Trog is a 1970 British science fiction horror film directed by Freddie Francis and starring Joan Crawford, Michael Gough and Bernard Kay. The screenplay was by Peter Bryan, John Gilling, and Aben Kandel. The film concerns the discovery of a troglodyte (or Ice Age "caveman") in twentieth-century United Kingdom. Trog marks Crawford's last film appearance before her death in 1977.
Plot
Set in contemporary Britain, the film follows Dr. Brockton, a renowned anthropologist who learns that in the caves of the countryside a lone male troglodyte is alive and might be able to be helped and even domesticated. In the interest of science and the potential groundbreaking discovery of the missing link, she gets the creature to the surface. While the rest of the townsfolk and police scatter in terror, Brockton stands steady with her tranquilizer gun and stuns the caveman into submission.
She brings him back to her lab for study, but runs into trouble as a few people oppose the presence of a "monster" in the town, especially Sam Murdock, a local businessman who is not only afraid of the negative commercial consequences but is also suspicious of a woman heading a research facility. In the meantime, the creature, given the name of "Trog", is taught by Brockton to play and share. A capacity for language is induced by a number of surgeries and a mysterious hypnotic device that causes Trog to see or relive his distant past, including clashes between various animals.
Still disturbed by Brockton's experiments, and enraged at a municipal court's decision to protect Trog, Murdock releases Trog in the middle of the night, hoping the caveman will be confronted and killed by either local residents or well-armed authorities. After being released, Trog wanders into town and kills the first three people he meets, a grocer, a butcher, and a citizen in a car, but not before he beats Murdock to death.
Trog then snatches a little girl from a playground and takes her to his cave. Dr. Brockton, the police, and army personnel soon gather at the cave's entrance. After pleading fruitlessly with the authorities to let her reason with Trog and safely retrieve the girl, Brockton suddenly acts on her own and charges down into the cave, where she finds the girl cowering in a corner. Trog initially behaves aggressively at the sight of the doctor in his refuge, but after a stern reprimand and a plea by Brockton, Trog surrenders the girl to her.
Shortly after the doctor and girl exit the cave, all of Brockton's work on behalf of science is shattered when soldiers ignite explosives before assaulting the cave. Trog is quickly wounded in a barrage of gunfire, falls, and is impaled on a stalagmite. The film ends with an on-site news reporter asking the doctor to comment on the death of the missing link; Brockton pushes aside the reporter's microphone and slowly walks away from the scene by herself.
Cast
Production
Based on an original story by Peter Bryan and John Gilling, the film was initially developed by Tony Tenser at Tigon Films, which sold the project to producer Herman Cohen. In July 1968, Cohen announced he had signed a contract with Warner Bros-Seven Arts to produce Crooks and Coronets and Trog, with the latter to begin filming in September.
Filming was delayed for several months, until after Joan Crawford agreed to star in the production in May 1969. Trog was the second of two films that she starred in for Cohen, the first being Berserk! in 1967. It also paired her again with Michael Gough, who costarred with Crawford in that earlier film. Crawford's character in the original script had been a man but Cohen rewrote it specifically for Crawford.
Filming
Crawford described Trog as "a low-budget picture", adding "I supply most of my own wardrobe." Just weeks after she committed to performing in the project, the film began shooting on 30 June 1969. The production also features actor David Warbeck, who has a small role as Alan Davis.
In a 1992 interview with the horror-film fan magazine Fangoria, Cohen notes that Trog, which was shot at Bray Studios and on location on the English moors, was more expensive to produce than Berserk! Cohen in that same interview also recalls the problems he had with Crawford's increased use of alcohol during filming: