Battle Beyond The Sun

American International Pictures bought the rights to the 1959 Soviet film Nebo Zovyot ('59). They had Roger Corman isn't mentioned in the credits, but is said to have acted as a producer. Francis Ford Coppela is billed as the associate producer. They edited down the original, keeping the basic story line, but expunging the more blatantly soviet elements. Aside from the necessary dubbing into english, they grafted in a brief bit of new footage of two monsters fighting. From the poster, you can see that they promoted Battle Beyond the Sun (BBS) as a monsters movie. The result was a B film that had some impressive scenes and models (from the original), though little of what the poster promised. BBS has a very 50s feel for 1962 audiences.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Read the plot synopsis for Nebo Zovot for the basic story. Briefly, in 1997, the space program of South Hemis has been preparing their rocket "Mercury" for a mission to Mars. A rival team from North Hemis launches theirs, "Typhoon", first. It wasn't well prepared and soon has navigation trouble. They're being drawn into the sun and have no fuel left to escape. The Mercury changes course and rescues them. The rescue uses up Mercury's fuel, so they have to land on an asteroid. An unmanned fuel ship is sent from earth, but it crashes. A second, manned, fuel ship is sent. It succeeds, but the pilot is mortally wounded by the monsters. The four return safely to earth for a heroes' welcome.

Why is this movie fun?
The original had many great 50s rocket and space station models and sets. Much of this remains. Even if becoming a bit dated by 1962, they're still great eye candy for the 50s sci-fi fan.

Cold War Angle
Some of the original film's moral message survives. Impetuous "races" to be first and one-upsmanship cause trouble. The tensions between the USSR and America get recast as rivalry between North Hemis and South Hemis. The hopeful note of reconciliation remains.

Notes
Cuttings -- Notably absent from the original are the reporter's initial dream sequence (the handy fictional too), and much of the early character development. Some of the closing human interest scenes logically removed too. There are the expected shifting nationalities of the characters. The American reporter Verst becomes the North Hemis captain Tawrence. The montage of western decadence, celebrating the Typhoon launching first, is missing. Most signs of soviet identity are cut (no proudly waving soviet flags) or hidden, but the red star on the fin of the rockets is often still visible. The trouble is caused by one man's reckless ambition (Tawrence), and not a nation's (as in the original) The closing monologue was left out.

Miscellaneous Monsters -- The ticket selling power of "hard" sci-fi had faded for American audiences by the mid-50s. A.I.P. must have assumed that a simple english-dubbed edit of Nebo Zovyot would not have sufficient appeal. Two monsters were created -- supposedly to resemble genitalia of both genders. These two oddities fight each other on the asteroid. Their inclusion was not necessary for the story line. All they really do is provide a different way for "Paul" to die. In the original, he dies from an unexciting overdose of radiation from piloting the unshielded fuel ship. Radiation death was not enough. Audiences wanted monsters, so Corman & Coppella pander up a couple gratuitous monsters.

Natural Non Sequitur -- Not only are the two monsters unnecessary for the plot, they exist in a vacuum -- literally. There was no atmosphere on the asteroid. How did they handle that? Further, for naturalists in the audience, how did survive there? Such giant mega-fauna require a vast food chain of lower life forms.

Naughty Nationalism -- Popular in the late 50s, was the notion that Cold War tensions could be blamed on nationalism. If only people could see beyond national boundaries and become one people, etc. etc. In BBS the post-war world is divided into two super-nations: North Hemis and South Hemis. Yet, like Orwell's 3-state world in 1984 the dissolving of many smaller nations into a few larger ones did not bring peace.

Identity Issues -- The english dubbing clearly recasts the Soviet team as South Hemis. The Americans (renamed Captain Tawrence and Dr. Martin) as recast as from North Hemis. This is a little contrary to American custom, as North Hemis included north america, northern europe, and northern asia. The rest is South Hemis. Yet, the supposedly South Hemis ship, the Mercury, has a North Hemis insignia superimposed on it to cover up the original film's "Rodina • CCCP" Who was supposed to be who? At a certain level. It doesn't matter.

Bottom line? For fans of "hard" sci-fi, there is plenty of serious space tech to enjoy. The original film may be too hard to find. Since the A.I.P version keeps the plot reasonably intact, this may not be necessary. Fans of alien space monster movies will likely be bored into a rage, as they'd have to wait through three quarters of the film to get two minutes of monster fight. Yet, BBS has a nice 50s flavor to it.

Godzilla Raids Again

Gojira no gyakushû (Japanese title ) was released in Japan in 1955, this movie would not be dubbed into an english version until 1959. Then, it would be retitled Gigantis the Fire Monster The original Japanese film was more artistic. The American dubbed version didn't do the original justice, but is more known by American viewers. Gigantis is more pure monster movie than sci-fi. Toho produced a sequel to the very popular Gojira ('54), repeating some features, but adding a few new ones. Gigantis is the first of a new genre in which rubber-suit monsters battle each other and stomp on a wide variety of model cities. An entire pantheon of rubber monsters would develop in the 60s and 70s, spun up around the Godzilla model. Mothra, Rodan, Megalon, Gamera, etc. etc., would be a study unto themselves. All of that, however falls outside of this study of '50s sci-fi. This review is more of a wave goodbye to a diverting branch.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Two pilots are flying small float planes as spotters for a tuna fishing fleet. One of them has engine trouble, so sets down on a remote and desolate island. While there, he sees two prehistoric monsters fighting each other. One is clearly a snaggletoothed copy of Godzilla. The other, called Anguirus. The two monsters fall into the sea and disappear. The two pilots fly back and alert the authorities. At a meeting of leaders and scientists, Professor Yamane (from the first movie) tells how Gigantis can't be stopped with conventional weapons, but is attracted to (and enraged by) light. When Gigantis is seen approaching Osaka harbor, jets drop flares to lure him away. It was working until some escaped convicts crash their stolen truck in a refinery and start a huge fire. This attracts Gigantis. The Anguirus suddenly arrives too. The two monsters battle each other, laying waste to much of Osaka, even toppling famed Osaka Castle. Gigantis finally defeats Anguirus and starts a firestorm that destroys what's left of Osaka. After the destruction, the Japanese begin rebuilding their lives. The two tuna pilots have new tuna-spotting jobs up in snowy Hokkaido. Tsukioka spots Gigantis on a snow covered island. The military attack, but bombs do nothing. The other pilot, Kobayashi, buzzes Gigantis, who flames his plane. He crashes into a nearby snowy mountain. The ensuing avalanche comes up to Gigantis' knees. This gives everyone the idea to bury Gigantis in ice. Jets bomb the nearby mountains. Snow and ice bury him. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
It's always fun to watch a sequel, even if it doesn't live up to the original. Even the crudely dubbed American version has an artistic flare to it. This is the first of a breed, the kaiju genre of monster movies that would proliferate in the 60s. The layers of allegory are fun to ponder too.

Cold War angle?
The opening few minutes of the Americanized version feature stock footage of nuclear explosions and V2 missile launches. The narration is heavy handed nuclear angst stuff. After that, the original Japanese movie's Cold War messages are less obvious than in Gojira. But, they are still present. The movie could be taken as an allegory for "what if" the Cold War turned hot. The two monsters personify the two sides in the Cold War. While they battle, the rest of the world is laid waste as a consequence.

Notes
Homage -- To cement its role as a sequel, the character of Professor Yamane gets a cameo. He also shows a film to other dignitaries, which includes clips from the first movie. In the Japanese version, the monster's name is the Gojira too. The American version got the new "Gigantis" name.

Born Hot -- The origin of the monster is explained differently in this sequel. Yamane explains Gigantis as a remnant of a prehistoric species which lived in lava. Fire is part of their being. With this new re-telling, Godzilla moves away from being spawned by nuclear testing -- a personification of nuclear arms. Instead, he's become more of a primal force.

