ew Mexico State Police Sergeant Ben Peterson (Whitmore) and his
partner find a dazed little girl wandering the desert. Close by, the troopers
find the nearly destroyed trailer of the girl's family. An entire side of
the trailer is not bashed in, but inexplicably pulled out, and the girl's
family is missing.
By the trailer, the cops find a strange print in the
sand, of which the forensics team makes a cast. Peterson and his partner
search for leads at a local general store—only to find it in the same
condition as the trailer. The proprietor of the store is found dead.
Peterson leaves his partner at the store while checking in at HQ. His
partner disappears amid a strange high-pitched keening.
FBI agent Robert Graham (Arness) joins the investigation. No
explanation can be found for the apparently motiveless crimes. Graham
forwards the cast of the mysterious print to Washington, and receives word
that he and the New Mexico authorities are to co-operate with two
myrmecologists from the Department of Agriculture—Dr. Harold Medford
(Gwenn) and his daughter, Dr. Patricia Medford (Weldon). While Peterson
and Graham show the scientists the area near the damaged trailer, the team
discovers the cause of the disappearances and destruction—a colony of
giant mutant ants created by A-bomb tests nine years before.
An attempt is
made to destroy the colony, but newly hatched queen ants, capable of
starting new colonies, have escaped. Unless the missing queens can be
located and destroyed, human beings "as the dominant species on the planet
will be extinct within the year!"
Still an incredible infestation
Them! has been a favorite of late-night TV for decades.
Generations of kids have delighted in this, the great antecedent (no pun
intended) of all Army-guys-versus-the-big-bugs movies, from Burt I.
Gordon's The Beginning of the End to Paul Verhoeven's Starship
Troopers. The giant ants of Them! have become such an icon that
they have been referenced in pop-culture artifacts as diverse as Joe
Dante's Matinee, Warren Ellis' breakthrough comic book,
Planetary, Blondie's song, "Attack of the Giant Ants" and the TV
sitcom Friends.
While Them! is very much a product of its
time, full of Cold War paranoia and A-bomb anxiety, it endures as a classic
because it is a very well-made, scary and intelligent film.
Director Gordon Douglas does a remarkable job creating mood. His
desert location work early in the film is full of gloomy, brooding
emptiness, courtesy of some tracking shots that are pretty astonishing when
one considers they were crafted long before the advent of the Steadi-Cam. The slow buildup of suspense in the first half-hour or so provides
a genuine sense of mystery that's lacking in most A-bomb-spawned-menace
features. The investigation of the state and federal officials is
presented more plausibly than the investigations depicted in most crime and
espionage movies made at the time ... and since. By the time the giant ants
make their appearance in all their irradiated glory, disbelief has been
thoroughly suspended.
While some of the special effects may seem wonky to those
accustomed to post-Jurassic Park CGI, Them! is still one of
the best examples of the SF/monster movie sub-genre.
