Beware! the Blob
Brief Synopsis
Cast & Crew
Larry Hagman
Robert Walker
Gwynne Gilford
Richard Stahl
Richard Webb
Marlene Clark
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
When Marian, the wife of geologist Chester Hargis, unwittingly thaws out one of her husband's scientific samples, a red gelatinous substance oozes from the canister in which the sample was stored and quietly engulfs their pet kitten. Seemingly energized by the sustenance, the blob oozes out into the yard, where Marian is searching for the kitten. As the creature grasps Marian's legs to engulf her, she faints in terror and succumbs, unknown to Chester, who is watching television in the living room. Soon after, family friend Lisa Clark enters the house to find Chester sitting in his reclining chair being dissolved by the ever-expanding blob. Horrified, Lisa races to her boyfriend Bobby Hartford for help, but when they return to the Hargis house, no evidence of the tragedy remains. Meanwhile, bowling alley owner Mr. Fazio, having spotted Lisa speeding, reports her to the police and follows her to the house to admonish her. When Lisa tries to explain to the police that her friends are missing, they search the house while Fazio insists that they arrest her for speeding. After finding nothing suspicious, the police release Bobby and Lisa. Meanwhile, two teenagers are smoking marijuana in a storm drainage culvert, when policeman Ted Sims confronts them. Seeing the red, viscous material dripping into the culvert behind Sims's head, the teenagers warn the policeman, but he suspects they are trying to trick him and ignores their pleas. Within seconds, the blob engulfs Sims and the teenagers. Later that evening, the blob seeps into a hair salon through the sewer system, swallowing the customer's head and hairdresser's arms during a shampoo at the sink. Meanwhile, Bobby and Lisa return to her house, where dozens of Bobby's friends are waiting to throw him a surprise birthday party. As the festivities ensue, Lisa, upset that Bobby does not believe her story, asks him to take her to his ranch. In another part of town, a middle-aged Russian man is taking a bath when the blob slips under the door and swallows his pet dog as the man watches helplessly. Petrified and naked, the man runs into the street, where police pick him up for exposing himself. Back at the police station, reports of missing persons are piling up. At Bobby's ranch, the blob, having already consumed three hobos, is growing exponentially, and quickly envelopes Bobby's truck when the couple arrives. Knowing what fate awaits them, Lisa screams for help, but they cannot escape. Suddenly during the tumult, the blob recedes for no apparent reason. Bobby and Lisa then race to a gas station to call Sheriff Jones and are told that he is at the bowling tournament. Seeing their friend Joe and his girlfriend Leslie, Bobby and Lisa describe the horrific monster. Although Leslie is convinced of their sincerity, Joe mocks them in disbelief and drives off in his dune buggy to investigate their claims. As Bobby, Lisa and Leslie make their way to the town bowling tournament to find the sheriff, they are confronted by the blob, which has covered the road and is enveloping Joe and his car. A hysterical Leslie rushes to help Joe, but dies with Joe under the oozing mass. Taking an alternate route, Bobby and Lisa reach the bowling alley, where Bobby uses the loudspeaker to advise everyone to leave the area, but his warning goes unheeded. Angered by the disruption, Fazio orders his bouncer to bring Bobby and Lisa to his office, where they explain the danger. Meanwhile, the blob, having already devoured the bowling alley mechanic, surges down all the lanes toward the terror-stricken people, who run for their lives. Bobby, Lisa and Fazio barricade themselves in a broadcast booth high above the adjacent ice rink, which is closed for repairs, and watch as dozens of people succumb to the fast-flowing blob. Using the speaker system, Bobby tells the sheriff and his men, who are waiting outside, that the blob is a giant single-celled animal that can ooze through cracks. As the sheriff and his men dress in riot gear to prepare to attack the creature, Bobby tries to electrocute it with a live wire, but does not succeed. Jones and his deputy shoot at the creature, which is unharmed and subsequently eats the deputy. Having devoured the remaining public in the facility, the blob seeps into the booth through a hole in the floor. Scrambling to get away from the creature, Bobby knocks over a small refrigerator and spills ice onto the blob, which shrinks from the cold. Realizing that the air conditioner in their truck must have been the reason the blob did not eat them earlier, Bobby and Lisa asks Fazio how to cool the rink to freeze the blob. Meanwhile outside, the sheriff, having lost contact with Bobby, assumes that he and the others have been eaten, and orders his men to dowse the building in gasoline so they can burn the blob, unaware that fire will have little effect on the creature. Inside, Bobby heroically climbs the ropes leading to the rink's switch box. Once the rink's cooling system is on, the blob freezes solid instantaneously. Bobby then runs out of the building just in time to stop the sheriff from setting it ablaze. Minutes later, the sheriff proudly stands on top of the mounds of frozen blob to give a television interview about the shapeless monster that almost destroyed their town and possibly the world. Just under his feet, a small section of the blob defrosts and begins to engulf the sheriff's boot.
Director
Larry Hagman
Cast
Robert Walker
Gwynne Gilford
Richard Stahl
Richard Webb
Marlene Clark
Gerrit Graham
J. J. Johnston
Danny Goldman
Rockne Tarkington
Dick Van Patten
Tiger Joe Marsh
Tim Baar
Fred Smoot
Randy Stonehill
Del Close
Preston Hagman
John Houser
Larry Norman
Robert N. Goodman
Patrick Mcallister
William B. Foster
Byron Keith
Margie Adleman
Shelley Berman
Godfrey Cambridge
Larry Hagman
Carol Lynley
Burgess Meredith
Wesley Addy
Bud Cort
Crew
Tim Baar
Ken Carlson
Richard Clair
Jesse Corallo
Dean Cundey
Tony Dezarraga
William B. Foster
Hana Gannon
Mort Garson
Mort Garson
Robert N. Goodman
Hazel Hall
Al Hamm
Anthony Harris
Anthony Harris
Jack H. Harris
Jack H. Harris
Raymond Mcgrath
Bill Pecchi Jr.
Conrad Rothmann
Randy Stonehill
Larry Wallin
Jack Woods
W. Allen York
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
The enormous success of Blob, The (1958) led producer Jack H. Harris to try and do a sequel. The project had been shelved for many years. The next door neighbor at his beach house, Larry Hagman, admitted that he had never seen "The Blob". Harris projected his personal 16mm print of the film for him. Hagman showed such interest and asked about doing a sequel to the film that Harris resurrected the project. Larry Hagman wound up directing this sequel and doing a small role in it as well.
Notes
Beware! The Blob was a sequel to the 1958 film The Blob (see below). According to a November 2, 1964 Daily Variety article, producer Jack H. Harris began negotiations with Allied Artists to make the sequel, tentatively to be entitled Son of Blob. According to a June 26, 1972 Daily Variety news item, after the film's initial release in June 1972, Harris changed the title to Beware! The Blob. The onscreen title for the viewed print was Son of Blob. Actor Larry Hagman made his directorial debut with the film. A modern source adds Conrad Rothmann to the cast.
While at the end of the 1958 film the alien substance is frozen and consigned to the North Pole, Beware! The Blob opens with a sequence in which a small section of the frozen substance is unwittingly thawed when it is taken from a geologist's freezer. As with the 1958 original, Beware! The Blob ends with the words "The End" and a question mark, alluding to another sequel. Although in The Blob the creature is identified as extraterrestrial, in Beware! the Blob the origin of the substance is not explained. In neither film is the substance actually referred to as "the blob." For information on the 1958 film and various other versions, please consult the entry above for The Blob.
Miscellaneous Notes
Released in United States 1972
Released in United States 1972
