Monster Mash!
Words by Liam Horgan
Monsters, who doesn’t love them. From the big and scaly to the small and creepy, there’s plenty of monsters to go around. Monster movies are great entertainment and have been around since the dawn of cinema. Starting off in 1915 with German silent film Der Golem, on-screen monsters have been terrorising audiences for years. The early 1930s saw the movie monsters take on more human faces, as seen in Bela Lugosi’s Dracula and Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein. In 1933 RKO released the film King Kong, directed by Merian C. Cooper. King Kong was a landmark film for the time and one of the earliest examples of a contemporary monster film, wherein the monster takes a giant, animalistic form. Of course, in 1954 the king of the monsters appeared. Toho Studios’ film, Godzilla, introduced the world to a forever-iconic on-screen monstrosity. A cinematic response to the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Godzilla has endeared as one of cinema’s oldest legends.
From the 1970s onwards monsters on film became blockbuster stars in their own right. Bruce, the bloodthirsty shark from Spielberg's Jaws (1975), was as much a star of the film as the three leads. Alongside Spielberg’s aquatic horror, Hollywood saw the creation of the xenomorph in Alien (1979), the emergence of the Predator in Predator (1987) and the return of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park (1993). To this day on-screen monsters still wow audiences, with films like Bong Joon-ho’s 2006 film The Host, found footage film Cloverfield (2008) and Legendary Pictures’ Monsterverse unleashing various giant monstrosity on unsuspecting audiences.
Yes, we’ve seen a fair share of movie creatures at this stage, but the purpose of this article is to look at some of the more unique modern monster designs to have graced the screen in the last few years. It should be noted this is not a ranking of Movie monsters, that list is fairly self-evident from the above paragraph, rather it is a look at some unique designs that truly encapsulate the monstrous legacy of cinema.
The Host (Gwoemul) - Gwoemul
Bong Joon-ho’s 2006 monster movie The Host is a unique monster movie which harkens back to the most iconic of Kaiju films, Godzilla (1954). The plot of the film sees a monster kidnap a man’s daughter and his family’s attempts to reunite with her. Like Godzilla, Bong’s film explores political themes born from specific events of the time. The film is inspired by an event where a Korean mortician working for the American military in South Korea was ordered to dump a large amount of toxic formaldehyde down a drain. The story caused severe environmental outcry and angered the general population who felt the US military didn’t care about the local populace. Thus, the creature of The Host was born.
The monster is a mutated abomination. Looking like a combination of a fish and a tadpole, the giant creature is grotesque. Featuring a segmented jaw with multiple mandibles and sharp teeth, as well as various deformed appendages and eyes, it is truly a walking nightmare. What makes the design of the film so unique is that it is directly tied to the event that created it, chiefly the dumping of toxic chemicals by the US military. At once a terrifying design and a walking metaphor for pollution, Bong Joon-ho created a great monstrosity to terrify audiences.
Pan's Labyrinth -The Pale Man (Hombre Pálido)
Monsters don’t just feature in horror films, sometimes they reside in other genre outings. Monsters and fantasy have always gone hand in hand, with the genre providing some great examples over the years. Indeed, one of the best monster creators is Mexican director Guillermo del Toro. Del Toro’s unique visual style is extremely recognisable. Starting off with the director's feature Mimic (1997), del Toro showed audiences he could create unique and disturbing monsters. He cemented this claim with films like Hellboy (2004), Pacific Rim (2013) and Best Picture winner The Shape of Water (2017). However, it’s in his 2006 masterpiece Pan’s Labyrinth that you’ll find some of his most unique designs.
Set in 1944, del Toro’s film follows young girl Ofelia, as she navigates the challenges of the real and fantastical world she finds herself in. One such challenge features the iconic Pale Man. Portrayed by actor Doug Jones, who has played a number of creatures over the years for del Toro,the Pale Man is instantly recognisable, with his pale, flabby skin, paper thin legs and eyeballs in the palm of his hands. When Ofelia enters the creature's lair, she is shown murals of the Pale Man devouring children. In a corner of his lair are piles of children’s shoes, a chilling reference to the Holocaust. In his lair, the Pale Man just sits, waiting for some child to eat from the banquet in front of them. Once they consume the food, he wakes and attacks, but until then he waits patiently. Combining both an iconic design with a chilling backstory, the Pale Man is indeed one of del Toro’s best creations.
Spirited Away - No-Face (Kaonashi)
Now for something slightly more light-hearted. Hayao Miyazaki’s fantasy masterpiece, Spirited Away (2001), is full of unique creature designs. However, none hold a candle to the simplicity of No-Face. Inspired in part by Bombyx mori (domestic silk moths), No-Face is a tall figure with a white expressionless mask, like the hannya masks used in Japanese Noh theatre, for a face and black translucent body. No-Face is a mainly silent spirit who fades in and out of visibility. However, when exposed to corrupt feelings of greed and selfishness, No-Face transforms. Having the ability to swallow individuals in order to gain their physical traits, No-Face transforms into a giant pulsing monster. In the film, after swallowing a frog, he gains massive black frog-like limbs. He has a huge mouth which he uses to devour workers at the bath house.
