"It's getting hot! I'm going in!"

Night of the Big Heat (1967) is one sweaty film. As it is to portray an unnatural heatwave on the Brittish island of Fara, the cast weares wet clothes and open shirts - though it was filmed in the midst of the winter. The scientist Goodfrey Hansen (Lee) has come to suspect there is something un-earthly going on on the island, and he is quite right.

"The entire cast wore the flimsiest of clothing, and we were covered in artificial sweat (...). This was physically very demanding on the cast..." Lee comments in Films of Christopher Lee.

As it is directed by Terence Fisher, it maintains high quality. Sweaty Lee is quite a distraction. Half of the time trough this film I just can't help thinking: Ok, so it's hot. Why don't you just take your shirt off?

It was released in US under the theatrical title of The island of the burning damned or The island of the burning doomed, which makes me think of those C-movies made in Hollywood in the mid 50's. Charming as they can be, that title is misleading. This is a well-made film with a great cast. And yayyyy! Cushing is in it. But they should have made better use of him.


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*Spoiler alerts:*
I had high hopes for SCL to survive this film.  He is after all a "goodie". He lives until 1:26 of 1:30. So - another death, incinerated by aliens. That must be one of the oddest ones - together with him being quartered in Torture chamber of Dr. Sadism, yuck!

So not even when he is a "goodie" he gets to survive. All heroes must survive, that is the unwritten law of pop-culture. Well, there is always one exception to the rule, and that exception in this case is Christopher Lee. *sigh*

"The idea is an excellent one and it's a good picture right until the very end, when they made the great mistake of introducing the ailiens. (...) To me, they looked like badly fried eggs."

Not an egg I would like to have on my plate, anyway. (I'd rathter have Lee there.)