Based on John Wyndham’s novel of the same name, this 1963 sci-fi horror strays from the novel but is still fun to watch.
Bill Masen (Howard Keel) awakens in a hospital, his eyes bandaged from an accident. While he was in the hospital a meteor shower graced the skies of Earth and blinded anyone who was watching it. Along for the ride with the meteors are the triffids, venomous plants that can walk and communicate with each other. They also like eating people.
Masen leaves the hospital to London in chaos as society has quickly crumbled with many people wandering around blind and the sighted taking advantage of the world. Masen saves a young girl named Susan and heads to France. In France he saves Christine Durrant (Nicole Maurey) from the triffids. They all head to Spain.
Meanwhile Tom and Karen Goodwin (Kieron Moore and Janette Scott) are biologists in a lighthouse trying to find a way to stop the triffids. The final solution is cheesy, in fact M. Night Shyamalan kind of borrorws it for Signs.
When the filmmakers were finished with production they discovered that the movie was under an hour long so they added the whole lighthouse subplot which was directed by uncredited frequent Hammer collaborator Freddie Francis. The movie deviates greatly from the book particularly from the last half. There was a TV mini-series made in the 1980s that was closer to the book. A more recent remake was just terrible. Still the original does have its moments.
