I think it chose me for saying something. A man with a unique sense of style and simplicity in relation to the image and storytelling. That's Saul Bass. The graphic designer. I'm not very fond of ants but I admire their collective intelligence. Just like the bees. I wish we androids could possess this skill. We would be so much better off. Bees are very sensitive creatures, while ants are made of teflon. I think bees cry too. We are creatures made out of fast food and various drugs. With thumbs. The end might come as a surprise to you.

Saul Bass is better known as a title designer rather than a film director on his own right. This film provides the answer why. If you are afraid of ants then stay away.The film with its set design wants to reflect the symbolism of 2001: A Space Odyssey with its giant towers and action inside a dome like laboratory somewhere in the Arizona desert.A colony of ants have somehow gained heightened intelligence and are manipulating events so local people leave the area. Two scientists remain examining and conducting experiments on the ants and rescue a young woman wandering around. However the ants are using their collective intelligence to torment and play mind games on the people.I can see that this film has a cultish following. Not a giant ant or a man in a rubber costume in sight. It wants to be enigmatic and perplexing, it suddenly ends leaving you puzzled.I found the whole thing dull, poorly acted with Nigel Davenport and Michael Murphy desperately trying to rescue this mess of a film.

By the Late Sixties and Early Seventies Sci-Fi took on a more Intellectual, Serious Concern about Our place in the Universe and Our place right here on Terra-Firma. This is one of those and one of the best. An underrated, little-seen Thriller with its Elegant Cinematography and Great Insect Footage remains a Thought-Provoking and wholly engaging Film.Directed by Famous and Award Winning Graphic Title Designer Saul Bass, combining stunning scenery and SFX with an Ominous Musical Score, the Movie is an Unnerving Unraveling of an event puzzling Scientists and could be a Foreboding of Things to Come.It's well Acted, save the Girl, and the Tension at times is unbearable. Some have said the the Ending is Ambiguous, but not really. The Voice-Over tells what happened and what is most likely going to happen. It's a bit Mysterious but a Solid wrap-up and is very disturbing.A tight little Thriller in the "Bug" Genre as the Little Creatures provide Unending Story lines and Fascination. A Cult Classic.

While it's true that "Phase IV" is rather slow moving in spots, and that the human characters are ciphers with no real depth to speak of, "Phase IV" is a nice sally at an experimental science fiction film that emphasizes mood and dread over action and character development.I had the good fortune to watch this on a really large flat screen TV, and the amazing insect photography (major kudos to the editor who managed to integrate it so completely into the story!) and dissonant synthesizer laden sound track come through nicely with good viewing equipment - they add the proper utterly alien and inhuman feel to the movie and turn something pretty good into something really creep and spooky.Although the characters are admittedly pretty flat, that's undoubtedly on purpose. "Phase IV" is all about the subjection of the human characters to the overwhelming power of a hive mind where "personality" is besides the point. Even so, Nigel Davenport brings the good stuff to his role as the biologist trying to contain the ants, and you both know everything you need to know and everything you'll ever know about in the first five minutes...without ever knowing him at all.An ambiguous and otherworldly/mystical ending might not sit well with a lot of viewers who like their science fiction movies to wrap things up by the end. And, OK, the goofy little montage at the end with the mathematician and the gamin doesn't really match the quality of the hallucinatory insect footage that preceded it.Still, Saul Bass knew how to present an otherworldly, truly alien experience, but he was probably just too far ahead of his time.A classic of sorts.