If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Good movie but grossly overrated

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Beast from Haunted Cave (1959) ** (out of 4) Slow-moving but mildly entertaining horror film from director Monte Hellman has a group of thieves stealing some gold and deciding to hide out in the snowy mountains. Their plan seems to be working at first but soon they come across a giant spider deep within the cave.This here was an early Roger Corman production and like a lot of the films from this era you soon realize that they were working with very little money, which means that there's going to be a lot of talking and very little action. One of the Corman's most known sayings was how when you're monster looks bad it's best to keep it hidden. That pretty much happens in BEAST FROM HAUNTED CAVE as the spider is rarely seen outside of a part here or a part there. The bad costume finally shows up at the very end but at that point it's too late to turn the film off.I thought the cast were decent for what they were asked to do, which was basically hit their marks and say their lines. The cast were at least interesting enough to keep you glued to the movie and to stick with it longer than you probably would have otherwise. The spider creature design is obviously very cheap but there's some mild charm that you can take from it.Hellman would go onto make much better cult movies but this one here was mildly entertaining as long as you don't take it too serious.

When budgets are low you have to hope that story, script and/or good camera-work will carry a project. They certainly do here in a slow-moving, scene-setting and altogether superior b-movie.Lovely scenery, a nice crossover story and gently appropriate music combine well to create a film with genuine qualities.

While this movie doesn't have all the typical low budget horror clichés, it's still manages to move slowly and confuse you at the same time. The acting isn't too bad, it's not a constant tight shot and they are smart enough to never let you get a good look at the low quality monster, yet somehow it's still not good. The premise is bad enough. Some guys steal six bars of gold and are prepared to kill multiple people to get away and they have the longest and slowest possible get away planned. The beast is first seen in a gold mine and then later it lives in a haunted cave so I'm not sure what's up with that but that's the least confusing thing about the movie. The best thing I can say about this is that most 70 minute movies are much worse. Two stars.

The Plot.Gangster Alexander Ward, his girl friend, Gypsy Boulet, and two henchmen come to Deadwood, South Dakota with the idea of stealing a few gold bars. They enlist the aid of a local ski instructor, Gil Jackson, and plan to use him as a guide out of the territory after the robbery. However, a blizzard forces them to take refuge in Jackson's cabin, where Gypsy lowers the inside temperature by giving the cold shoulder to Ward, her former sweetie until she saw Jackson. Ward don't care, as he plans to kill Jackson after they have no further use of him. But they had used an explosion in a cave to serve as a distraction during the heist, and this explosion had irritated the big spider that lived there and, sure enough, all hands have to seek refuge in the cave from the fury of the storm. All but two of them would have been better off facing the South Dakota elements.This movie is atrocious. Poorly written and not even directed. The acting is below sub par.Contrary to another review which says the monster doesn't show up until the lat 10 minutes, it actually appears about 19 minutes in. Not particularly scary however.A real miss for Corman.