There was a volcanic eruption and some earthquakes related to it down in Mexico. A geologist from the United States, Hank Scott, and his Mexican partner, Artur Ramos, are sent to do research in the area. Once they get there though, they start encountering strange things. Dead bodies, torn up vehicles, destroyed houses...and a mystery that needs to be solved. The local villagers think it's some kind of a demon bull that's causing all the mayhem, death and destruction. Turns out they were wrong. It was actually a giant black scorpion, and it wasn't alone. See, when the eruptions started, it exposed this massive underground cave system that winds it's way all around the area and even as far away as Mexico City. Well it turns out that there's a huge number of these scorpions living down there along with a variety of other giant beasties. With the upper world open to them now, the scorpions venture out in search of food, and it's up to our heroes, their new friend (and Hank's new love interest) Teresa Alvares, who owns a nearby cattle ranch, a scientist by the name of Dr. Velazco and the boys from the Mexican army to stop them.

Ray Harryhausen is a household name when it comes to stop motion creature animation in films. Willis O'Brien, who did the effects for this and many other films, may not be as much of a household name as Ray Harryhausen, but he does have an impressive body of work to his credit including films like The Son of Kong, The Lost World and Mighty Joe Young just to name a few. In this film, he did a tremendous job basically creating a nest of scorpions, and in many scenes, had several scorpions going at once and even had them fighting with themselves and other monsters. In one spectacular scene, two scorpions derailed a train and started picking up and killing people who were running away from the wreckage. Then, the big daddy scorpion comes along and kills the two smaller, albeit still giant scorpions, for no particular reason. I guess maybe he just didn't like the competition for the food, because earlier he killed some other of the smaller giant scorpions so he could eat the giant clawed worm they'd just killed. Needless to say, if you're looking for great monster action, you're going to find it in this film.

The acting in this film was really quite good, and yet it was also very typical of the style of acting that you'll find in most films of this era. Most of the characters in this film were really quite likeable, and everyone, I thought anyway, pulled off their characters quite well. The only one that may be an exception to this would be Juanito, but only because his dialogue didn't sound natural enough. Then again, he was seven and a half years old and speaking in a second language, so that could be why.

One thing I found particularly strange in this film is that the cop the guys were talking to on the radio after they found the destroyed police car, sounded like a white guy that just walked out of an episode of Dragnet. Later on in the movie, when the big daddy scorpion came to Mexico city and there were alerts being broadcast to the public, it also sounded like a Dragnet white guy with perfect English. It made me wonder. If this is happening in Mexico, why would they be broadcasting alerts in English? Anyway, it just struck me funny, but it's not detrimental to the film or anything.

This movie is a prime example of why I love classic b-movies so much. It's got everything. It's got heroic characters, a hot chick, great special effects and best of all, great monsters! They really went all out too. There were huge running crowd scenes, scenes with heavy equipment and military vehicles, lots of guns and artillery, a huge, creepy cave system - the whole nine yards. I think the only thing I could really complain about in this film is that there were too many of the cool scenes shot at night, so they were awfully dark and it made it hard to see what was really going on.

The long and the short of it though is, this is a great film. This is exactly what classic monster movies should be. It's fun, and the animation and effects with the scorpions and other creatures gives it a coolness factor that's hard to beat. What's even better is that the DVD has a bunch of cool extras on it as well, including a stop motion masters featurette with Ray Harryhausen, some never before seen test footage of some different monsters, an animated dinosaur sequence that Ray Harryhausen did for a film called The Animal World, and a collection of trailers for other giant monster movies. It's really a great DVD and I would highly recommend that any of you out there who love these kinds of films should add it to your collection as soon as possible. You won't be sorry you did.