The Giant Claw – a huge, superfast bird thingamabob terrorizing the earth. They can't kill it with military weapons. But maybe there is hope, because Mitch (Jeff Morrow) and Sally (Mara Corday) work on a way to defeat the bird with the help of (dramatic drum roll) science!"Yet another monster flick", you might think – and you'd be perfectly right. Why should you watch this one? Because of the Giant Claw itself. It is a truly wondrous creature: a hideous puppet with a wrinkled face, off-standing hair and enormous pop eyes. As a movie monster, it's as ludicrous as it gets. Surprisingly enough, the movie itself is pretty okay. Director Fred Sears doesn't make as many catastrophic blunders as you'd expect. This isn't an Ed Wood movie, after all. It's just that the contrast between the fairly serious story and the silly bird is as pungent as it's funny. As a trash movie, it might be a bit underwhelming. Still, you haven't lived until you saw the amazingly ugly Giant Claw.

"The Giant Claw" is an adorably horrible monster movie featuring a silly plot, inept script, pedestrian acting, and the most endearingly ridiculous monster ever to threaten mankind. Stories abound about disappearing budgets, Mexican puppet makers, Jeff Morrow slinking out of the theatre when he first saw his feathered antagonist, etc., all of which elevate the movie to the rarified status of one of the "Worst Movies Ever". This is, of course, nonsense, as most people would not bother to finish the "Worst Movie Ever"; whereas, people watch "The Giant Claw" (and its ilk) over and over again. I'd bet in 50 years people will still be snickering over the anti-matter space buzzard when, for example, "Star Trek: Beyond" doesn't even make it into trivia contests. How do you rate a movie that is awful by any measure but yet makes the world a better, or at least a more whimsical, place simply by existing? Metaphorically, HAL would give it a 0, Dave would give it a 10, so I'll split the difference and give it a 5.

...Good Special Effects for it's time (1957)....The Claw monster was just hokey enough to let us face the fears of being thrown into the "Atomic Age". A time of ever present instant annihilation... ….It helped us come to terms with an insane time & real fears ...A worthwhile movie...Audiences responded with laughter and it allowed us to view our Human-ness...

Fred F. Sears directed this science fiction/horror picture that stars Jeff Morrow as pilot Mitch MacAfee, who one day reports seeing a huge UFO flying overhead. He is not believed, but is later proved right when the "UFO" is identified as...a giant outer-space bird with big bulging eyes and a Mohawk which is composed of anti-matter, and proceeds to decimate the world! Oh Boy... Astonishingly(even staggeringly!) inept film has the most jaw-dropping, god-awful model F/X ever seen in a motion picture. Truly laughable and cringe-inducing at the same time. Actors were reportedly embarrassed by the big turkey when they saw the finished film, and who can blame them. Ludicrous plot and cheap production only makes this all-time worst film candidate even worse.