| Caltiki - The Immortal Monster | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Riccardo Freda |
| Produced by | Samuel Schneider |
| Written by | Fillipo Sanjust |
| Starring | John Merivale Didi Perego Gerard Herter Daniela Rocca Daniele Vargas Arturo Dominici Giacomo Rossi-Stuart |
| Music by | Roberto Nicolosi Roman Vlad |
| Cinematography | Mario Bava |
| Editing by | Salvatore Billitteri |
| Distributed by | Allied Artists Pictures |
| Release date(s) | August 8, 1959 |
| Running time | 76 minutes |
| Country | Italy |
| Language | Italian |
Caltiki - The Immortal Monster (Italian title: Caltiki - il mostro immortale) is a 1959 Italian horror film directed by Riccardo Freda. The plot concerns a team of archaeologists investigating Mayan ruins who come across a blob-like monster. They manage to destroy it with fire while keeping a sample of the monster. Meanwhile, a comet is due to pass close to the Earth, the same comet which passed near the Earth at the time the Mayan civilization mysteriously collapsed. The film proposes the question "Is there a connection between the monster and the comet?"
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The film begins as a delirious archaeologist stumbles into his group's camp without his partner, both of whom having been exploring a cave. He becomes mad, requiring hospitalization. Their interest piqued, the group sets out for the cave.
Upon reaching the cave, they find a deep pool of water, behind which is a large statue of Caltiki, the vengeful Mayan goddess who had been ceremonially presented with human sacrifices. Hoping to find artifacts, the group sends one of their number down into the pool. At the bottom, he finds a menagerie of skeletons clad in gold jewelry. Running out of oxygen, he comes back up, clutching as much gold as he can. Although the group wishes him to not go down again, he insists on doing so, suggesting that they could become millionaires from the wealth below. Relenting to him, they let him descend once more. As he collects more and more treasure, his cable to the surface suddenly writhes erratically. Fearing for his safety, the group pulls him back to the surface, only to find, upon removing his face mask, his body reduced to a decayed mass distended about his skeleton.
Moments later, the monster that attacked him rears up from the pool, attempting to digest anyone near. One of the group is caught, but is then rescued. As the team escapes, the monster begins to crawl out of the cave menacingly. Luckily, there is a tanker truck full of gasoline nearby that the main character drives into the vile blob. It explodes violently, vanquishing it.
The team travels back to Mexico City to take the man who had been caught by the monster to a hospital. Still on his arm is a small piece of the monster that had come apart from the main blob and is still digesting him. When the surgeons remove the blob, they find that his arm is nothing more than a few moist scraps of flesh still connected to his bones. The surgeons wrap it up anyway. After further experimenting on the blob, scientists later discover that it is a unicellular bacterium that quickly grows when in the presence of radiation. Unfortunately, a comet that emits radiation and crosses Earth's path only once in every 850 years or so is quickly approaching. Upon the comet's closest approach, the piece of the blob that the main character left in his house with his wife and infant expands to enormous size and reproduces.
Dr. John Fielding (John Merivale), meanwhile, attempts to convince the Mexican government to send its army to destroy the beast, but is then thrown in prison for his "madness". Fortunately, the government changes its mind, releases him, and sends regiments of flame-throwing tanks to his house. Upon their arrival, they find that the blobs have overrun the house and Dr. Fielding's wife and child are desperately standing on a second-floor window ledge. The mother and child are rescued by Dr. Fielding as the flame-throwing tanks lay waste to the blob monsters.
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