"This is the ant. Treat it with respect for it may very well be the next dominant life form of our planet. Sound incredible? Impossible? Have you ever taken a good, close look at what the ant is all about?" So begins the opening narration to Bert I. Gordon's masterful nature-run-amok film, and dare I say it is the greatest of the giant insect films.

A bunch of prospective buyers board a yacht headed for Dreamland Shores, a time share community on an island swamp. The problem is that barrels of silvery toxic waste have washed up on the shore and the cute, little ants have begun feasting on the leaking ooze. We spend 27 minutes getting to know the buyers, their quirks and their life problems, which is kind of a waste of time and is really the only boring part of the film. We came to see giant ants, not people dealing with divorce and infidelities. But never fear, at the 27 minute mark the giant animatronic ants attack and all hell breaks loose and it doesn't stop until the end.

They race back to the dock only to find that the giant, ten-foot-tall ants have overrun their yacht and Captain Dan decides the best way to get rid of the buggers is to set the boat on fire, effectively stranding them on Dreamland Shores with the bastards. They camp out on the beach and keep a fire going to ward off the ants, but when a rainstorm hits they can no longer count on the protection of the flame. Marilyn (played by the icon Joan Collins) tells them there is a small rowboat on the other side of the island so the gang makes a mad dash through two miles of island to get to what they think will be their way out. There are a lot of characters, but by the time they reach the weathered rowboat, their numbers have been thinned down to the main cast of 6 thanks to the voracious appetites of the stalking ants. After a leisurely boat ride through the swamp that manages to not slacken the tension, they take a wrong turn down the river and run into a nest of ants that overturns their escape vehicle. One of them is eaten while the others make it to safety back on the land and continue to trek through the cloying swamp, looking for a way out.

They manage to find their way to civilization somehow. There appears to be a small town on this island and the sheriff arrives to help out our survivors. But something isn't quite right, and we quickly find out that the ants have not only invaded the town but managed to turn the folks here into mindless drones. This, of course, is the movie's master stroke, separating it from other giant insect movies by making the creatures not just hungry, but smart and planning world domination as well! The movie is titled Empire of the Ants after all, and not just Ants. The survivors are taken to the sugar refinery where the queen ant is kept behind glass and is used to hypnotize the townspeople into her employ with her farts. Will our friends make it out alive? Can the burgeoning empire of the mutant ants be toppled? I won't spoil it for you here...go and find out for yourself, you'll be glad you did.

Besides Joan, there is one other female star of merit in this picture. Coreen, the cute blond in the tight red shirt, is played by Pamela Susan Shoop who is famous for revealing her goodies in Halloween 2, right before being boiled alive. This is Bert I. Gordon's 18th film, and I consider it his best. This was filmed right after his well known take on H.G. Wells' Food Of The Gods, which is a fine picture, but not as wonderful and breathlessly entertaining as Empire. You would think a giant ant movie would be lame, but this film actually manages to become a class act, if only in this critic's eyes.

- Jose Prendes