Fire and Ice -- Since fire is part of Gigantis' very essence, it's a poetic natural that his demise (even if temporary) should be ice. No conventional weapon could hurt him, but a mountain of ice could cool him into inactivity. In this, there is yet another metaphor for the Cold War. You can't eliminate conflict, you can only cool things off (for awhile).

Hyper Monsters -- Unlike most of the giant rubber monster movies, the fight scenes between the two monsters were shot at "normal" speed. Typically, such scenes are shot at a faster film speed to slow down the final. This makes each motion look more like that of a 100' tall multi-ton beast. In Gigantis, the normal speed action looks odd -- not in scale -- but does give the beasts a more savage quality.

Alternative Allegory -- Gigantis and Anguirus could also be seen from a WWII retrospective point of view. Gigantis is America. Anguirus is the Japanese militarist ruling faction of the 30s and 40s. As the two of them fight each other, innocent Japanese suffer. One defeats the other, then the Japanese try to rebuild their lives amid the ash and ruin. If this is the spin intended by the writers, it shows an interesting distancing of the Japanese culture from its part in the war. It was the militarist's war, not theirs.

Heroism -- The tuna pilot Kobayashi ends up being the film's tragic hero. He dives his unarmed plane at Gigantis and goes down in flames. The imagery is quite suggestive of the kamakazi. All the noble talk about brave Kobayashi gives a hint of how differently the Japanese view the WWII kamakazi. Even the Americanized version cannot hide this.

Lingering War Wounds -- After Osaka is engulfed in the firestorm, Kobayashi's fiance mourns over her city's fate. She asks, "how could this thing happen to her people? What had they done to earn such a dreadful punishment?" Since Gigantis, like his predecessor, is an allegory for war, such musing comes across as a sincere puzzlement over why Japan had to suffer as it did in the war. Victors may write the history, as the saying goes, but the losers often don't see their fate as so obviously deserved.

Bottom line? Gigantis (the Americanized version) is not as good as the Japanese original, but even then, it's worth the time. As a movie, either version is straying out of sci-fi-land, and into pure monster flick. But is the notable ancestor of a whole sub-genre of rubber-suit monster movies. Yet, despite this, it still has some war-allegory message merits.

The Horror of Party Beach

Only nominally a sci-fi movie, Horror at Party Beach (HPB) is a curious hybrid of the "Beach Movie" genre, horror (killing & gore) and sci-fi (radiation spawned monsters). The two stars, John Scott and Alice Lyon are very long-in-the-tooth as teens (both rookie actors in their mid-30s). They lead the fight against murderous "zombie" humanoid monsters from the sea. The shallow features of the beach movie (girls in bikini's shakin' their stuff) and old-style rock and roll are present. There are rubber suit monsters aplenty. Yet, science holds the key to stopping them. HPB's "sister" production was Curse of the Living Corpse (same writer, director, crew, etc.) with which it often double-billed.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Hank and Tina arrive at a beach where the Del-Aires are providing dance music. Meanwhile, a ship dumps drums of radioactive waste offsore. The cap pops off one. Dark liquid oozes over a skeleton in a shipwreck. It morphs into a somewhat exaggerated creature (from the black lagoon) Back on the beach,Hank & Tina's relationship is deteriorating. He wants to grow up. She wants to party. She swims out to breakwater. The gillman attacks and kills her. Tina's body washes up on the beach, interrupting the dance party. Later, two monsters attack a slumber party and kill 20 teen girls. A monster kills a pair of comic-relief drunks. Another monster almost gets two store clerk girls on their way home. That monster, frustrated at its failure, attacks some store manikins. Its arm is severed by the sharp glass. Dr. Gavin studies the arm and quickly deduces that atomic waste caused sea-creature cells to take on a humanoid shape around the skeletons of the fishermen. With no means to feed, they seek human blood as food. Noting that the arm is also lightly radioactive, they deduce that they can use Geiger counters to find them. Gavin's comic-relief black maid, Eulabelle, spills some liquid (solution?) sodium on the arm, which causes it to burst into flames. Now they have a weapon. Hank is charged with finding lots of sodium. He has to drive to New York City to get it. Meanwhile, Elaine is testing the water of a dark spooky quarry near the murder scenes. The monsters rise up. She flees, but gets her leg stuck in a rocky crevice. Dr. Gavin saves her but must fight a monster hand to hand. Hank arrives with his bucket of sodium. He and the police lieutenant toss the baggies. Each monster goes up in sparky flames. Later, Hank visits Elaine in her bedroom (?!) and pledges his love for her. The Del-Aires play another rockin' beach dance song under the final credits. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
As schlock as it is, HPB, gets right down to the action with little time wasted. The mixture of Beach, Horror and Sci-fi, is odd enough to be interesting. A few other points of interest are below.

Cold War Angle
HPB is mildly a nuclear cautionary tale. Atomic-stuff still has its cache as mysterious black magic which can create zombies. Message: radioactive materials mean trouble for mankind.

Notes
A Tale of Two Moralities -- HPB is noteworthy for having a foot in two moralities. One foot is in the innocent, chaste, orderly world of the 1950s. The other foot is in the debauched, life-is-cheap 1960s. A scene which typifies this dual nature is the monsters' raid on the slumber party. The girls, dressed in flannel night gowns, sing folk songs, giggle and have pillow fights. The monsters attack, killing all the young women with much "blood" and gore (for 1964). Gore, for its own sake, would become big in the 60s and beyond. Thus dawns that peculiar age in which audiences delight at seeing pretty innocent women slaughtered -- in droves. 50s Civility was crumbling. 60s Savagery -- the era of Helter Skelter and Chainsaw Massacre -- was rising.

They're After Our Women -- HPB gives the old Abduction trope a dark twist. At the end of the slumber party scene, two gillmen each carry off a young woman per the classic Abduction theme. The fact that they would be killed, not just "had", seems to touch on deep and ancient feeling that women taken by the "other" tribe were ruined -- as good as dead.

Good Girl - Bad Girl -- HPB is blatant in its repeating of the polarized archetypes of women: the virtuous woman and the harlot. Tina, the "bad girl," drinks too much (right from the bottle!), flirts with bikers, and dances provocatively (with hints of strip-tease). In the old-style morality, her fate is somehow "just deserts" for her loose lifestyle. Elaine, conversely, is chaste, temperate, modest and sensible -- in the June Cleaver idiom. When confronted by monsters, she, a crowd of men rush to protect her. Elaine's "just deserts" is the heart of the hunky hero. Let that be a lesson to ya, ladies.

Elaine 2.0 -- Note whenever actress Alice Lyon (who plays Elaine) has a speaking part. She appears to have been dubbed throughout. This is most painfully obvious when she and Dr. Gavin are conversing in the garage. Was Alice just too soft spoken? Did she have too-thick of an accent? How did she get the job with such problems? Could be it's not really Alice's voice we hear. This was her only movie.

Alleged Humor -- The mainstream Beach Party movies were light comedies. Not so much for HPB, though the writer Richard Hillard tried to inject a little humor. In the fight scene between Hank and the biker leader, Mike, there one sequence intentionally reminiscent of the comic Eric von Zipper (a regular in the Beach Party movies) and his bumbling Ratz and Mice motorcycle gang. Aside from that, "cute" (bad) jokes are inserted as token efforts.
Girl: "Do you think kissing is unhealthy"
Boy: "I don't know. I've never..."
Girl: "You've never been kissed?"
Boy: "No. I've never been sick." yuk yuk.
---
Girl: "Do you like bathing beauties?" (she strikes a pin-up pose)
Boy: "I don't know. I've never bathed one." yuk yuk yuk.

Naked Rock -- Of some amusement to modern eyes is the bare-bones performances of the Del-Aires. After the big-hair and heavy-metal eras, rock band performances became standardized as dark affairs replete with pyrotechnics, smoke machines and sweeping spotlights. How almost-naked were the Del-Aires. Just four guys in matching striped shirts, crooning their quaint rock-a-billy tunes in broad daylight. No smoke. No pyro. No gimmicks.

