The Fly was released on 16 July 1958.
There are no more iconic horror films than The Fly. And it’s a lot better than you probably remember. In most ways, it is of comparable quality to Imitation of Life. But there are no flies in that classic — much less a man with a big ol’ fly head. Regardless, 20th Century Fox clearly felt the same about The Fly because they released it as a regular feature rather than as a B-title under Regal Films.
The film is based on a George Langelaan short story, “The Fly,” published in Playboy magazine. In those days, Playboy paid top dollar to writers and many of the best published there. Kurt Neumann, who would go on to produce and direct the film, read the story and decided it would make a fine film.
Robert L Lippert would go on to produce The Last Man on Earth. But at this time, he was the head of 20th Century Fox’s B-movie division. So he hired James Clavell to write the script. At this point, Clavell was a rising star in Hollywood but he hadn’t done much. He would go on to do quite a bit of writing, directing, and producing. But today people remember him as the writer of Shōgun.
The script works very well. But psychotronic fans want to get right to the action and see the guy in a 20-lb fly mask. It is unfair to expect this, of course. And watching Patricia Owens obsess about house flies is fun.
Celebrate the release of The Fly by watching it! Watch it for free with this wonderful print on Archive:
The Fly (1958) poster via Wikipedia under Fair Use.
