Earth VS the Flying Saucers (1956) directed by Fred F. Sears

 

One of the lesser know Ray Harryhaussen films, mostly because of the lack of giant monsters I think. Its interesting to see stop motion used for spaceships, robot aliens and scenes of destruction, though. It's very typical of film of this type... aliens arrive and humans attack them so they assume (rightly) humans are hostile. Things escalate and there is an all out war between the saucers and the military. 

It's really hard to think of the aliens are the bad guys, though the story keeps trying to show them as cold killers, they only kill when attacked, at least at first. The film is hardly a Star trek episode, the earth people never really try to makes things work and the saucer people who have kidnapped the main female character's dad and a police to suck information out of their brains (promising to put it all back later) throw the bodies out of the ship from the air in a horrifying scene after the military shows it can makes their spaceships lose control. As shocking as this is it's still not more horrible than the humans having already murdered several of the visitors right from the start. The whole thing ends in a spectacular fight over Washington DC which destroys several well known buildings and monuments until the "invaders" are destroyed and things go back to normal. 

The looks of the spaceships and aliens are cool, the flying saucers are exactly what you think they would look like and the robot suits that contain the aliens are unique... sort of goofy and stiff but original in design. The stop motion destruction is well done and pacing is quick enough between effects shots to keep you interested. 

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) Directed by Robert Wise

Based on short story "Farewell to the master" this early sci fi 50 classic sets the high bar for films even made today. The music is one of the first time the theremin was used in science fiction and it has become synonymous with the genre ever since. Filmed in a pseudo documentary style and using actual reporters  know to the public, the film has a certain realism to it lets say lacking on other futuristic films from the later 50s. 

Spoilers:

The story is not complicated. One day a spaceship lands, in effect, on the White House lawn and a human-like being gets out. He is immediately shot. As he struggles on ground bleeding the gathered crowds suddenly notices a giant humanoid robot has exited the craft and it destroys all the gun and weapons in sight until the injured alien tells it to stop.

In hospital, the visitor, named Klaatu tried to get a meeting with world leaders so he can transmit a serious message to the people of Earth. When made clear this is not going to happen, he escapes to learn about the people by living among them for a while. This causes hysteria and conspiracy theories. He decides to meet a famous Einstein-like scientist to see if he can talk at least to the scientist of Earth and to convince them he agrees on a display of power that won't hurt anyone but will basically scare the crap out of everyone. By stopping all activity on the planet for 30 minutes, the scientists gather to meet him at the spaceship. Sadly this action also increases the pressure to capture him and he is killed trying to escape from the authorities. Before dying he tells a woman he has befriended to go to the ship and say a phrase to Gort, the robot which tells it to get him and bring him back to the spaceship. 

Inside the ship, Gort revives Klaatu and he leaves the ship to give an ultimatum to all the humans on Earth. Keep your weapons and violence on your own planet or Gort and other like him, who keep the peace between planets, will return and destroy the Earth to "a burnt out cinder".

This is a classic for a million reasons. The effects are sparse but very effective and still look good, the performances are very good and the actors, especially Rennie take their roles seriously and the message of peace, or else is pretty effective. 

Klaatu lives in boarding house while trying to get a feeling for your everyday human and there he meets a single mother and her son. The father was killed in the war and her new suitor is determined to marry as soon as they can. Billy Gray is the child actor and for once, it's role that doesn't grind the film to a halt. Patrica Neal is amazing as the mom who is career oriented, smart and one of two people Klaatu trusts. There is a good rapport between them and it never gets romantic, something that would have seriously undermined the film. When she is stuck in an elevator with him during the world-wide shutdown and he tells her who he is why he is there (which we don't see happen) she is shook to her core and we get how badly this meeting or worlds could go. Her boyfriend, on the other hand sees only ways to become known and make money off Klaatu's real identity and she dumps him without regret. 

Micheal Rennie is perfect. Unknown at the time his performance is a mix of superiority, confusion and bemusement as he tries to navigate human society. He has no patience for foolishness but his goal is to warn not punish humankind... Gort will do that if needed. I love the scene where he asks for a flashlight and can't figure out how it works and when the child shows him his look says "How cute! A switch!". its endearing but also character-wise shows he really doesn't come from around here. When he takes the boy to Arlington Cemetery to visit the father's grave he is touched and it manages to relay how dying in a war is completely, for lack of a better word, alien to him. 

