The Last Man on Earth (1964)

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HALLOWEEN REVIEWS 2021

Director: Ubaldo Ragona (Italian prints), Sidney Salkow (US prints)

Writers: Richard Matheson and William F. Leicester, Furio M. Monetti and Ubaldo Ragona (Italian version), from a novel by Richard Matheson

Stars: Vincent Price, Franca Bettoia, Emma Danieli, Giacomo Rossi Stuart, Umberto Raho, Christi Courtland



Robert Morgan (Vincent Price), the last man on earth, spends his days killing the vampiric remnants of the human race as they sleep and his nights barricaded in his home, waiting for the dawn. 



This film has many good points.

 


Spoiler alert!!! Final scene!!

The black and white photography presents a bleak, creepy setting. 



The sense of isolation is powerful.

 


An extended flashback presents a poignant portrait of a man losing his family as the world dies.

 


However, Price is miscast; his old-fashioned style of acting, which is so effective in grand Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, is not suited to this grittier material.

 


The vampires are not very threatening and some aspects of the production are not realized very well, such as Morgan’s home, which seems very vulnerable rather than the fortress it needs to be.

















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