Verdict
Summary
A template for what would become the creature feature of the week on the SyFy Channel, Empire of the Ants is wacky, to be sure, but it’s also fun and effective as a mindless monster movie.
Plot:
Mutant ants terrorize the Florida Everglades.
Review:
Toxic waste canisters are dumped en masse into the ocean off the coast of Florida. One barrel ends up washed ashore on the beach of a small coastal area where a cunning and heartless real estate developer (played by Joan Collins who gets hers toward the end) has set up shop to swindle a bunch of unsuspecting hopeful investors into joining her plan to convert the area into a high end resort. Plans are supposedly in place because she has planted colorful flags all over announcing her intentions with signs everywhere that promise “Future Golf Course,” “Future Tennis Courts,” and “Future Community Center,” but this is the kind of person who’ll take everyone’s money and run, so all these future plans are obviously never going to happen. A boat brings her prospective patrons into her future paradise, but by then some ants have stepped into the leaking toxic waste on the shore and are roaming around the island like a pack of wild animals, seeking to devour. When her patrons begin turning up dead, the others panic and try to survive the day by retreating to the nearest town, and something hinky is definitely going on: The police department is under a spell, it seems, and so is everyone else. The giant, mutated ants have made slaves of everyone using the queen ant’s pheromones and the human slaves do the bidding of the ant army by using the nearby sugar cane factory as a feeding hub for the ants! With the other frantic survivors about to be forced into ant slavery, they revolt, causing a war with the enslaved police force … and the empire of the ants!
A template for what would become the creature feature of the week on the SyFy Channel, Empire of the Ants is wacky, to be sure, but it’s also fun and effective as a mindless monster movie. Filmmaker Bert I. Gordon did a pretty good job with all the practical effects, but the optical illusion interposing of the ant footage to make it seem like they’re much bigger sometimes looks very antiquated and goofy, but who cares? I had a pretty good time with this nonsense (which is based on a story by H.G. Wells), and co-star Pamela Shoop’s headlights shine brightest whenever she’s dunked in water. I mean, what’s to complain about?
Kino Lorber’s newly reissued Blu-ray edition of Empire of the Ants is part of the Kino Cult label (#11 on the spine), and comes with two audio commentaries – one with director Gordon, the other by two film historians – and the trailer. The high definition transfer is more than adequate.