Bottom line? HPB is a mixture of genres popular with the drive-in crowd in the early 60s. The overall effect will be quite hokey for viewers who expect sophistication. People with a soft spot for low low budget 50s-style monster movies will find lots of cheese to love.

Monster From Green Hell

This movie is a hybrid of two B-film sub-genre. It's 80% jungle safari movie and 20% giant bug film. It covers no new ground in either. Them ('54) opened the big bug sub-genre. Judging from the poster art, the producers tried to position the movie as another big-bug tale. On the other hand, the jungle safari sub-genre (more prevalent in the 40s) must have still had some audience appeal. Since Monster from Green Hell (MFGH) is only partially a big-bug movie, it's place in the sci-fi genre is a bit tenuous. Still, it deserves at least some mention as part of the 50s sci-fi family. One of its writers, Louis Vittes, wrote the screenplay for I Married a Monster from Outer Space ('58), which was better than its title suggests. Producer Al Zimbalist gave us Catwomen of the Moon ('53). Near the end, MFGH shares the location shooting of Bronson Canyon with Robot Monster ('53). That's enough peripheral connections to merit at least one viewing.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Dr. Quent Brady and Dan Morgan are sending V2 rockets up into space with various animals aboard, to test their reaction to "cosmic radiation." These are our old friends, the checker-painted V2s, by the way. One rocket had too much thrust. Instead of exposing its animals to 40 seconds of radiation before coming back down, it stayed up for 40 hours. This rocket happened to have aboard it, some wasps, including a queen. This rocket then came down on the African coast, near the Congo. There, in an area around an active volcano the natives call "Green Hell", all animals are fleeing and natives are being killed. A local missionary, Dr. Lorrentz treks into the jungle to solve the mystery, but is himself killed by "monsters". Brady and Morgan arrive to check out the reports. They suspect the radiated wasps are the cause. After a great deal of trudging through jungle, they come upon the volcano and the nest. Sure enough, giant irradiated wasps. The explosives they brought with them do not kill the monster-wasps. The safari escape to a cave but are trapped in there for awhile. The volcano erupts. Lava pours down its sides. The lava kills the giant wasps. The safari folk are saved. The end.

Why is this movie fun?
Even though the "monsters" don't get much on-camera time (as is typical), they're actually pretty well done (for B monsters). There is a combination of large, articulated models and small-scale stop animation model work. By modern standards, quite cheesy, but in 1958, still above average. They came off better than the superimposed real bug type of films.

Cold War Angle
There isn't much of the Cold War angst here. Instead, we have a tepid example of the radiation cautionary tale. Radiation turns nature into monsters. Beware.

Notes
Radiation Angst -- MFGH caters to 50s audiences' built in anxiety about the effects of radiation. It was often the catalyst of choice in the 50s for introducing dangerous change. Surgery, chemistry and electricity each had their vogue periods. For the 50s, it was radiation. The only twist here, is that it's "natural" cosmic radiation from space, not man-made atomic radiation. Space was still a scary place in the late 50s. Many a film hinged on exposure to "space" causing bad things to happen. Riders to the Stars ('54) tried to make a serious plot of this. The Quatermass Experiment ('55) played up this angst. Later movies would too. People worried about radiation then.

Stereotyped Africa -- An amusing sidelight to MFGH is seeing the mishmash of african footage glommed together. Even in the later 50s, Africa was still stereotyped as wild place, with every corner filled with natural dangers. Elephants, pythons, lions and lava all existed side-by-side with fierce tribes of generic war-like natives. This generic vision was typical enough in the 30s and 40s, but apparently hadn't improved by the late 50s. Anything african was imagined to exist everywhere in Africa. Each sector contained both tropical jungle, arid savannah, swamp, desert canyon AND active volcanos. The only thing missing was the dinosaurs of Lost World.

For Love of Trudging -- A trait of many a jungle B-movie, is the obligatory marching through the jungle scene. MFGH had far too many of them. Dr. Lorrentz (an Albert Schweitzer copy) has his safari trudge through to get at the cause of the native chief's death. Much trudging. Brady's safari from Libreville to Dr. Lorrenz's camp went through yet many more minutes of trudging. Then they have to mount yet another safari to find the monsters that killed Dr. Lorrentz. The movie could have been perhaps 20 minutes shorter if all that trekking had been edited out. The fact that it wasn't suggests that the producers (who had made prior jungle films) must have expected their audiences still liked the vision of white men leading black porters through the jungle. It should be noted that the typical porters-deserting-white-leaders scene happened twice.

Stock Footage Fare --For fans of stock footage, there are numerous examples to spot. The V2 footage had become almost one of the four food groups by this point in the decade. Stock natives, stock wildlife clips and recycled footage from Stanley and Livingstone ('39) This helps explain why Dr. Brady gets decked out in the classic 19th century British pith helmet, khakis and tall boots. It helped him blend in with the '39 footage better.

Weak Ending -- Where most cautionary tales end with a moralizing moment, MFGH did not. For a brief moment, Dr. Lorrentz's daughter, Lorna, blamed science for the trouble, but Brady quickly corrects her that science is wonderful. Still, there were monsters out there. In the end, they're stopped, but unlike in other tales, man did not get wiser and stop the danger. Good did not triumph over evil. Instead, the wasps are killed by the lava. Since they were said to "not like fire," it's a bit incongruous that they made their nest on the side of a volcano. In the end, nature kills the monsters. As the Morgan character says at the end, "Nature has a way of correcting its own mistakes." Yes, nature killed the monsters, but its a bit odd that they gave nature the "credit" for making the monsters. Who shot the wasps into space? This may be a vestige of an old fear-of-nature theme.

Bottom line? At the end, MFGH may be a movie that only 50s sci-fi collectors will tolerate, or perhaps fans of jungle movies. Big bug movie fans will enjoy the big bugs, though they get only a little screen-time near the end.

At The Earth's Core

This is the middle of three films produced by Amicus Productions in the mid-70s. All were based on Edgar Rice Burroughs novels, and all three starred Doug McClure. The set are more properly classified as fantasy than sci-fi, but this middle film, At The Earth’s Core (AEC) at least featured a steampunk earth-boring machine called The Iron Mole. This techno-wonder is just a device to deliver two Victorian man into a fanciful world of monsters and pretty “prehistoric” women. Doug McClure (more famous for his role in The Virginian television series) stars with the venerable Peter Cushing. Caroline Munro stars as tribal babe and love interest.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Dr. Abner Perry (Cushing) and David Innes (McClure) set off to explore the center of the earth in their giant boring machine, The Iron Mole. Very soon after embarking, however, the Mole proves difficult to steer. They avoid magma, but stumble upon an underground sea and prehistoric land with a giant cave. They are chased by a sort of parrot T-Rex until captured by little pig-men with spears. They are added to the pig-men’s other captives, which includes the beautiful Dia (Caroline Munro). Dia escapes. The rest are taken to the city of the Mahars. These are chunky pterodactyl beings who command their pig-men army via telepathy. Most of the captives become worker slaves. Perry is sent to the library to copy cuneiform clay tablets. Some are set aside to be food for the Mahars. David escapes in a moment of chaos. Once outside, he comes across Ra. They fight, until a tentacled plant has Ra. David saves him and they become best buds. David wants to free the slaves from the Mahars. Ra says they’re too strong. He shows David the feeding ritual wherein the Mahars mesmerize their prey (20-something pretty women with glistening cleavage) so they can swoop down and grab them. The eating is mercifully just assumed. David falls from the hiding spot, but the Mahars are all asleep. He crawls to freedom, but return to help the slaves. They are captured by pig-men and brought to an arena. David has to fight a big lizard thing. He manages to kill it, but as a Mahar swoops in to get David, Ra breaks free and kills the Mahar with his chains. The slaves make a rush for freedom. Most are stopped, but David and Perry are reunited. They remerge to find Dia being menaced by Hooja. All are attacked by a fire-breathing frog-thing. Perry kills it with his newly built bow and arrow. David reconciles with Dia by being assertive. They go back and unify the tribes to mount an attack on the Mahars. Perry teaches them all archery. The attack does not go well at first, as the Mahars direct the pig-men to close the fire curtain gate after David and a few get in. Ra manages to find the control room with the gate lever, but dies opening it. The Mahars swoop in to get David and his few tribesmen. Reinforcements arrive just in time to shoot arrows into the swooping Mahars. The city starts to explode, so everyone rushes back outside. Fast forward. David and Perry, now all cleaned up, prepare to take the Iron Mole back to the surface. David wants Dia to come with him as his wife. She loves him, but cannot leave her people (she’s a princess). Sad David leaves with Perry. The Iron Mole comes up in the White House lawn. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
The rubber suit monsters have a nostalgic charm, giving the film a very 50s feel. While the budget cannot live up to the story’s ambitions, the story itself shines through to keep interest up. Of course, the revealingly-clad prehistoric women add visual appeal.

