The Twilight People

Eddie Romero and John Ashley built a small industry out of luring American drive-in money to the Philippines, and this is their Island of Doctor Moreau. A captured adventurer wakes on a jungle estate where a courtly madman is surgically remaking people into animals, and the menagerie includes an Antelope Man, a Bat Man who flaps around on visible wires, and a pre-fame Pam Grier as the Panther Woman, given no dialogue and told to hiss. The surgery is implied, the costumes are carpet offcuts, and the whole thing moves at the brisk clip of a crew with a boat booked. It sits on the same shelf as the Blood Island pictures and shares their charm, the kind that comes from people who never once thought the material was beneath them. The Bat Man's wire-assisted flight test alone is worth the rental.