The Navy vs. the Night Monsters starts in Antartica where scientists have found frozen planet & animal specimens buried deep under the icy surface, they are packed up & sent by plane to Gow island where the plane is due to refuel & drop the specimens off at a military research base. However while making the approach to land something happens on the plane, all communication is severed & the plane crash lands on the island. A rescue is sent straight away but only the pilot is found & in a state of extreme trauma unable to speak, the race is now on to find out what happened on the plane, why it crash landed & where the other nine crew disappeared to. The plane is unload & the specimens are taken to the base where Dr. Arthur Beecham (Walter Sande) gets to work, it's not long before worrying incidents begin to happen as a corrosive substance turns up everywhere, people start going missing & mutilated bodies are found in the jungle. It seems that killer Tree's are loose on the island & looking to feed...Co-written & directed by Michael A. Hoey who apparently had major disagreements with the producer during filming & as such John Hall & Arthur C. Pierce were hired to shoot scenes that Hoey refused to including some of the more comedic moments & some of the terrible looking scenes featuring the Tree monsters. I quite like 50's & 60's sci-fi horror monster films generally but The Navy vs. the Night Monsters is pretty hard to sit through let alone recommend. The script was based on the novel 'The Monster from Earth's End' by Murray Leinster which I have not read so cannot compare the two but I suspect it's better than what ended up on screen, even at a fairly brisk 84 minutes long this thing drags badly in places & is very talky with lots of dull exposition that has dated very badly. The character's are clichéd, the dialogue is wooden, everyone is so impassive & uncaring despite what is going on & copious amounts of stock footage means that a few scenes are a complete mess to watch especially the ending. Overall this is a pretty dull film that takes ages to get going, it's well over an hour before we get any significant killer Tree vs. Navy action which is too long. This starts out like a mystery as we try to figure out what happened to the nine missing plane crew & a Penguin but it doesn't hold ones interest & it's pretty obvious what happened anyway, after that it's just a plodding monster film full of dull talk & stock footage bookended with some narration about nothing in particular.All of the action scenes including the crash & the napalming of the island is nothing but stock footage badly edited into the film & there are other scenes of stock footage like planes flying, waves hitting rocks & shots of the island from above. The Tree monster look daft, they look like ordinary Trees but with thicker trunks & leaves that shake a bit. The best moment is when a soldier has his arm ripped off by one of the monsters in what was probably quite a graphic scene back in the mid 60's. Originally title 'The Night Crawler' the producer changed it which is one reason why he & Hoey feel out.With a supposed budget of about $178,000 this was shot in about ten days this is badly made throughout. The acting is poor & very wooden.The Navy vs. the Night Monsters is a pretty bad 60's sci-fi horror monster film with nothing to recommend it apart from some bad special effects which end up being funny & a guy having his arm ripped off. Don't waste your time.

A navy C-47 filled with man-eating plants lands at an Antarctic research station filled with dumbbells.Bobby Van flies in from the New York comedy clubs to trade one-liners with Tony Eisley while the other idiots at the installation try to figure out what in the hell is gobbling up various penguins, sheep, and support personnel. Walter Sande makes an appearance as a 'Gung Ho' operations officer, but even he could not save this Saturday matinée bargain flick from descending into oblivion.Mamie van Doren's beautiful boobs upstage everybody, including the stupid plants.

Navy vs. the Night Monsters, The (1966) * 1/2 (out of 4) This now legendary cult movie has the reputation of being one of the worst ever made but I wouldn't go that far. The film has a pretty simple storyline as a Navy base has a plane land where only the pilot is alive and the rest of the crew have mysteriously disappeared. The only strange thing is this acid material that is all over the place. While the doctors try to figure out what's going on, more deaths happen and sure enough it's because of those killer trees brought back from Antarctica. The killer tree genre didn't deliver too many movies and you just need to watch this one to understand why. Again, this is no where near the worst movie ever made but at the same time I will call it one of the most disappointing because it really isn't as bad as what you've heard. I think the biggest problem with the film is that it really doesn't do anything with its silly and stupid plot. Yes, the plot is incredibly dumb but so were the majority of stories that were used for our sci-fi and horror favorites. The filmmakers want us to believe that trees have come to life and can attack people. Fine, do something with it. The first hour of the film pretty much has everyone talking about terrifying these creatures are yet it takes forever to get to see them in action. Once they do go into action we get a few nice laughs because of how silly they look. The low-budget is obvious with the special effects and especially one scene where a man gets his arm pulled off. An even stranger thing is why this movie was made to begin with. Outside it being shot in color the thing really looks and feels like something made ten or fifteen years earlier. When you think of what was going on in the film world by 1966 it's as if the filmmakers of this thing were in a coma and didn't realize how out-of-date their movie was. The performances, as you'd expect, are all rather wooden and this includes cult favorite Mamie Van Doren who plays the head nurse. She's suppose to be playing this brilliant mind but I think you know how that turned out. At least the directors were smart enough to keep her in tight shirts. At 88-minutes this comes off as one of those films where you keep watching and keep yourself entertained hoping that something good eventually happens but in the end there's not enough there to make it worth the effort. THE NAVY VS. THE NIGHT MONSTERS isn't a good movie but sadly it isn't bad enough to be fully entertaining.

When I was a little kid this film gave me the creeps, but now its just a cure for insomnia. The only thing that makes this film watchable is Mamie Van Doren in a blouse that looks like its about two or three sizes too small and shows the thing (or should I say things) that made her one of the icons of B-movies. This film will always hold a special place in the hearts of fans of Ms. Van Doren.