Cultural Connection
Rubber Suit Monsters — The movie Godzilla in 1954, introduced audiences to the man-in-a-rubber-suit monster. At first, it was fairly effective as a technique. Toho Studios would produce many, and have many imitators (often of much lower production values). Toho themselves devalued the technique down to cheesy levels by creating so many rubber suit monsters themselves. Only the very young in a 70s audience would still have the suspension of disbelief to simply accept the monster for what it pretended to be. The advent of the Star Wars era, just a couple months after the last of the three Amicas ERB films hit theaters, spelled doom from the old school approach. People still accepted wacky monsters played by men in rubber suits, but the fashion was for them to be aliens in galaxies far far away.

Notes
Based on the Book — Edgar Rice Burroughs published the story “At the Earth’s Core” in 1914, as a four part serial. It was pretty much a solid ERB tale, with monsters and villains to fight and a beautiful princess to defend and win the heart of. AEC follows the book reasonably closely for the story line. There was no way Amicus Productions limited budget could have done ERB’s fanciful monsters justice, of course. The ending of the film deviates from that of the book. In the novel, Dian did not return with David to the surface because of a trick by Hooja. It was not because she had to stay with her people. The book leaves open the possibility of a sequel when he goes back for her Orpheus in the Underworld-like.

Retro Sandwich — AEC was the second of three films by Amicus, based on ERB’s prehistoric fantasy stories. The first of the trilogy was The Land Time Forgot (’75). Then AEC in ’76. Finally The People That Time Forgot (’77). All three featured Doug McClure.

How To Treat A Woman — An amusing leftover bit of ERB’s man’s man world view, lingers in the story thread of David insulting Dia. When Hooja made rude advances towards Dia, David smacked him down. But, David did NOT then claim Dia as his justly-won property, thereby insulting her and making her unfit to be anyone’s mate — except for Jubal the Ugly One, who did not seem to care. To resolve her feeling insulted, Perry tells David to “be strong and masterful.” So, David spins her around by the shoulder and orders her to sit down and listen to him. Once he had pushed her around, all was well. She was all smiles and eager to rest her head on his semi-bare chest. That’s how ya have to treat wimin. Show ‘em who’s boss. This is a surprising carryover from older days, given it was a mid-70s film.

Bottom line? AEC is marginal as sci-fi. It does have a bit of steampunk with the Iron Mole, but this gets little screen time. The rest is pure fantasy genre. 20 years after Godzilla introduced audiences to the rubber suit monster, the technique was pretty lame. People weaned on CGI in the post-StarWars era may have a hard time looking past such low-rent FX. Fans of the older style of movie story telling may be able to look past all that, and just enjoy a good adventure story. —

Island of Terror

Released in its native Britain in 1966, Island of Terror (IOT) made its American debut in early 1967 as half of a double bill with The Projected Man. The theater poster (below, left) suggests that IOT was the "B" feature, but based on the production quality and some personal recollections, IOT was the lead film. Though an independent production (by Planet Productions), IOT has a Hammer Films feel to it, and for good reason. It stars Peter Cushing and was directed by Terence Fisher and it features some Hammer-esque style soft gore.

Quick Plot Synopsis
On a small island off the east coast of Ireland, a reclusive researcher and his team are trying to develop a cure for cancer. Their goal is to create, via irradiated nucleuii, cells that will attack and eat cancer cells. A local man is missing. When found, his body is distorted and soft. The local doctor declares that he has no bones. Dr. Landers travels to the mainland to consult with experts. They are puzzled so fly back in a helicopter that cannot stay. Another boneless body is found. When they seek out the reclusive scientist for advice, they find everyone in his mansion and lab are squishy dead bodies too. They take the scientist's notes and leave. The local constable arrives looking for them. A tentacle grabs him. He dies. Drs. Landers, Stanley and West return to the lab and are menaced by the culprit -- a turtle-shell shaped creature with a long tentacle. It grabs Landers. He dies. The creature then goes dormant and divides. The others escape. Later, it is deduced that there are dozens of them on the island, dividing every six hours. A militia of locals and the doctors try to shoot, burn and blow up the Silicates, but to no avail. They're impervious. All the townsfolk are sheltered in town hall, but they're a panicky lot. A dead Silicate is found near the half-eaten body of a dog. The dog was exposed to Strontium 90. Thinking that S90 is what kills the Silicates, Drs. Stanley and West return to the lab to get some isotope. Their plan is to irradiate the island's cattle, so the Silicates eat them, then die. One grabs Dr. Stanley's hand as they leave. West chops off his hand with an ax in order save him. West injects the cattle. The Silicate's arrive en masse and eat the cattle. They then attack town hall, breaking in through windows, killing quite a few. The survivors hole up on the windowless clinic, but the Silicates are breaking down the door. Dr. West is just about to give his girlfriend, Toni, a lethal injection in order to spare her the agonizing death, but just as he's about to act, the Silicates start to quiet down. They all die off. The S90 worked. The helicopter returns. The two doctors speechify a bit. They are glad it happened on an island, so the world was safe. Cut to a lab in China (presumably). Cancer research with radiation. A scream, a sucking sound. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
The acting is great. The pacing is great. The story is fairly familiar (see Notes below), but retold with zeal.

Cold War Angle
Beneath the typical monster/horror tale, are the usual cautionary flags. Radiation creates the deadly menace. Scientists, even though intending to benefit mankind, create something terrible -- rather analogous to the atomic bomb. Also in keeping with the Cold War attitude, it is radiation which is seen as their savior.

Notes
Under Siege Again -- The plot of IOT is the familiar one in which a group of people find themselves under siege by a monster (or monsters). Since they're trapped, they must fight to survive. This trope fueled The Thing in 1951 -- there, a remote arctic base. Islands were popular isolation places, as in Attack of the Crab Monsters ('57), Killer Shrews ('59) and The Flesh Eaters ('64). Rockets in space were popular venues for sieges too, as in It! Terror From Beyond Space ('58), Mutiny in Outer Space ('65), and Queen of Blood ('66) to name a few.

Killer Shrews II -- There is a lot of similarity in plot and premise between IOT and the 1959 film, The Killer Shrews. In both, reclusive scientists are conducting research on a remote island. Their work is intended to benefit mankind (world hunger / cancer). In both cases, their experiments backfire and produce deadly monsters. In both cases, said monsters quickly multiply in the wild. In both films, the potential (or eventual) solution is to let the monsters starve to death by eating everything on the island. The two diverge in their endings, but the net effect (hero and heroine survive) remain.

Nuclear Curse and Cure -- As is fairly common in 50s and 60s sci-fi, radiation is both the cause of the monster-of-mass-destruction, and turns out to be the only thing that kills the monster. Thus is encapsulated the Cold War era's bipolar attitude towards nuclear power. Scientists let the genie out of the bottle during WWII, unleashing horrific mass destruction. Yet, it is those same bombs which (so far) have kept the armageddon beast under control.