The restored Blu-ray is worth buying. Though there are a few nonsensical things in the movie (only 2 guards for the spaceship at night? How does Gort walk from the ship to where Klaatu's body is with no one noticing an 8 foot alien robot on the streets?) there is only one shot that takes me out of the story. When Gort is seen by the crowd they run away... sort of. The film is sped up and it looks cartoonish. Apparently the untrained extras just couldn't get it right and Wise had to resort to the film trick or not get the shot at all. 

Gort, Klaatu Barrada Nicto! 

The Time Machine (1960) Directed by George Pal

 

George Pal made a few iconic science fiction films and this is up there with version of War of the Worlds which also was from a book by HG Wells. It is the story of a man obsessed with time who arrives late for a dinner with friends at his own house in a terrible state. He is cut and exhausted but insists he tell the story of what happened to him. He has discovered a way to move through time, but not space, using a very cool looking victorian machine that is worth watching the movie just to see it. 

With this device he has travelled to the distant future where humans have been divided into two distinct species. One docile and dependent on the other aggressive and living underground. Our traveller meets a beautiful girl, don’t they always, and finds himself trapped in that time period when the aggressive race, the Morloks, drag his time machine into his layer behind doors he can’t get through. 

There is plenty of of adventure that follows but before all that we a treated to a few great moments of him moving through time, stopping a few decades later when he meets his best friend’ s adult son, who wasn’t born when he got into the device and then decades later still when a nuclear bomb goes off forcing him to jump into the far future. The passing of time is demonstrated by a women’s dress shop window at first and with stop motion, it shows time by the animation of the changes of the dresses in the window display. 

I don’t want to spoil the movie, old as it is, because its old enough that younger people might never even heard of it and its worth saving it surprises for them. The costumes and make up is great and the special effects have a few weak points but mostly still work today and have that look that War of the Worlds and his other Sci fi film When Worlds Collide have. Its distinctive and wonderful. The players are all good, I like the maid a lot and Rod Taylor is perfect as the scientist. 

A hit when released, it stands up by keeping the exposition to a minimum and the story moving always forward… well when it isn’t moving backward in time. 

Poster Project: The Day the Earth Stood Still

 

After about 35 hours of work this poster is done. I thought I was done earlier but I rewatched the film and noticed some robot details I missed. After drawing the elements in Affinity Designer I moved them to Affinity Publisher and composed the poster, added the title and other information. I made a 1940's- 50's style earth that was to go under the hand of Klaatu but it didn't look right and didn't really add to poster for me. Gort, the robot, was a bigger challenge than I thought as he is smooth, reflective the costume lacks some details, his superman undies always look a little goofy to me but I knw why they are there from a practical costume making viewpoint. 

I would like to make a "war of the Worlds" poster from the George Pal movie but I have come up with a decent way to pull it off. I might have to make a 3D model of the spaceship, the creature, the martian probe... maybe all of that and work out my composition when I see what looks good or not. 

Island of Lost Souls (1932) directed by Erle C. Kenton

 

Ok enough of bad horror films this year. I had seen Island of Lost Souls, a film not easy to see for years in the 80s. Not sure how or where, there video release so maybe that was it. I had not seen it since and after watching the Criterion restoration it felt like the first time. The quality is excellent and my vague memories of the films were nothing to how it affected me this time. 

This film is horrifying in the best ways, the look, the makeup, the acting of Charles Laughton as one of the creepiest and evil villains you might ever see on screen. All of this done with no gore but with enough hints of what is happening to freak you out. It's hard to believe they got away with some of the elements in this movie - and they didn't after the Hates Codes came into effect a couple years later and the film was banned. Laughton's Dr Moreau, as in the book Island of Dr Moreau it's adapted from, is the epitome of inhumane. His plan to turn animals into humans under the guise of scientific advancement but really done under the perversion of sadistic cruelty is shocking even today. He creates a woman and tries to get a shipwrecked guy to knock her up just to see if she can be. That falls apart when the man's finance shows up to rescue him, and he decides maybe one of the less successful beast men he created should rape her and see she can carry that baby to term. His plan seems to be create in "lower animals" the one thing he will never have - humanity. 

