An American reporter in Japan meets with an elusive Japanese scientist who has crazed (well he is kind of mad) theories about chemically changing evolution. Drugging the American, he invites him to vacation around Japan - but then weird things start happening - like GROWING AN EYE ON HIS SHOULDER! This scene was homaged in Army of Darkness. A crazy but fun little film, it's better than most of what is on the SyFy-less channel. The end has to be seen to be believed. Just amazing! and fun.

The late Bill Warren in his classic history of fifties sci-fi 'Keep Watching the Skies!' characteristically astutely observed that "The story of the production of 'The Manster' would almost certainly be more interesting than the film itself." For starters, the leads Peter Dyneley and Jane Hylton (best remembered by me as a kid as respectively the urbane voice of Jeff Tracy in 'Thunderbirds' and as Frank Spencer's anxiety-stricken mother-in-law in 'Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em') were both British - Dyneley was raised in Canada and held dual Canadian & British nationality - and were in real life married to each other. I expect they got a nice expenses-paid holiday together in Tokyo out of making this. (Dyneley also spoke the opening narration of the 1963 film version of 'The Day of the Triffids'.) I knew years ago about the famous 'eyeball' shot, and have just been dismayed to have had to sit through 45 minutes of Dyneley shuffling about getting boorishly drunk and attacking people before finally getting to see what all the fuss had been about; and then had to endure another half hour of him shuffling about some more, now with two heads and the Japanese police in pursuit. Jerry Ito is personable and reassuring as the police superintendent, while many before me have commented on how seriously Hot the mysterious Terri Zimmern is as Dr.Suzuki's assistant (or rather accomplice) Tara. I was on the verge of expiring from boredom when finally, minutes from the end, the film suddenly regained my involvement with the genuinely touching farewell between Dr. Suzuki and his deformed wife Emiko, whose sad, drooping left eye generated actual pathos; followed soon afterwards by the spectacular final split which earned the film it's British release title.

This film surprised me - better than I ever expected it to be. Something about it reminds me a little bit of Jekyll & Hyde and to a lesser degree The Wolf Man... I can't place my finger on it but I think it was the chase scenes. The Manster may not be quite as good as the 2 films I mentioned but it's almost to the level of them - quite a good film.A mad scientist is interviewed about his amazing experiments. The scientist feels the reporter would make the perfect subject for his most diabolical of experiments which turns the reporter into a two-headed creature - a killer.This one is a little bit above average on the 1950's horror b-films - they really went all out for the film. As one reviewer said "This is a film waiting to be re-discovered".5/10

Over the years, there haven't been that many movie co-productions between Japan and The United States. "The Manster" gives some clues as to why that may be the case. As I said in my summary line, the movie isn't terrible. The Japan setting does add a little flavor, and occasionally there is some atmospheric direction. But for the most part, the movie comes across as routine. You will recognize elements like the mad scientist and his innocent victim from other movies you've seen before, enough that you'll be able to predict much of what will happen before it actually does. There are additional problems, like the villain disappearing for really long periods of time, a protagonist who isn't very likable, and the fact that very little is done with the idea of a monster with two heads. I will say it again: This is not a terrible movie, but I can only really recommend it for die hard fans of '50s horror movies and/or Japanese cinema.