Bottom line? IOT is solidly a horror-sci-fi hybrid, with the bias towards horror. That appeals to some, but not others. The monsters aren't particularly terrifying. The pacing is good, so the over all result is fairly entertaining.

Godzilla, King of Monsters

This is the remixed version of Godzilla that America knew. It's not simply a subtitled or dubbed copy. It takes the original Gojira footage, edits out parts and adds in new footage shot with Raymond Burr and a bevy of asian extras to shoehorn Burr into the original. It's not overly successful, but not that badly done either. If someone had not seen Gojira before, the remix seems smooth enough. That said, the Americanized version is a serviceable, though weaker movie, but it IS the version that American kids grew up watching. For that reason, it's included here.

Gojira came out in '54, but not in America. It wasn't until late 1955 that an American distributor, Edmund Goldman, came across Gojira, bought the rights and set a team of producers onto it. The new producers felt it needed an American star and tapped Raymond Burr to play the role of an American reporter who happened to be in Tokyo when all heck broke loose. Much of the character development of the original was cut out -- to save running time AND because it was a bit long and talky for impatient American audiences. The title needed some juicing up too, apparently. Godzilla, King of Monsters (GKoM) seemed neatly self-explanatory. By April 1956, American audiences had seen many sci-fi movie monsters. They needed a king.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Read the plot synopsis for Gojira for the meat of the story. The story line remains largely intact, though staged as a flashback. GKoM opens with scenes of Tokyo already in ruins and Burr buried in building rubble. Once the flashback story line catches up to the destruction of Tokyo, the story moves on in "real time" to the same ending.

Why is this movie fun?
GKoM is a great deal more fun to watch if you've watched Gojira first. You know what Ishiro Honda had done in '54, and so you can spot what Terry Morse added. Morse actually did some clever shooting to make his new footage fit into the original. You know Burr is NOT there with the others in Japan, but it's quite fun to see how Morse made you think so. Overall, the original story still asserts itself, which has a layer of fun to it anyway.

Cold War Angle
Gojira was all about the dangers of nuclear testing with politely hinted at accusations that the United States was reckless in how it went about "staying ahead" in the Cold War. For American consumption, much of this message is edited out or reduced to easily-missed proportions. One rather telling bit of remix comes when Dr. Serizawa (inventor of the terrible Oxygen Destroyer) is fretting about his invention. In Gojira, he worries about politicians (in general) getting his destructive device and turning it into a superweapon that will be worse for the world than the A-bomb was. In GKoM, he frets (via dubbing) of his secret falling into "the wrong hands." This was more in synch with the American mood.

Notes
Careful Insertion -- One of the interesting features of GKoM is how Morse managed to put Raymond Burr into the original footage. By careful editing, directing and costuming, Burr is wedged into the story. One example is when Dr. Yamane and entourage are examining the destruction of the village on Ohto. Villagers are lined up at the edge of the holes (footprints) watching Yamane. Morse had several Asians wearing similar Japanese peasant costume stand side by side peering down. Burr stands behind them, also peering down inquisitively. Behind them all is generic leafy vegetation. A few quick cuts back and forth like this and you could get the idea that Burr was there, even though he wasn't. Many other such graftings are done much like this one.

Lost in the Herd -- When Gojira debuted in 1954, he was one of the first radiation-mutation monsters. Godzilla has to share the platform with the giant ants in Them! (June '54). By 1956, however, Americans had seen the radiated-boyfriend-beast in The Day the World Ended ('55), the radiation-mutated-minigodzilla in Phantom from 10,000 Leagues ('55) and the giant spider in Tarantula ('55). Radiation mutated monsters were becoming almost commonplace by the time the Americanized GKoM came on the scene. Poor Godzillia looked like just another copy-cat monster, when in reality, he was one of the first.

Lost Love -- The original Gojira had much more footage devoted to the love triangle between Emiko, her 'betrothed' fiancee, Dr. Serizawa and her actual love interest, Ogata. This triangle had more meaning in Gojira, but so much of the character development was cut out of the Americanized version that their actions make almost no sense. This severe editing also reduces Serizawa to a rather minor role so that his sacrifice at the end feels less significant.

King of Sequels -- Godzilla proved so popular (even from the weaker GKoM platform) that he became almost a franchise. American audiences would be treated to (or subjected to) dozens of Godzilla vs. (whatever) flicks of mostly declining quality. Several other rubber-suit-monsters would become popular too, such as Gamera, primarily on Godzilla's coat tails. Ishiro Honda had no idea his metaphoric monster would be such a hit.

Bottom line? If you can get it, watch the original 1954 Japanese version (with English subtitles). It is a more cohesive movie. If you can't find the original, this 1956 American remix will (barely) suffice, but you should plan on cutting the movie a lot of slack.

Attack of the Crab Monsters

This movie was the top half of an all Roger Corman double-feature with Not of This Earth. ACM was not as imaginative of a story, but managed to be somewhat offbeat from the usual radiation-generated giant critter sub-genre. While it does have the requisite giant animal, per the title, there is a semi-mystical element that keeps things unusual as the scientists disappear one by one. It flirts around the edges as a ghost story.

Quick Plot Synopsis
A plane lands a group of scientists on a remote Pacific island. They are replacements for a mysteriously missing research group sent to study the effects of nuclear test fallout. The plane explodes on take off, trapping them there. There is too much radio interference to call for help. Earthquakes and landslides rock the island. A deep pit appears near the cliffs. That night, Martha hears the voice of one of the lost scientists calling her to the pit. Carson hears it too, so they investigate. Carson falls in. While the others go via a sea cave to look for him, Martha and Dale go back to the house. A giant crab attacks the house (next room), eats their lab mice and deliberately smashes their radio. The next day a better equipped search party for Carson. While in the caves, a cave-in wounds Jules. That night, feverish Jules hears the voices calling him to the pit. He goes and a giant crab claw gets him. Others awaken at his scream. Jules' voice says he and Carson are fine, come to the cave. So, they all do. (?) A giant crab attacks them. Grenades and bullets are useless, but a stalactite falls, piercing the crab's brain. A second giant crab escapes. The scientists take a claw back to study. The molecules of the flesh can move like a liquid, so bullets simply pass through them. Electricity, however, turns it to dust. The crabs are able to create great heat too. Hence the tunnels, pits, earthquakes and downed plane. They are also making the island smaller. Soon no place to hide. Mutated by radiation, the giant crabs absorb life, include their victims' consciousness. Growing ever smarter and more powerful, they plan to dominate mankind. (a female crab has an egg brood). Trapped on the rocky mountain peak (all that's left of the island), Hank powers up the radio transmitter antenna. He topples it across the crab just before it gets to Martha and Dale. Hank and the crab die amid the massive sparks. The end.

Why is this movie fun?
It is part ghost story, with the 'spirits' of prior victims enticing the living to join then. The pacing is pretty good. Despite the huge logical gaps and obviously low budget, the mood of impending doom works pretty well.

Cold War Angle
As per usual, radiation from nuclear tests created the monsters. Symbolically, these monsters absorb people who then try to recruit others to join their collective. This could be taken as either communism or McCarthyism.

Notes
Hand of God? -- ACM opens with a turbulent cloudy sky and a God-like narrator reading Genesis 6:7 -- the verse where God tells Noah that He's going to wipe out the earth. "And I will destroy man..." This opening Bible verse isn't tied in well. Were the life-absorbing crabs God's judgement on nuclear-sinful mankind? If so, it wasn't a very divinely powerful judgement. Was it a blanket caution that nuclear man is bringing this and other troubles upon himself? Other than it being somewhat customary to open a sci-fi film with a Bible verse, there's no connection.

