Mesa of Lost Women

Film: Mesa of Lost Women

Year: 1953

Directors: Ron Ormond and Herbert Tevos

Writer: Herbert Tevos

Starring: Jackie Coogan, Allan Nixon and Richard Travis

Review:

Now this is a movie that I feel I’ve seen the title in passing but didn’t know about it looking for horror from 1953. The title was intriguing. I did read a bit of the synopsis ahead of pressing play while making sure that I had the correct movie. Other than that, I came into this one blind.

Synopsis: a mad scientist named Aranya (Jackie Coogan) is creating giant spiders and dwarfs in his lab on Zarpa Mesa in Mexico. He wants to create a master race of superwomen by injecting his female subjects with spider venom.

We start this with seeing a man kiss a woman. She has long nails. A narrator kicks in to say, ‘have you ever been kissed by a woman… like this?’ It then sets the stage of what we’ll get from there. The narrator is Lyle Talbot by the way. Grant Phillips (Robert Knapp) and Doreen Culbertson (Paula Hill) are found wandering in the desert. The reason is that their plane crashed. It is surprising that they were found since the desert is known as Desert of Death. They were lucky since there are oil surveyors out here, Frank (John Martin) and Pepe (Chris-Pin Martin). They ask how they survived and what led them to be lost.

Dr. Aranya has taken up residence in a remote cave. He has Dr. Leland J. Masterson (Harmon Stevens) come to his laboratory to see his experiments. Both men admire each other and Dr. Aranya makes an offer to have Dr. Masterson help him. Seeing what he is doing out here, he refuses. This causes Dr. Aranya to instead use this other doctor in his experiments. To give a bit more information, Dr. Aranya decided to inject spider venom into women and creates Tarantella (Tandra Quinn), amongst others. They are stronger and able to heal, taking attributes from the arachnids. There are other experiments done on other animals and insects, not always as successful.

In the nearby town, people fear what is happening out in the desert. We have a newly married couple on their wedding night get stranded when their pilot was forced to land. Doreen is married to Jan van Croft (Nico Lek). This seems like she married him for his money and security. They go into the bar for dinner where they encounter Dr. Masterson. He takes a liking to Doreen and he seems like he’s in a trance. Tarantella also shows up and does a dance that draws the attention of everyone. A ‘Doc’ Tucker (Allan Nixon) also shows up, trying to take Dr. Masterson back to a hospital.

Instead, he pulls a gun. He shoots Tarantella, saying that he doesn’t like her. He takes the newlyweds and his doctor hostage, forcing them to the airplane. Grant is the pilot. He’s forced to fly this group over the desert. There is also Wu (Samuel Wu) who joins them and he’s a servant of sorts. The plane can’t take the stress so they’re forced to land on Zarpa Mesa. They feel they’re being watched from the woods. Dr. Aranya learns of their arrival and might have had a hand in causing this, setting his sights on new subjects.

That will be where I’ll leave my recap and introduction to the characters. Now when I think of cheesy 1950s sci-fi/horror, this one is going to pop into my head. This feels like it watched other films that came out in the previous decade and then borrowed those ideas. That’s not to say there aren’t good aspects to this. The first would be the setting. I love being out in the middle of the desert. That isolates Dr. Aranya so he could do his thing without being disturbed. It would be hard to get there. I like that also is a miracle that anyone survived this ordeal. Ironic it is an oil surveyor that found them.

Now the idea of mixing animal or insect DNA isn’t necessarily new. This idea of taking glands from humans and putting them in animals would be done in things like Captive Wild Woman. I believe The Ape Man also did this. I’m not fully sure if we’ve seen that done with spiders or insects off the top of my head. I like this idea. There is a subplot here that experiments on women have succeed so far. Dr. Aranya has a dwarf lab assistant, played by Angelo Rossitto. It is stated that this experiment failed. I do like that they got Rossitto an acting role here, as I know him from Freaks, even if he was uncredited here.

The problem with all this is that it was unfortunately boring. I’ll then pull in filmmaking here as well to help explain why. Part of it is voice-over narration. It explains everything. I get that this movie is 70+ years old. The audience might need some things explained, but it also seems like this movie felt that they weren’t smart enough so it led them along. Another issue is that nothing happens. There are attacks on the mesa off screen. It focuses too much on an affair between Grant and Doreen which felt odd. The limited effects we get are cheesy. I will say that the landscape shots are good so credit the cinematography there. There just isn’t a lot that happens unfortunately. I did learn from trivia as well that this was a different movie. It was abandoned due to the director not getting along with the crew. That footage was then purchased and reshoots were done. It was edited together, but it is roughly done. I do believe that is why the tone is off as well.

All that is left then is acting. Coogan was solid as our mad scientist. It was an interesting move that he only had one eye. Not sure why that decision was made, but it does make him distinct looking. Nixon, Richard Travis, Chris-Pin Martin and John Martin are fine. The latter two were the only ones that stuck to me in a limited capacity. Talbot has a good voice, but I don’t think we needed the narration. Hill, Knapp, Lek and Stevens were solid as the group we followed around. I also liked Quinn and the other experiments, including Rossitto. The acting is decent across the board for what was needed.

In conclusion, I think that there are interesting ideas here, but the movie falls flat for me. I like the mad scientist angle. Having his lab be isolated is also good. That feels almost Fu Manchu or James Bond villain like. The sci-fi elements used also work. The problem is that nothing happens. It focuses too much on the love triangle between Doreen, Grant and Jan. Even worse is that it is the former and latter’s wedding night. I just wanted more than what we got and it struggled to keep my attention. Not one that I can recommend giving a watch unfortunately. The good aspects are just lacking.

My Rating: 4 out of 10