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ON THIS DAY IN HORROR - July 16th

"THE FLY" premieres in San Francisco in 1958

Based on the chilling short story of the same name by George Langelaan, The Fly tells a story of a scientist who mutates into a grotesque human fly after one accidentally flew into his transportation machine and mixes their atoms. The film has since become a classic cult horror hit and created a slew of imitators about mad scientists and experiments gone wrong.

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When renowned Quebec scientist Andre Delambre (David Hedison) is found murdered with his head crushed in a hydraulic press, his wife Helene (Patricia Owens) immediately confesses to the crime. Later in police custody, Helene explains what happened to Andre's brother, François (Vincent Price). Andre had been working on a matter transporter device called the disintegrator-integrator, first testing it on inanimate objects, but quickly moves on the living creatures - starting with the family cat (though it does 'disintergrate', it didn't fully reintegrate, but can be heard meowing somewhere). Helene becomes worried for Andre when he hasn't come up from the basement lab for days, goes down to confront him. Helene finds Andre has a strange deformity on his left hand and covered his whole head with a black cloth, and Andre explains (through typed notes) that he tried the machine on himself, but a fly got caught in the chamber with him and mutated their cells - leaving him with the head and left arm of a fly! Time is running out for Andre, whose mind is slowly being taken over by the fly's instincts, and for Helene, who must find the original fly to reverse the process before Andre's humanity is gone forever.

Andre Delambre: [about the cat killed by the transporter] She disintegrated perfectly, but never reappeared.

Helene Delambre: Where's she gone?

Andre Delambre: Into space... a stream of cat atoms...

[sighs]

Andre Delambre: It'd be funny if life weren't so sacred.

Top:   David Hedison as doomed scientist Andre Delambre;

Above:   Patricia Owens as Delambre's wife Helene

Of all his literary works, George Langelaan will probably be best remembered for his 1957 short story The Fly, which originally appeared in the June 1957 issue of Playboy magazine. Seeing potential, film rights were purchased by 20th Century Fox who then hired then unknown screenwriter James Clavell to adapt the short story to the screen. Clavell's first script was faithful to Langelaan's original story, but Fox executives demanded a rewrite with a happier ending (the original ending was with Helene committing suicide in her police cell, and François  and Inspector Charas destroying Helene's manuscript/confession knowing that no one would believe the truth). Satisfied, Fox then hired German director Kurt Neumann, who had a reputation for directing science fiction/horror films such as Rocketship X-M (1950), Kronos (1957) and She-Devil (1957).

Insp. Charas: He put his head and his arm under the press. Why?

Helene Delambre: I cannot answer that question; coffee, Inspector?

Top:   Helene sees her transformed husband for the first time;

Above:   How Andre the fly now sees the world

British actor Michael Rennie (best known as Klaatu from The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)) was offered the title role but declined it because his head would once again be covered thru most of the picture. David Hedison (credited as Al Hedison, and would later go on to appear as Felix Leiter twice in the James Bond films) took the lead role and was actually inside the fly make-up the entire time (not a stuntman as was common practice). Hedison's costume featured a twenty-pound fly's head, about which he said: "Trying to act in it was like trying to play the piano with boxing gloves on." Patricia Owens was cast as Helene Delambre - Owens had a real life fear of insects, so Neumann used this to his advantage by not allowing her to see the makeup until the "unmasking' scene, resulting in a very real scream from his leading actress! Cast as François, Voncent Price has fond memories of filming The Fly, in particular the scene where the fly with Andre Delambre's head and arm is caught in the spider's web. Price remembered that filming the scene required multiple takes, because each time he and Herbert Marshall (playing Inspector Charas) looked at the animatronic figure, with its human head and insect body, they would burst out laughing!

Top:   The now classic "Help me!" scene from The Fly;

Above:   Hedison resting between takes

The Fly premiered in San Francisco to critical acclaim and an enormous box office gross, over $25 million in 2016 dollars, before being released in New York on August 29th. Tragically, director Neumann died from natural causes on August 21st, shortly after a preview screening of The Fly but before the official premiere not knowing what a box office hit The Fly would become. The Fly would go on to inspire two sequels - Return of the Fly (1959) and Curse of the Fly (1965) - and a remake in 1986, directed by David Cronenberg and starred Jeff Goldblum as the doomed scientist. Cronenberg's The Fly, like Neumann's original, would also become a huge critical and commercial hit and become a cult horror classic film in it's own right.

ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE:   95%