The Creature from the Black Lagoon + some Carol Clover

I grew up watching Svengoolie (aka, campy horror films on TV) every Saturday Night from 6th grade until college. And on breaks we still watch Svengoolie whenever we can, and one of my favorite films is The Creature from The Black Lagoon. I mean, as a biochem/chem enthusiast, this was one of my earlier introductions to what scientists did, and I was glad Kay was at least given the title of a scientist too. (don’t @me, no one in my family is a scientist and earlier scientist representations were all like, Mojo Jojo, Dexter’s Lab, Woody from Psych, and Victor Frankenstein…I hope you can spot the pattern). Also there were really cool underwater shots. But one aspect that particularly draws me in is the failed seduction that takes place. I mean, it’s obvious that the Creature has some infatuation with Kay, we all know this at this point, and we’ve talked about how the monster can help stand in for the thing against status quo.

The failed seduction also works because the creature is framed sympathetically, it’s just an old, primitive creature with strength but no real ill intent, it’s just doing what nature things do. Love of Kay if that humanizing factor, love being one of the most powerful and common emotions to use to humanize something non-human, and this is seen throughout, from Doctor Who to sympathetic Superhero villains. But enough on what we know, and really know because of the Shape of Water haha. And why do some of us root for the failed seduction? Well, because maybe we can identify with the creature being shunned and different from society and enjoying that, or maybe just like, bland archetype males are kind of bland and oversaturated?

I want to deep dive a bit into Kay’s character in relation to Clover’s chapter “Opening Up,” it’s pretty straightforward but it might be nice to have all the thoughts about it written down. Because Kay is a scientist, and not only is she a scientist, but she apparently helped one of the other scientists a ton in their work and the men recognize that. However, all of this is tossed aside in having her probably the least critically thinking of the group, and that’s blamed on how she’s a woman, and thus, mainly just an object of affection and plot point. Kay’s the one who decides to swim on her own far from the boat and thus, attracts the creature’s curiosity, and other than that she really has no scientific contribution to the expedition (which is such a wasted opportunity really…). But in being a woman, she’s what draws the creature out of its realm and into theirs, and she also creates the main beef between David and Mark. Would they have been at each other’s throats were it not for Kay? Yeah, probably, but it wouldn’t be as pronounced. They act as these opposing forces, one all about making the big bucks and the other being the “good” scientist and just wanting to study lungfish noninvasively, it’s a rather classic and common dynamic but it works. But the thing that get’s David to start actively trying to harm the creature, is when he attacks the crew to get closer to Kay. Afterwards it becomes this whole moral dilemma of to kill or not to kill the creature. As Clover says, “the female body is on the line only in order to put the male psyche on the line” (86), and that happens quite literally in the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

Although the creature is technically a scientific discovery and they treat it like a scientific subject of interest, the creature is still an anomaly of it’s time and given that it’s also from a legend by told to the captain by an ‘old crazy lady’ only further sets up this science vs magic thing going on. Especially because it was an old lady talking about the legend to the Captain, and not like, just a local folk tale or something (because of course, women are more in tune to the supernatural you know). One of the more interesting (maybe very, minusculely subversive) aspects of the film is how Mark gets killed, and so do some crew members, and Kay’s kidnapped, yet David decided to let the creature retreat back to the lagoon in the end. He chooses the preservation rather than further annihilating it for everything the creature’s done. As in the PowerPoint online, there’s thus new versus old masculinity presented in David and Mark. Mark’s brash, greedy, and is very happy to just instantly kill the creature, while David is much more sympathetic. I also think it’s worth noting that Kay is David’s love interest, so the movie early on sides with him as the better and more moral of the pair, the “new” masculinity that likes lungfish and evolution.

And in discussing how these roles in the narrative functional, it’s really easy to see the formula in many, many other horror movies. From The Shining (sober Jack vs actually insane Jack?) to King Kong to like, many, many other 1950s horror films and too many creature features. Regardless, I’m still really fond of them.

Also, I love that they gave David and Mark different air tanks for the scuba shots, I would 100% not be able to tell them apart otherwise.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ACa-L3uKLI <-- Are you curious about Svengoolie?