The Monster of Piedras Blancas

The Monster of Piedras Blancas
Theatrical release insert poster for the film's double-feature release with Okefenokee
Directed by	Irvin Berwick
Produced by	Jack Kevan
Written by	Irvin Berwick
Starring	Les Tremayne Forrest Lewis John Harmon Pete Dunn Jeanne Carmen
Cinematography	Philip H. Lathrop
Edited by	George A. Gittens
Production company	Vanwick Productions
Distributed by	Filmservice Distributors Corporation
Release date	April 22, 1959 (US) 1961 (UK)
Running time	71 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$29,000

The Monster of Piedras Blancas is a 1959 independently made American black-and-white science fiction-horror film, produced by Jack Kevan, written and directed by Irvin Berwick, that stars Jeanne Carmen, Les Tremayne, John Harmon, Don Sullivan, Forrest Lewis, and Pete Dunn. The film was distributed by Filmservice Distributors Corporation on a double bill with Okefenokee.

The Monster of Piedras Blancas was influenced by The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954). Kevan, who had supervised the manufacture of the Gill-man suit at Universal-International, created the Piedras Blancas monster costume. Kevan employed several of his former Universal associates on the picture, including soundman Joe Lapis and prop master Eddie Keys.

The setting is the sleepy lighthouse town of Piedras Blancas. Sturges (Harmon) is the lighthouse keeper of the town and is very superstitious and concerned for the safety of his teenage daughter, Lucy (Carmen). He leaves food for a sea monster who lives in a nearby cave. The locals disregard him at first, but they begin to take notice when the bodies of people killed by the monster are found on the beach. A local scientist identifies a scale found near one of the bodies as belonging to a "diplovertebron," a prehistoric amphibious reptile long presumed extinct.

Both Berwick and Kevan toiled in unbilled obscurity as contract employees at Universal-International. Berwick had been an uncredited dialogue director at U-I and at Columbia prior to that, working with the likes of William Castle and Jack Arnold. Kevan in particular chafed under the stewardship of Bud Westmore, the head of the studio's makeup department,who seldom allowed employees like Kevan or sculptors Chris Mueller and Millicent Patrick to receive publicity. Berwick and Kevan formed Vanwick Productions and became independent producers. The Monster of Piedras Blancas, their first film, was designed as a takeoff on U-I's popular Creature from the Black Lagoon, whose iconic monster suit Kevan had helped create. For this film's fictional "diplovertebron", Kevan cut cost and labor time by using existing molds for the feet (cast from those of the Metaluna Mutant from This Island Earth) and the oversized hands (designed originally for The Mole People). Actor/stuntman Pete Dunn wore the green-hued monster suit in the film and did double-duty playing the bartender character. Parts of the rubber monster suit showed up years later in the TV show Flipper, in the episode "Flipper's Monster", which was directed by Ricou Browning, who had performed the Gill-man swimming scenes in Creature From the Black Lagoon.