The Horror!? 65: The Killer Shrews (1959)

Captain Thorne Sherman and his helmsman and friend Rook Griswold transport supplies to a research station on a remote island. Nobody told them that the resident scientists under Doctor Craigis and his daughter Ann have made some troubling mistakes in their quest to solve the problem of overpopulation. Their experiments created a species of dog-sized, poisonous and highly aggressive shrews. After depopulating the island's fauna, the monsters are in dire need of food. As if this wasn't troubling enough, the island is hit by a hurricane, destroying every hope of leaving for at least a day. Soon Rook, being black, is eaten and it doesn't look too good for the rest of our heroes either.
Why the hell didn't Ray Kellogg direct more films? His only directing credits (if you believe the IMDb) besides this and The Giant Gila Monster are something about a dog and John Wayne's nauseating The Green Berets. And yet The Killer Shrews shows so much promise, some of it certainly created by one of the tighter and psychologically more nuanced scripts for an American monster movie of the Fifties, but most of it carried by a directorial sense for suspense you won't find in too many movies of the time. What impresses me most is the oppressiveness the siege scenario provides, even if the monster are obviously dogs wearing shaggy carpets and fake heads and teeth. The character's actions are not always pretty or all that clever, providing a far more realistic feeling than usual. And there are not many films of its time that actually know what jerks their designated heroes are.
The movie's big problem is some very uneven acting, with performances reaching from the decent to the terrible. Ingrid Goude's Ann is a real pain to watch and has a voice that has a lot in common with the (very effective) screeching noises the shrews produce.
This of course shouldn't hinder anyone to watch one of the great monster movies too few people know.