Night of the Big Heat Movie Review

Night of the Big Heat a.k.a.Island of the Burning Damned is a 1967 sci-fi film directed by Terence Fisher and starring Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Patrick Allen, Sarah Lawson and Jane Merrow.

The movie begins with a man called Godfrey Hanson(Lee), who is setting up cameras around the island of Fara. There is a weird noise all over the place. The temperature on the island is above every other place in Britain. There is a heatwave in the middle of winter. There is something odd happening. A woman called Angela Roberts(Merrow) comes to the island. She arrives at the local pub and she tells the owner, Frankie(Lawson) that she is going to be the new secretary to a writer called Jeff Callum(Allen). Jeff is the husband of Frankie. Hanson is staying in rooms above the pub. The locals wonder what he is doing up there as he won't let anyone inside. Angela meets Jeff and it is revealed that she is not his secretary. They had an affair and she has followed him to the island. Jeff is not happy that she has come.

There is interference on the phone line and there is no TV signal. A local man's TV explodes. Another man hears the noise and he crashes his car and dies. Jeff asks Hanson what is going on.
Hanson tells him that it is aliens. He is a scientist and he has been studying the area. Jeff isn't sure.
The heat is getting worse. Jeff and Hanson find the dead body. They figure out that the aliens need heat to survive and that is why they have been heating up the area. They need to get a message to the mainland. The local doctor, Doctor Stone(Cushing) wants to help. He offers to go to the met station and get to the radio. He drives along, but his car stops. He hears the noise and he sees something horrible before he gets killed.

Hanson decides that he will go. He finds Stone's dead body. He realises that the aliens are attracted to light. He tells the locals to turn out the lights. The creatures are at the met station. They have destroyed the radio. Hanson says that they were able to come to Earth using the met equipment. He, Jeff, Frankie and Angela look for explosives. Hanson wants to bring the creatures out into the open. They want the fire to draw them in and attract attention from the mainland. They try to blow up the creatures. Hanson gets attacked and dies. Everything looks bleak until it starts raining. The creatures are destroyed.

This film was enjoyable. The cast were great, of course. That is why I wanted to watch it in the first place. The story is good and it is fun. The ending was a little silly, I thought, but that doesn't take away from the film. The aliens look very primitive but it was 1967 so I can let that go. If you can find this film, I certainly recommend it as it boasts a great cast, including Kenneth Cope!! I will give this a 6/10.