Energy Monsters -- Radiation changed the molecular make-up of ordinary land crabs (whom we are told were ruthless). They absorbed the energy of their victims as well as their minds, Apparently they were able to absorb chemically potential energy too, such as the missing dynamite. They were also able to direct energy (beams?) to down planes and bore tunnels. This last feature is somewhat like Godzilla's atomic breath. These were not simply big critters, as were the giant ants in Them! ('54). They were highly intelligent (though ruthless) energy monsters.

Budget Beast -- The actual crab monster models are predictably low-budget looking. Corman shows a bit too much of them. Their obvious prop-model status keeps ACM from rising into higher 'thriller' status. But, they did what they could with the budget they had.

They're Not After Our Women -- The poster pushes the usual button that the monster is out to capture our prime females. A few scuba scenes tease at setting up the poster image, but it never happens. The crab monsters never pick up Pamela Duncan in their claws.

Gore Rising -- Two scenes in ACM show the inroads that screen gore was beginning to make. Early in, a headless sailor is hauled into the rubber boat. In the cave-in scene, a stalactite severs Jules' hand, which lay just beyond his arm. Gore for sensationalism was becoming more common in the horror genre and was starting to show up in sci-fi.

Evil Collective -- ACM almost fits into the alien-takeover sub-genre. The 'absorbed' colleagues ceased to be individuals and became part of the 'new' order. Atypically, they became part of a single physical 'thing' but with separate consciousness. In line with the sub-genre, their personalities changed. Instead of friends, they became proponents of the new order, seeking out their colleagues to be absorbed too. This 'turning' fits the existing mood (fear) of communism.

Electronic Savior -- Once again, good ol' electricity saves the day. No conventional weapon could kill the crab. High voltage, however, does it's usual magic. This plot device was already a bit threadbare by the mid-50s. Nonetheless, it won't be the last time our friend the kilowatt saves our day.

Poor Russell -- Once again, Russell Johnson plays the tragic hero. As in This Island Earth ('54), he gives his life to save the male and female leads. Retirement to Gilligan's Island may have seemed relaxing.

Bottom line? If plot holes, cheap props and marginal acting bother you, it may not be enjoyable. If you're a Corman fan, or an aficionado of 50s radiation-mutant-critter movies, you'll enjoy ACM.

The Trollenberg Terror

This UK sci-fi movie ran as the second feature to Cosmic Monsters. For American promotion, it marketed as "The Crawling Eye" even though the credits retained the original title. The movie was itself an adaptation of a six-part serial aired on British TV in 1956. The original was entitled "The Trollenberg Terror." For a B production, Trollenberg manages to be a reasonable horror/mystery story set in the Alps. Only towards the end the actual aliens appear on camera. For many viewers, this is the movie's downfall. In truth, the crawling eye aliens are not all that bad (compared to say the space bird in The Giant Claw ('57). The quality of the first three-quarters of the movie has raised expectations, such that merely B monsters tend to disappoint. That aside, Trollenberg is actually a fair bit of British sci-fi from the 50s.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Three young men are climbing Mt. Trollenberg, one above them, off camera. He talks of fog and seeing something, then screams and falls. He comrades are horrified to see that he has no head. A young woman on a train gets a vision of the three climbers, then passes out in the lap of Alan Brook, special investigator for the UN. Alan, Ann and her sister Sarah all get off at Trollenberg. Alan visit Professor Crevett at the high mountain observatory. He's tracking a mysterious radioactive cloud on the mountain. The villagers talk of mysterious deaths of climbers and curses. Two other men buck the warnings and climb. That night, Brett leaves the hut. Something returns to to get Dewhurst. Ann sees this too, as a vision. A rescue party finds Dewhurst decapitated. Brett shows up in the village acting odd. He tries to kill Ann, but is stopped. The cloud is coming down the mountain towards the village. It covers the only road out, so everyone must evacuate to the observatory. Hans, now an alien-animated zombie arrives and makes another attempt to kill Ann. The aliens are moving up, surrounding the bunker-like observatory. They start to break in. Alan gets the idea that heat or fire will stop them. They make some molotovs, but they're not enough. Alan calls in a bomber with fire bombs. After a few passes, the fire does stop and burn the aliens. The people emerge safe. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
As a horror murder mystery tale, Trollenberg moves along fairly well. Qhentin Lawrence keeps the mood spooky and the pace reasonable. Though much maligned, the eye monsters are not all that bad, for a 50s B movie. They're actually rather similar to how H.G.Wells describes his martians in his novel "War of the Worlds". Janet Munro is also a pleasure to watch.

Cold War Angle
There is a touch of the venerable "invasion" trope as a tie to the Cold War. This, however, is far overshadowed by the larger (and simpler) horror and mystery story.

Notes
Quatermass Formula -- The structure of Kneale's Quatermass stories was popular with British audiences. A mysterious and bizarre creature is terrorizing the countryside. Only our lone take-charge expert seems to know what's going on. Hammer's X-The Unknown ('57) used it, but with a Dr. Royston in the Quatermass role. In Trollenberg, the Quatermass role is performed by Alan Brooks (Forrest Tucker), special investigator for the UN.

Monster Motivation -- Not much screen time is spent on the aliens as anything other than murderous monsters. There is, one brief scene, however, in which Professor Crevett theorizes about them. He thought that maybe they came from a dying world, in search of a new home. They pick mountain peaks because they're accustomed to lower pressures and cooler temperatures. The clouds, he mused, could be them making their own atmosphere. They appear to multiply by division, as the cloud splits and re-splits. Since they use mental suggestion to murder, they would appear to be a hostile invasion.

Zombie Tools -- The aliens animate and control the bodies of dead people to do their manual labor. Brett dies up on the mountain, but returns to kill (and decapitate) Dewhurst. He then appears in town on a mission to kill Ann. Hans rashly tries to drive out of the village, but is apparently killed by the aliens. His zombie appears at the observatory, again with the mission to kill Ann. Interestingly, in both cases, our heros are able to kill the already dead men.

Geo-Trivia -- There IS a quaint little village named Trollenberg, but it's not in the Alps. It's due north of Zurich, in the German state of Baden Württemberg. It is in the Black Forest, but there are no alpine mountains nearby.

Bottom line? Don't let the MST3K spoof throw you off. View the original and cut the producers some slack on the monsters. It's a B movie. Get over it. Trollenberg is actually a pretty good B movie.

Monolith Monsters

Universal International had been producing some quality B sci-fi in the 50s. They gave us The Creature From The Black Lagoon trilogy, This Island Earth and The Incredible Shrinking Man. Their 1957 venture, Monolith Monsters (MM) is similar in production value, though far less known than their classics. The movie's almost-unique distinguishing characteristic is casting a mineral as the "monster." The movie is reasonably well done, considering an inanimate mineral is the villain.

Quick Plot Synopsis
A meteor crashes in the California desert. A state geologist brings one of the strange shiny black rocks to his office. They are made up an odd mix of silicates. A mishap spills water on the rock, which begins to grow. The next day, his fellow geologist, Dave, finds the office in shambles, black rocks everywhere, and Ben turned to stone. A little girl, Jenny, brings home one of the black rocks from a school field trip. Her farm house is destroyed, her parents turned to stone. Jenny's arm is turning to stone because she touched the growing rocks. She's rushed to the big city for intensive care. Rain comes to the desert and the rocks grow into 100' monoliths which fall and break. The fragments grow and fall too, beginning a destructive march down the valley. Nothing stops them. The doctor figures out that Jenny is lacking silicone. He fashions a cure. Dave and his college professor try the cure on the black rocks. They stumble upon saline as the key. Salt water halts the growth cycle. The monoliths will break out of the valley if they're not stopped. Destruction will be widespread. Dave thinks the only solution is to blow up a local irrigation dam in order to flood a salt flats and lay a moat of saline in front of the monoliths. They blow the dam. Water floods through the salt works and in front of the monoliths. It works. The town, and the world, is saved. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
The production values and effects are good enough to not hinder the story. Director Sherman does a good job pacing the story. After a steady diet of aliens, creatures and mutants, it's fun to see lifeless black rocks as the monsters.

