Return of the Fly was conceived and executed as a sequel to The Fly in order to cash in on the latter's reputation as a grosser. With justice, it will be unfavorably compared with the first, which was a superior horror film.

Return of the Fly was conceived and executed as a sequel to The Fly in order to cash in on the latter’s reputation as a grosser. With justice, it will be unfavorably compared with the first, which was a superior horror film.

The sequel’s amateurishly contrived plot picks up at the death of the inventor’s widow, who had been acquitted of murdering him. Vincent Price, the only actor carried over from the original, explains to the inventor’s now-grown son, played by Brett Halsey, the plot of the other picture.

What follows is one unmotivated episode after another, loosely tied to the theme that the son, in following in his father’s footsteps, will come to the same bad end. Suspense is attempted by making the son’s assistant a traitor who is trying to steal the secret of the ‘matter transmitter.’ Horror is achieved when the assistant uses the device to scramble a policeman’s corpse with a guinea pig and to scramble the inventor’s scientist son with a fly.

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Considering the script’s limitations, the cast does fairly well. The picture is technically slick and the special effects – for which no credit is given – are good.

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Return of the Fly

  • Production: 20th Century-Fox. Director Edward L. Bernds; Producer Bernard Glasser; Screenplay Edward L. Bernds; Camera Brydon Baker; Editor Richard C. Meyer; Music Paul Sawtell, Bert Shefter; Art Director Lyle R. Wheeler, John Mansbridge
  • Crew: (B&W) Widescreen. Available on VHS, DVD. Extract of a review from 1959. Running time: 78 MIN.
  • With: Vincent Price Brett Halsey John Sutton David Frankham Dan Seymour Danielle De Metz

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