Despite his somewhat monstrous tendencies, No-Face is at heart a lonely spirit who just wants to prove himself. While Miyazaki isn’t known for horror films, it still didn’t stop No-Face from becoming an iconic monster design in its own right.
The Ritual - Moder
The Ritual is a 2017 British horror film directed by David Bruckner, based on the novel of the same name by Adam Nevill. The film follows four college mates who reunite after the death of one of their groups. They decide to go hiking in Scandinavian wilderness, where they encounter a horrific creature. The Ritual is a fine horror film, but the monster design is truly great. This disturbing creature is described in the movie ‘as a bastard child of Loki’ (yes THAT Loki). Known as Moder (Swedish for mother), this creature is truly disturbing. Resembling a giant elk, instead of a head it has a human torso. This torso-head has a pair of antlers for arms, a pair of human arms where legs should be, and a shadowy gaping hole containing glowing yellow eyes in the crotch area. It’s a truly sick monster design, one that hasn’t been seen in a long time in cinema. Harkening back to body-horror creatures seen in the likes of John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982), Moder is a truly grotesque design.
Annihilation - Mutant Bear
Alex Garland’s 2018 adaptation of the Jeff VanderMeer novel is an enigmatic science fiction horror starring Natalie Portman. The story follows a group of scientists who explore an area known as ‘the Shimmer’, a mysterious quarantine zone where wildlife has mutated due to alien interference. VanderMeer’s novel is a complex body of work and thus adapting it to the screen is no easy feat. Although Garland took liberties with the more ethereal elements of the novel, the core of VanderMeer’s work is present in Garland’s film. One of the additions to the film that is not present in the novel is the terrifying mutated bear.
Drawing influence from a creature that is never shown but heard in the novel, Garland created a living nightmare. The hulking creature has the body of an American black bear, however the bear's skin on its face is all worn away leaving a skull. Alongside this, the bear has a human skull embedded on its right side and human teeth mixed in with its own. The final thing that truly makes the bear disturbing is that when it makes noises it sounds like a human, in fact in the film it sounds like missing crew member Cass. It’s one of the most visceral and disturbing moments from Garland's otherwise esoteric film and it’s all thanks to a truly frightening creation.
Coraline - The Other Mother/Beldam
You might not view Henry Selick’s 2009 stop-motion film Coraline as a monster movie. However, the character of the Other Mother or, to refer to her proper title, the Beldam is a truly monstrous entity. Adapted from the Neil Gaiman novel of the same name, Coraline follows Coraline Jones as she moves to a new home and discovers a secret door that leads to an idealised alternative world. The first time we see a hint at the true form of the Other Mother is actually in the opening credits of the film as hands made of needles sew a doll that looks like Coraline. However, our first reveal of the Other Mother shows her to look like Coraline’s real mother just with button eyes. Discounting the buttons, the only other change in appearance is that the Other Mother looks happier and less tired than the real mother.
Later, we see the Other Mother’s true form when she loses her temper with Coraline. She transforms from a short figure into a tall, thin skeletal figure. It’s not until the film’s final moments that the true form of this skeletal figure is revealed, however. Shown to have long needle hands, cracked porcelain skin, dead black hair and long limbs like a spider, the Other Mother is a true monster. Part of the effectiveness of the character is in the voice work of actress Teri Hatcher. Hatcher brings a disarming charm to the character, hiding their sinister undertones. A testament to the design of the Other Mother is that she creeps out both adults and kids alike.
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest - Davy Jones
While it might seem like an odd choice to include a character from Pirates of the Caribbean on a list of great monster designs, an exception can be made for Davy Jones. The character, played to perfection by Bill Nighy, is a fantastic concept. Davy Jones is reminiscent of some of the early onscreen monsters, the ones who still had some semblance of humanity within them. The character is easily comparable to the portrayals of Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein or Lon Chaney’s Phantom of the Opera. Nighy imbues the character with enough withered menace and melancholy that he feels like a character plucked from one of the early black and white monster films. Like those menaces of old, Davy Jones has a tragic backstory and could be considered a misunderstood character.
Davy Jones’ appearance is caused due to his corrupted nature as he abandoned his duties of guiding the spirits of those who died at sea. His body has become a monstrous combination of sea creatures: covered in barnacles, tentacles for fingers, an octopus for a head, and a crab claw for a right hand and left leg. He is a deep-sea nightmare brought to life. From a cinematic standpoint, Davy Jones is a huge achievement, being entirely composed from motion capture footage and CGI. Debuting a full 12 years before Thanos and three years before Avatar, the effects used on Davy Jones still stand up today.
