a nearly identical cast to the simultaneously-made Danish version, was directed by the film's American producer-director Sidney Pink; this version was initially deemed virtually unreleasable by American International Pictures and had to be extensively reworked by the film's Danish-American screenwriter, Ib Melchior, before being finally released in America in 1962. Pink was angry at the changes and wound up in a legal dispute with AIP. After Pink and others viewed the English-language version, the lawsuit was dropped.I suspect he American version is the one currently available on Blu-ray from Scream Factory and now lampooned by "Mystery Science Theater" in their 2017 reboot. The film is, well, rather disposable. It's good fun, but not a good film, and pales in comparison to the film they paired it with, "Tentacles". Which is saying something, because "Tentacles" is not a great film either. I liked the creature and was amused by the cartoon green breath, but... it was pretty bad, even by AIP standards.Seeing the Danish version might be interesting. I am not sure if it would be any better, but maybe we could at least see what they were trying to do before AIP stepped in. I suspect this film is also slightly better if you appreciate the comedy of Dirch Passer (1926–1980), who was apparently a big deal in Denmark but completely unknown in America.