Cold War Angle
One could see in the monoliths, a metaphor for something which dehumanizes and destroys civilization. This could apply to materialism or modernism almost better than communism.

Notes
Rock On! -- Most movie monsters are humanoid or at least animal-like in some sense. They're usually presumed to have some intelligence, even if only enough to have malice. Rocks, however, have no feelings, no malice. They simply exist. MM is one of only three movies (thus far) in which an inanimate mineral is the "monster" of the story. The first was Magnetic Monster ('53), in which a freak isotope was doubling in size every 11 hours, threatening to unbalance planet earth. The second was Night The World Exploded, ('57), in which a rare mineral from deep in the earth was reacting with ground water to generate great heat, swell up, and explode, thereby causing massive earthquakes. In MM, the mineral also reacts with water, but destroys simply by growing so large that it crushes whatever is nearby.

Double Trouble -- The silicon-leeching quality of the monoliths is a second level of menace. This is a second story-within-a-story which keeps the movie moving. Like a stony Midas curse, whoever touches the growing monoliths eventually turns to stone. It becomes a race against time to halt the petrification of poor Jenny before it kills her (and several other hapless towns folk). The cure for Jenny becomes the key to stopping the monoliths themselves.

Double-Duty -- The dam model used in MM is the same one used in Night The World Exploded. The town was on Universal Studios' back lot. It was also featured in It Came From Outer Space ('53) and Tarantula ('55). A quick-eyed viewer might also spot that the meteor falling to earth was a repeat of the fireball-like "ship" landing scene from Universal's It Came From Outer Space. A quick-ear will hear the Creature's three note theme from Creature From The Black Lagoon as the meteor falls.

Star Watch -- Geologist Dave is Grant Williams who was the Incredible Shrinking Man. Les Tremayne who plays the old newspaperman, was General Mann in War of the Worlds. --- Paul Frees narrates the opening. William Schallert is uncredited as the double-talking meteorologist.

Hot Wheels -- Dave's car is actually a bit of a rare 50s "star", so worth noting. It's a 1956 De Soto Fireflite convertible. Only a hundred or so were made. One was used as the Indy Pace Car that year. It was a pretty hot full sized car. The '56 Fireflite line was very popular. In fact, it marked the pinnacle of the DeSoto company. The '57 model had an all-new body with bold styling, but production quality in the new line was poor. DeSoto never shook off the bad reputation it developed from the '57 models. The recession of '58 hastened the slide. Chrysler dropped the brand in 1960. Dave's hot convertible in MM captures the moment when DeSoto was at its zenith.

Bottom line? MM is a good 50s sci-fi movie worth watching for its rare "monsters". It's unthinking, unfeeling antagonist has left it poorly remembered and under appreciated. MM is a well paced and fairly well acted drama with two races against time to keep the hero hopping.

The Flesh Eaters

Jack Curtis and Arnold Drake were two guys at the edges of the film industry mainstream, who got together to make their own movie. The Flesh Eaters (TFE) is one of those horror/sci-fi hybrids (mostly horror, very little sci). Working outside of mainstream Hollywood, Curtis and Drake pushed the envelope for on-screen gore and exploitation gimmicks. The cast are mostly third-tier actors who played bit parts ("man" or "woman" or "saloon girl") in TV episodes. Shot in black and white in 1962, (but not released until '64), the overall mood of TFE is very 50s. Even the monsters have a decidedly 50s B look.

Quick Plot Synopsis
A young couple, swimming off their yacht near Long Island, disappear amid ominous music. A NYC taxi pulls up at a wharf. Jan, the assistant for Laura, a post-prime alcoholic stage star, charters Grants seaplane to take them Provincetown for some rehearsals. His plane develops engine trouble en route. They set down beside a "deserted island". There, they bump into Professor Peter Bartell, there to study marine life. They discover a human skeleton on the beach (from the opening couple) and lots of fish skeletons. Peter tries to assert himself on Laura, but she bites his wrist and runs away. After the storm, the plane is gone. Grant figures out that the shimmery bits in the water are microbes that eat flesh. A non-sequetur beatnik named Omar drifts up to the island on a stereotypic raft. Peter shows the others how high voltage "kills" them. Says if they put a big shock in the surf, it will kill be critters and they can get away on Omar's raft. He has a huge solar battery to do this. In private, Peter gives Omar a drink with critters in it. They eat the middle out of Omar. Peter lies that Omar left on his raft. The others hear the recorded screams and figure Omar died trying to escape. Laura sees that the shocked bits aren't dead. Instead, one of them is growing into a monster. Figuring that Peter will get rich selling monsters, she dolls up and tries to come on to him. Peter stabs her (revenge for the bite) in the belly and buries her in the sand. At gunpoint, he forces Grant to finish the surf-shock work while monologuing the backstory of Nazi scientists developing the shimmery bits as a super weapon. Peter plans to sell it to the highest bidder. They deliver the mega shock to the ocean. Meanwhile, the bits in the tent have grown into a cycloptic warty blob with two pointy crab arms. It comes after the three suvivors. Grant, Peter and Jan run up a dune to escape it. Laura (not quite dead after all) appears with the knife and attacks Peter. He shoots her. She tumbles down the dune, the bloody knife still in her hand, stabbing into the monster's white eye. Her blood drips into the eye. The monster throbs and explodes. Blood, hemoglobin, kills the monster. They collect some of their own blood into a McGyveresque mega-hypodermic. On the beach, Peter pulls his gun again. He and Grant fight. Peter is tossed into waves and gets shimmery bits on him. In agony, he kills shoots himself. A really big crab-wart monster rises from the sea. Grant grabs one pincher to ride up onto monster's back. He stabs the eye with McGyver-hypo. Screen goes red and magenta. He jumps off. The monster blows up. Grant takes his wet suit top off, embraces Jan and the two walk off all happy. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
TFE is too odd of a movie not to love, especially for fans of 50s monster-sci-fi. The pacing is brisk. The camera work and directing add visual appeal. Martin Kosleck plays the evil villain with entertaining zeal.

Cold War Angle?
Other than suggestions of selling the shimmery bits to the Russians as a super-weapon, there is no connection. At its heart, TFE is more of the usual cautionary tale about man messing with nature. Oh, and that the Nazis are evil.

Notes
Montauk Monster 1.0 -- Long before there were the infamous Montauk Monsters, there was TFE. Much of it was filmed on the beach of Montauk, New York, (out at the tip of the south fork of Long Island. Direction and editing help the illusion that a single stretch of beach and dunes was a small desert island. The notion that there was some 'uncharted' desert islands off the New England coast is charmingly absurd.

Gates of Gore -- While tame by today's baseline, TFE was a very gory movie for its day. When Omar's belly is being eaten by the critters, there is much gooshing blood through his hands. Much blood spurts from Laura's abdominal stab wound. The sailor on the supply boat becomes a grisly skeleton. Perhaps the goriest, is when Peter, being consumed on the beach by the critters reaches his hand (little but bloody bones) for the pistol, then shoots himself in the head (off camera). Blood pours from a moulded head. Of course, this is all muted by being shot in black and white, and the scenes are on the screen for only a second.

Speak To Me -- Perhaps for budget reasons, all of the audio track was added post-production. The voice dubs are pretty good. You can only spot a few times that lips don't quite match the words. The sounds (water splash, wind, footsteps, etc.) are all obviously studio sounds.

Comic Book Style -- Blake was a writer for DC comics. His experience is evident in the direction. Note the deep depth-of-field shots with one person's profile close to the camera on one side, and others as tiny distant figures on the other side. Note too, the fairly frequent use of extreme close-up (more the lenses could handle), and classic visuals -- such as Laura's not-dead hand clawing up out of her sandy grave. These visuals give TFE a distinctive visual style.