The great performances don't end there. Bela Lugosi knocks it out of the park as the "giver of the law". He is barely recognizable under all the makeup but his intense eyes give him away. A small role that he runs away with, his final scenes as the animals turn on Moreau, led by him truly is scary as he traps the Doctor in own "house of pain. 

The panther woman (Lota) played by Kathleen Burke is not over the top and you feel for her as a person. She doesn't over play "cat" stereotypes, she isn't Catwoman in the Batman TV show, she sells her role completely to the audience. 

The rest of the cast is fine, not really standing out and to be honest there isn't room for more standouts with the previous three actors mentioned on the set. 

Makeup of the creatures on the island is really disturbing and believable. If you were not familiar with the book you would be confused and put off by what they might represent until what they actually are is revealed. At 70 minutes, you don't wait too long for answers and the pace of the film might be slow by today's standards but certainly isn't boring. 

One negative is the odd choice to not name Kathleen Burke in the opening titles but instead credit "The Panther Woman". She is only one of 2 women in the piece and the only one the island at first so her reveal as being one of Moreau's tortured creations is not a surprise. Moreau also talks about her in a way that takes any surprise out the castaway getting a kiss from her and coming to realization of what she really is. For me, this robbed the actress of some of the power in her performance. 

In summary... this is a fantastic, disturbing film that makes you think and will unnerve you in ways you didn't think an early 30s still could. I wish I could see it in a theatre! 

Silent Summer: Metropolis (the novel) 1925 written by Thea von Harbou

 

This was a book I looked decades for in either English or German and never came across a copy until I recently searched again, but this time for digital copies and easily found a one for under 2$ on Kindle! I had read the script and seen the movie many times and finally was able to compare the film to the source material.

Von Harbou wrote the book with a film adaptation (by her then husband, Fritz lang) in mind and it was serialized in a magazine as way to get the story out to the public as pre-publicity for the upcoming film. 

The story and characters are pretty much the same overall, thought Joh Frederson, the Master of Metropolis, is more fleshed out and has a mother who makes it very clear that he has become a terrible person after the death of his wife after the birth of their son, Freder who he adores but shows little emotion to.

Another difference is the religious symbolism, heavily Christian -  but sprinkled with other mythologies throughout. It is something not really seen in the film and a little overdone. As it was written in 1925 there are also some lines of racism and quite a bit of sexism thrown in for good measure, thankfully missing from the film. The biggest was a huge surprise for me, the absence of the film's iconic message: "There can be no understanding between the hand and the brains unless the heart acts as mediator."

The robot, so iconic in the film is less here and is much more human-like in the novel, It arrives on the scene already made, can talk and begs Joh Fredersen to give her a face. She still gets the face of the Maria the defect leader of the poor and the love interest but her role is smaller and a little muddled in book form.

Well worth a read if you never have and having read the script long before any restorations of the film were done, this would have been an amazing revelation as to the many missing elements from the presentations of the movie I was seeing at small theatres and church basements in the early 80s. 

Silent Summer: The Haunted Castle (1921) directed by F.W. Murnau

 There really isn't much haunted anything in this film as the story centres around a group of aristocratic hunters stuck indoors because of a storm and receiving an unwanted visitor - a man accused of murder three years before. The plot revolves around his efforts ot vindicated himself and is more like a Agatha Christie mystery than anything else. Being a Murnau film is it exceptionally well made, great editing and interesting shots as the twists and turns and new guests arrive to shine light on the murder and who might really be the killer. 

The Kino restored version is on youtube:

King Kong 1933 directed by Merian C. Cooper

The story, which has become the basis of most of the later King Kong remakes, is simple. A down on her luck actress is hired by a somewhat sketchy film producer to star in an adventure film on a mysterious lost island that only he knows how to find. When they get there, they discover a lost world of savage natives and prehistoric animals ruled over by a legendary figure - King Kong. The natives capture the actress in order to sacrifice her to Kong but when he arrives, he is smitten with her and take her into his care, fighting all sort of creatures as her human love interest follows and attempts to free her. When he succeeds, they rush back to the boat with Kong in hot pursuit and the monstrous ape is captured and brought back to New York City to be exhibited as the 8th Wonder of the World. Opening night the beast escapes, gets the girl back and flees to highest structure he can find, in this case the Empire State Building where he is shot down by bi-planes and falls to his death.

