Attack of The Giant Leeches – Swamp Trash Entertainment

By Steve D. Stones

Miss July 1959 Playboy centerfold Yvette Vickers stars in this 1959 low-budget pot boiler produced by Gene and Roger Corman. Vickers is type-cast as a town tramp unfaithful to her overweight store keeper husband – Bruno VeSota. Vickers played the same role in Attack of The 50 Foot Woman (1957). She shows off her sexy legs by rubbing them with lotion in an opening scene meant to grab the attention of the male viewer.

Local rednecks living near a swamp in the Florida Everglades are being killed off one by one by giant leeches who hide in underwater caverns. A game warden, played by Ken Clark – who looks like he just stepped off the front cover of GQ Magazine, tries to determine the cause of local deaths in the swamp.  With the help of his girlfriend and her father, Clark discovers that a handful of giant leeches living in the swamp are responsible for capturing and killing locals who poach the swamps. Two of the victims are Vickers and her lover, who were lured into the swamp when VeSota discovered the two making out near the shore.

Despite its low budget and lurid subject matter, Attack of The Giant Leeches (aka The Giant Leeches) manages to be a fun little movie to watch. Bernard Kowalski’s direction is solid and the actors seem to do a serious, convincing job. The only thing unconvincing is the giant leech costumes, which are obviously divers with scuba gear poking through the leech costumes. A Wade Williams print of this film cuts out the opening sequence of a swamp poacher shooting a rifle at a giant leech while the credits roll to the Alexander Laszlo score - the same music used in director Kowalski’s 1958 film – Night of The Blood Beast. 

Sadly, actress Vickers was found dead in her Beverly Hills home in the spring of 2010. A neighbor crawled in through her home window after no one had heard from her in months. Her mummified corpse had been sitting in a chair for over six months. A sad ending for a beautiful woman who had great promise as an actress. She will be greatly missed by her fans. See Attack of The Giant Leeches with Vickers’ other film – Attack of The 50 Foot Woman. Happy Viewing!!