Teenage Cave Man (1958)

Director:

Roger Corman

Writer:

R. Wright Campbell (screenplay)

Release Date:

July 1958 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

The future of humanity is in his hands

Plot:

A young man defies tribal laws and searches for answers. The result of his quest yields knowledge of past generations.

Plot Keywords:

Irish Wolfhound | Great Dane | End Of Civilization | Caveman | Mushroom Cloud

Cast

Robert Vaughn	...	The Symbol Maker's teenage son
Darah Marshall	...	The Blond Maiden
Leslie Bradley	...	The Symbol Maker
Frank DeKova	...	The Black-Bearded One
Charles P. Thompson	...	Member of the tribe (as Charles Thompson)
June Jocelyn	...	The Symbol Maker's wife
Jonathan Haze	...	The curly-haired boy
Beach Dickerson	...	Fair-haired boy / Man from Burning Plains / Tom-tom player / Bear
Ed Nelson	...	Blond tribe member
Robert Shayne	...	The Keeper of the Small Fire
Marshall Bradford	...	Member of the tribe
Joseph Hamilton	...	Member of the tribe (as Joseph H. Hamilton)

Also Known As:

Out of the Darkness
Prehistoric World
Teenage Caveman (USA) (alternative spelling)

Runtime:

65 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Filming Locations:

Arcadia, California, USA

Company:

Malibu Productions

Trivia:

The same "wild" dogs from The Saga of the Viking Women and Their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent (1957) appear here.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Mystery Science Theater 3000: Being from Another Planet (#5.5)" (1992)

Warning, don't go beyond the river

Teenage Caveman is an enjoyable Prehistoric adventure from Roger Corman and I taped this when BBC2 screened it during the early hours some years ago.

A young caveman goes against warnings and decides to explore the land beyond the river where his tribe live. There are plenty of dangers our there, including stock footage dinosaurs from One Million BC and Unknown Island, a pack of wild dogs and, best of all, a very strange looking "monster" that turns out to be a man in a radiation suit. We then learn that after a nuclear war, this part of the World went back to Prehistoric times.

Being made in the Atomic Age, this movie show was yet another theory what people thought could have happened in the event of any nuclear war. At the end, we also get to briefly see clips from other AIP movies including The She Creature.

The cast includes a young Robert Vaughn (The Man From UNCLE, The Magnificent Severn, Hustle) and sci-fi B movie regulars Jonathan Haze (Little Shop of Horrors, It Conquered the World), Ed Nelson (The Brain Eaters) and Robert Shayne (The Neanderthal Man, The Giant Claw).

Teenage Caveman is a good way to spend just over an hour one afternoon or evening. Low budget fun.

Rating: 3 stars out of 5.