At the Earth's Core (1976)

Absolutely Fantastic

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

I've never read anything by Edgar Rice Burroughs but there is no way his book was anything like this movie.If it was, he would have not been considered a great writer.So anyway, an elderly scientist builds a giant drill so he can drill through mountains and he decides to enlist his worst student to help him.As soon as they start up the drill, they point it down and even if you didn't know the name of the movie you see what's going to happen.They end up in the center of the Earth(and the drill is inoperable) and the scientist makes up lots of lies to explain why it looks the way it does.They get chased by Godzilla with a bird head and end up getting turned into slaves.The other slaves appear to be cave men who haven't bathed in months except for one woman(played by the lovely Caroline Munro) who has perfect hair and make up.As soon as you see her you know she's only there for a love story angle.I never watch romantic movies but I wonder if they always have a sci-fi story line.Sci-fi movies always have a love story angle so they must. For all the dumb stuff that doesn't make sense, it's not really too bad. Give it a chance.

Refreshing to see Peter Cushing in something outside of the standard horror or mystery genre. He is absolutely charming as Dr. Abner Perry.Dr. Perry and his assistant, David Innes, has just finished building their huge Iron Mole drilling machine. Their adventure begins promptly as they quickly burrow down into the Earth's Core. They step out of the machine and find themselves in a beautiful fantasy jungle - but watch out for that giant dinosaur bird guys! They find themselves captured and enslaved with other humans (cavemen) by strange dominating creatures/monsters. Humorously, these humans or cavemen speak English! How great for our two travelers - now they have help to figure out what's going one and might help them to find a way out of there!This one is just simply fun - no other way to word it. It's a terrible movie but has a certain silly charm to it that is appealing.6.5/10

Just watched "At The Earth's Core" after not having seen it for very many years. Any serious film critic could pick dozens of holes in the movie but despite its many faults it is nevertheless fun to watch. It was made before the advent of computer graphics which dominates the film industry these days, especially in sci-fi special effects. It was deliberately made with its tongue firmly in its cheek & is an imaginative escapist movie. Based on the book by Edgar Rice Burroughs it stars Peter Cushing & Doug McClure both of whom are excellent & good fun to watch. Busty Caroline Munro provides the obligatory female interest & what a cracking piece of crumpet she was back when this movie was released in 1976. For us lads it is almost worth watching just to ogle her!. The sets are awful as are the rubber monsters but you couldn't expect much else given the low budget. They are, in fact, so bad that it somehow helps to make the movie even more fun.

At the Earth's Core (1976) *** (out of 4)Set in the Victorian times, this Amicus picture has a scientist (Peter Cushing) and his assistant (Doug McClure) creating a machine that allows them to dig through the ground. They plan to go to the center of the Earth but they end up in some sort of land with monsters and humans who are being held by slaves by some sort of tribe. AT THE EARTH'S CORE turned out to be the final film from Amicus and it's really a good movie. Well, it's not really a "good movie" but I think it's so silly and so wacky that you can't help but have a blast with it. The term "so bad it's good" certainly fits this thing but the most important thing is that it's highly entertaining. We've got several different types of monsters on display here and all of them are nothing more than rubber suits, which look extremely bad. Just take a look at the first monster attack when a man is eaten by the creature. This sequence is one of the funniest things I've seen from any sci-fi picture. The entire catalog of monsters are pretty fun to watch even with the rubber suits that make some of those Godzilla creatures look like Oscar-winning work. Even the monsters holding the human slaves are incredibly cheap as they just wear masks that cover half of their faces with their normal skin still showing making it all the more obvious. Cushing plays a dimwitted scientist and while his performance is good the character is certainly less than memorable. McClure is good in his supporting role and we got Caroline Munro at least wearing a somewhat cute outfit. Throughout the film there are all sorts of fights, weird looking sets and other strange things that really make this film stand out compared to other low-budget films of the genre. AT THE EARTH'S CORE isn't going to be confused with THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL but those who enjoy campy movies should enjoy it.