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Everyone’s heard of vampires, werewolves and zombies. They are the staples of mainstream horror creatures – the A-list of the macabre monsters – and they get the lion’s share of the spotlight.
But what about the lesser-known creatures? Aren’t they just as deadly, just as frightening, as their mainstream counterparts?
Well, I’m sure that’s what the creators of these films were intending. And to be fair, sometimes they got it right! For the most part, though, the surprise/disbelief factor overrides any feelings of horror and scariness that they may have been trying to illicit.
But hey: as far as I’m concerned, if it’s entertaining, it has done its job.
Here is a celebration of what I think are some of the creature features with the best B-movie monsters, from the slime to the ridiculous!
Author’s Note: We contemplated putting the golem (from Der Golem) on here as he’s one of our favourite B-movie monsters, but he felt out of place on this list (and Der Golem is a definite classic), so out of respect we’ve kept him off. However, if you’re interested in learning more about the monster made of clay, we have a whole list of books about golems for you!
Wondering where to watch?
We have done our best to list buying – and sometimes viewing options – for the following films. But as streaming services vary greatly from country to country and we probably don’t live where you do, we just can’t cover them all. However, we 100% recommending checking if the show is available on your favourite viewing platform(s).
As digital nomads we don’t always have access to some of the MANY options only available in countries like the USA and UK. So outside, of the powerhouses like Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime, these are the services we recommend:
• Shudder: This one is for all our fellow horror fans out there!
• KweliTV: Find 500+ Black TV shows, films, documentaries and more from around the world
• Viki: A must for those who love East Asian cinema. An absolute treasure trove of Korean, Japanese and Chinese media.
• Mubi: Perfect for anyone who enjoys indie and arthouse cinema from around the world. If you feel overwhelmed, they do a film of the day recommendation.
• SovietMovies: If you haven’t gotten into Russian cinema, you’re missing out! They have a great range of old and new Russian films available with many subtitle options. And, they offer a lifetime, unlimited subscription option for $100!
With that having been said, here are some options to find where to watch or buy in your country:
• uNoGS will tell you in what countries a film or show is available on Netflix.
• JustWatch & PlayPilot can help you find additional streaming and buying options in several countries around the world. Those located in the USA and UK can also use ReelGood.
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The Incredible Melting Man (1978) – A Melting Man
To the credit of The Incredible Melting Man, it was allegedly originally made as a parody or horror films. But unfortunately, a straight-up horror was thought to be more financially viable by producers (according to writer/director William Sachs) so comedic scenes were edited out and replaced with more horror.
Essentially, a man exposed to radiation on a mission to Saturn returns to Earth, and starts melting. And he’s INSANE! So he starts eating people. Yep.
You wouldn’t think you’d need to do much to avoid becoming a victim of a man whose superpower is essentially that he’s dying slowly. But the Incredible Melting Man proves to be surprisingly capable when it comes to killing people.
Legendary makeup artist Rick Baker (of An American Werewolf in London fame) provided the effects for the Melting Man, which may explain why he looks the best (or worst, depending on your point of view) of everything you can see in this film.
Fair warning: it gets pretty icky. The film is about a person melting, after all.
Buy The Incredible Melting Man
Rubber (2010) – A Sentient Car Tire
A car tire named Robert comes to life and begins experimenting with exploding things with its telekinetic powers. First bottles and cans, then animals, and then (dun dun duuuuuunnnnn) PEOPLE.
This movie is weird, and not just because it’s about a tire that kills people with its mind. The film begins with an audience gathering in a California desert to watch a movie, which turns out to be Robert the car tire’s rampage. So we’re looking at an audience watching the film we’re watching. Then, the people in the film start to interact with the audience watching in the desert, as we watch them. It’s very meta.
Perhaps a positive way of looking at Rubber is as a genre experiment. It’s certainly very different to a lot of other B-movie creature features. In any case, look for hidden meanings and metaphors at your leisure.
Mosquito Man (2005) – A Mosquito/Human Hybrid
What happens when you commute a prisoner’s life sentence so that you can use him in your experiments with mosquitos modified by radiation? Disaster, of course! Not only does convict Ray Erikson escape and transform into the titular Mosquito Man, but Dr. Jennifer Allen is also changing, just more slowly. Will she be able to find a cure in time? Or will the world become overrun with mutant mosquito men?
There are obvious parallels to The Fly at work here, even though the cause of the insectoid mutations is radiation rather than teleportation, but that’s true of many B-movies. There’s probably an excellent cliche-based drinking game hidden in this movie somewhere …
Fun fact: lead actress Musetta Vader is no stranger to playing an insect, having portrayed a praying mantis monster in one of Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s first season episodes!
This movie also has an alternate title – Mansquito, which I think is even better.
Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957) – Giant Mutant Crabs
Ah, the 1950’s. Where would movie monsters be without the paranoia and vivid imagination brought about by the dawn of the nuclear age? We wouldn’t have Godzilla, for a start. But we also wouldn’t have Attack of the Crab Monsters, and the world would be poorer for it.
A group of scientists travel to a remote Pacific island to find out what happened to a previous scientific expedition who mysteriously disappeared there. What do they find? Why, it’s two giant, mutated crabs that have absorbed the minds of their victims and are now psychic! And they’re destroying the island piece by piece until there’s nowhere left to hide!
We can thank the prolific producer/director Roger Corman for the creation of this made-for-the-drive-in-market science fiction masterpiece. That and the unease of Pacific Ocean nuclear testing. Corman allegedly told his screenwriter that he wanted “suspense or action in every scene” – I’ll let you be the judge of that.
Buy Attack of the Crab Monsters
Night of the Lepus (1972) – Giant Rabbits
Anyone trying to take regular bunny rabbits and make them sinister is giving themselves an uphill struggle. Even if you try and trick the audience with miniature sets and ketchup blood (which they did), it’s a hard sell. Which is probably why marketers for the film neglected to put any rabbits in any of the promotional material for the film.
Can you imagine the reactions of the audience members who went into this movie without knowing anything about it? I can.
Starring Janet Leigh, who you may remember from Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (now there’s a contrast in quality), Night of the Lepus’ depiction of giant bunnies terrorising a town sadly doesn’t get any more realistic than Monty Python and the Holy Grail’s killer rabbit. But it’s almost as funny.
Frogs (1972) – Frogs … who Demand Social Justice
Don’t mess with Mother Nature. And especially don’t use pesticides to try and clear the way for your extravagant birthday party. Because the frogs are watching, and they’ll enlist the help of all manner of flora and fauna to rid their habitat of all of those pesky, polluting humans.
The variety of deaths-by-nature on display in this eco-horror movie is impressive. There are snakes, tarantulas, geckos, alligators, snapping turtles and, of course, frogs. Even moss manages to cause injury to the upper-class Southern USA family who incur the wrath of the swarm with their nature-corrupting extravagances. But it’s the frogs who are the masterminds here, and it is they who will have the last ribbit.
Make sure to look out for a young Sam Elliott (before he grew his incredible moustache) as he tries to avoid becoming nature’s lunch!
The Gingerdead Man (2005) – A Possessed Gingerbread Man
An executed murderer is brought back from the dead in the body of a gingerbread man – now the Gingerdead Man – after his cremated remains are mixed into ginger powder by his witch mother and anonymously donated to a local bakery, where they are accidentally mixed with blood and then again accidentally electrified while baking in the oven. Then it’s rampage time!
This is beyond silly, but that’s exactly the point. The acting, the violence, the Gingerdead Man puppet himself … it’s a lot, whilst simultaneously being not that much, which is an achievement in and of itself. But as B-list B-movie creature feature monsters go, if you’re looking for a low-investment film to have fun watching with friends (and lots of pizza), the Gingerdead Man will fill you up nicely (haha).
If you end up a fan of this movie, you’re in luck – there’s a whole series of these films for you to enjoy, including Gingerdead Man 2: Passion of the Crust, Gingerdead Man 3: Saturday Night Cleaver and Gingerdead Man vs Evil Bong, as well as the graphic novel Gingerdead Man: Baking Bad.
The Crawling Eye (1958) – Radioactive Giant Eyeballs with Tentacles
Also called The Trollenberg Terror when you’re not in the USA, The Crawling Eye is one of your typical 1950’s sci-fi horror yarns, except that this doesn’t feature a man in a terrible mask stumbling around on two legs. Oh no, for this under appreciated gem, it’s giant, tentacle-clad eyeballs that decapitate humans and control their dead bodies in order to make them kill more humans!
Once the mystery of the decapitations has been linked to the radioactive cloud near the Trollenberg Observatory on the Swiss mountainside, it’s up to our heroes to defeat the monsters with as many Molotov cocktails and firebombing raids as possible.
With special effects including nailing cotton wool to a picture of a mountain to simulate clouds, this really feels like they were just firing off ideas and putting them all in.
Trees (2000) – It’s… Trees
The woods of Hazelville, Vermont are being terrorised by killer trees. But despite pressure from forest ranger Mark Cody, Mayor Swindell outright refuses to close down the woods ahead of Memorial Day weekend – the town’s main cash crop.
If this plot sounds somewhat familiar, it’s because Trees is an homage to classic horror movie, Jaws – which you should definitely be familiar with before watching Trees for maximum callback pleasure.
Trees might seem like unlikely b-movie monsters, but there are actually quite a few horror movies about plants, and they range from the sublime to the absurd.