Kong’s lasting popularity, I will argue, stems completely from his first film appearance. Not one of the re-boots comes close to the original. The monstrous ape is not so monstrous in the hands of legendary animator Willis O’Brien who infused a small puppet moved one frame at a time with such real emotion and personality that he became not an amazing special effect but as real as any human actor that has graced the silver screen.

The 1933 film started not just the legend of Kong but giant monster movies in general. This film developed a look and style of its own - partly from the limits of the era and partly from the incredible imagination of Willis O’Brien who not only animated Kong and the other creatures but did the matte paintings and overall design. Skull island is at once a real place and a fantasy world. 

On release, this film was a blockbuster. No one had ever seen anything like it and they flocked to theatres for a decade… literally. The film was re-released in 1938, 1942 and again in 1952, a release that out paced not only the previous ones in profits but also most of the new movies released that year. Looking at the movie with modern eyes, it might be hard to imagine, but this was a terrifying  and shocking motion picture, so much so it was censored for violence and sexual content after its debut. My Aunt Helen saw it back then and she often recounted to me how scared she was each time she saw it. It was her favourite film. 

While the film’s effects are legendary, it was also the first film with a totally original music score. The sets of the film were also amazing and were used for another production, The Most Dangerous Game, filmed in tandem and using many of the same actors. 

Is King Kong a perfect film? 

Some might say it’s THE perfect film and it’s hard to argue it isn’t. In its favour is its longevity, the story is still being told and retold as recent as last week. It does have plenty of flaws, but even they are hard to criticize. Kong’s varying size throughout the running length is an often stated problem with the production - but is it? I would say no as the director Cooper deliberately changed the titular character’s height (to the chagrin of Willis O’Brien and the effects team who wanted it to be a real as possible) to match the content of the scene. On the island the great ape is smaller, more human, if that can be said of a monstrous monkey, and in the big city he is 3 times that size to avoid him looking small among the skyscrapers. Kong must look like the king of his surroundings at all times for him to work as a character and frankly, while watching the film you would be hard pressed to notice his leaps in grandeur. The film is just too compelling for the viewer to be distracted by anything but other than what is happening on the screen. The effects are dated, but also they are so stylized looking that Peter Jackson’s 2005 overly long and somewhat over the top remake tried to recreate the look and feel of the 30s version to sell the idea better to modern audiences. Yes, you can see where the animators fingers moved the fur on the puppet as it moves about and the dinosaur designs are out of date by today’s Jurassic Park standards (which are in turn now out of date as well) but it really doesn’t matter one bit. The acting is definitely from it’s time, but it is a style of acting we all accept and in many ways expect see in films. What makes this movie at least seem perfect is how it plays. We buy it all. When Kong breathes is last after falling from the Empire State Building, we feel it in our bones and even though Carl Dedham tells us it was beauty that killed the beast, we know it was us and our pride that brought him to his fate and if he was real today, the same thing would happen. The success of King Kong comes not just from it’s innovation but the universality of it’s story which is just as relatable today as it was almost 85 years ago. 

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Coming Soon to your living room!

Hooray for those of us not living in a major metropolis! The restored "METROPOLIS" is coming to us! Turner Classic Movies will air Fritz Lang's masterpiece, commercial-free (of course) on Sunday, Nov. 7 at 8PM Eastern.

I Think It's The Ass-Slapping That Got To Me

.....not that I'm into that sort of thing actually. Vitameatavegamin this ain't. Vita, yes. Meata, yes. But vegamin, no. Quite the seductive babe, one might say. This was long before she got that only occasionally appearing weird Charles Gibson brow, and way, way before getting all moved by the chickdudeish Wayne Newton and befuddled by Burton and Taylor on Here's Lucy or The Lucy Show.