Simple, if Illogical, Solutions -- Sci-fi likes irony. Monsters cannot be killed by things we think are powerful. Instead, a simple (even ubiquitous) items becomes mankind's savior. Nukes couldn't stop the martians in War of the Worlds. It was the humble germ that did. Simple salt water stopped the triffids and monolith monsters. This trope would still be alive many decades later, when plain water hurts the aliens in Signs. In TFE, the trope is paradoxical. The critters eat flesh, yet blood kills them? Consuming flesh yields torrents of blood. Plot hole? Perhaps not. Blood kills the giant crab-blobs. Nothing was said that blood killed the shimmery bits. In fact, at the film's end, the shimmery bits were still out there.

Good Girl / Bad Girl -- TFE reuses the old trope of two women: one good, one bad. Laura, the aging actress, is an alcoholic, arrogant and domineering. While not without some physical charms (movie bad-girls usually have some), she is a schemer. She rejects Peter's "advances" until she thinks he's got power or future wealth, then she schmoozes. Jan, her long-suffering secretary, is the stereotypic good-girl. Pretty, blonde, and well-built, she's the helpful one, the compassionate one. As per the usual of the trope, the bad girl gets her just deserts, while the good girl gets the square-jawed hero.

Not Without Humor -- The writers did manage some amusing lines. One joke, delivered around the campfire, has Omar telling Laura that she's cranky because she has a sour liver. "You've had too much coffee, sugar, white bread, alcohol, onions and sex." Laura responds, "Well now, I could get by without all those things, doctor, but you canot expect me to give up...onions." :-)

Plane Crazy -- The little float plane which Grant flies (and gets them marooned), is a Republic RC-3 SeaBee. Republic, like many WWII aircraft makers, figured to transition to peace-time production with planes for private aviation. The expected boom in civil aviation never quite materialized. Republic launched the RC-3 in 1946. By 1947, they halted production after making only 1060 units. the military market rebounded (Cold War), and Republic was making their F-84 fighter jet. As a trivia note: Grant's plane, N6047K, production number 222, was still around in 2002. Records show it being sold in 2002 to an individual in Islip Terrace, NY.

Bottom line? As a sci-fi movie, TFE has little to offer. It is mostly a gore / monster flick. Yet it has an indie charm with evil scientists, ruthless nazis, lab skeletons and giant crab monsters -- everything for a quaint 50s drive-in second feature. The acting isn't that bad for this grade of movie. If you want to see passion, watch Laura's knife attack on Peter in slow motion.

The Creeping Terror

Sometimes nominated as one of the worst films ever, The Creeping Terror (TCT) is, nonetheless, fascinating in its badness. It has developed a cult following over the years, with much written about it. Many rumors and several urban legends surround this movie and its producer/director: Arthur Nelson. TCT exhibits many of the foibles of films produced, directed and starred in, by the same man (under the stage name of Vic Savage). Other low-budget features, such as local/amateur actors and production "economies" all leave their mark too. Perhaps because of this "perfect storm" of shortcomings, TCT has a sizable fan base. Ostensibly, the tale of a couple of alien monsters who slowly rampage around eating people. A lone scientist thinks he has some answers. A newlywed deputy sheriff must stop the beasts.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Deputy sherif Martin and his wife Brett are returning from their honeymoon. They don't see the rocket land in the woods, nor the first monster emerge. Sheriff Ben, Martin and Brett investigate the reported plane crash. Ben goes inside and gets eaten by a second monster still strapped inside. A Colonel Caldwell's crack unit of six soldiers are dispatched. A Dr. Bradford, expert on "space emissions," is also dispatched. The monster eats a young woman. Martin and his deputy buddy Barney discuss the pros and cons of being single vs. being married. The monster moves on to eat a housewife as she hangs up laundry. The monster then eats a young boy and his fat grandfather. Unsated, the monster attacks a picnic hootenanny, eating everyone. Martin and Barney investigate all the missing person reports. Dr. Bradford conducts tests on the rocket, but learns little. The monster attacks the Community Dance Hall, interrupting extended dancing sequences. Everyone obligingly bunches up in one corner, so the monster can eat them all. Despite the abundant meals, the mosnter moves on to Lover's Lane. It eats some. Some escape. Finally, Caldwell's men arrive to battle the beast. It's bullet proof and eats all but two of the soldiers. Outraged, the Colonel attacks the monster with a grenade. This kills the monster. Bradford finds some electronics in a hunk of the flesh. Based on an unstated epiphany, he rushes back to the spaceship. Martin follows in the sheriff's car. Bradford rushes into the ship, but it explodes inside. This mortally wounds Bradford, but also frees the second monster. This second monster almost eats Bradford before Martin rams it with his car, killing it. Bradford says the creatures were data collectors. With both creatures dead, transmission would begin. Martin tries to disable the ship's transmitter by beating on the equipment, but this fails. Bradford says it might not be so bad. Maybe the aliens were dead. He then dies. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
TCT is just too bizarre to not find fascinating, in a sort of forensic sort of way. Everyone in TCT is so earnest that it lends an amateur charm.

Cold War Angle
It is doubtful that there is any serious analogies in use. Instead, TCT is a sort of reflection of more earnest works. They had monsters as metaphors for Soviet invasions. TCT has monsters because they did. Nothing deeper.

Notes
Art or Scam? -- Rumors claim that Arthur Nelson was a scam artist always working an angle. It's not like unscrupulous men were rare in the movie business. Scam or not, we have at least the film he convinced his investors to make. Nelson wasn't a good actor, nor a good director. He did, however, appear to have some talent as a producer/promoter. His one-man-show production is reminiscent of Mikel Conrad's The Flying Saucer (1950) and Russ Marker's The Yesterday Machine ('63) as a home-grown product acted by locals. In TCT, several people do get their brief (and glorious) moment on the big screen: Betty with her laundry gets several minutes; the brunette who gets to say,"My God, What is it?"; the sergeant who did not get eaten -- scam or not, they all got to be in a movie.

A Tale of Two Monsters -- Observant viewers will note that there are two different monster costumes used for the same monster -- collectively called the "carpet monster" for its resemblance to being made up of carpet remnants. Fans have labeled the first carpet monster "clamhead", the other, "shovelhead," for differences in how the "head" was shaped. They vary from scene to scene. A plausible explanation is that Jon Lackey, the man who created the first (clamhead) costume left the production over a dispute (not getting paid for his work) and took clamhead with him. Undaunted, Nelson had a second costume made. Though similar, Shovelhead was less well-crafted. The alternating appearances are due to scenes being shot out of sequence. (a common practice in movie making). Clamhead's scenes (mostly outdoor stuff) were apparently shot early on, while Lackey was still waiting for his check. Post-Lackey footage was shot with Shovelhead and intercut.

Cheap Sound -- A popular urban legend surrounding TCT is that the audio track was somehow lost or destroyed, thereby requiring dubbed sound and a heavy reliance of narration. The supposedly lost audio may well have never existed. It was not that unusual in low low budget productions to not bother with as-shot audio. This saved a whole load of expenses for sound equipment and a sound crew on the site. It was cheaper to dub in audio in post-production. We just saw this rather well done in The Flesh Eaters ('64) and not so well in Horror at Party Beach ('64). A classic example of this -- including heavy reliance on narration -- is Beast of Yucca Flats ('61). Nelson may well have planned post-production audio in the first place.

Mixed Messages -- As a director, Nelson had an eclectic set of messages worked into his project. Part of him was (apparently) a staunch social conservative. There was the extended treatise on the virtues of marriage and how it changes men. There was the somewhat traditional subliminal message that bad things happen to kids who slip away from adult supervision to make out. The dance hall scene and subsequent massacre seems like retelling of the old modern-decadence-begets-doom trope. Yet, amid these conservative staples, are mixed exploitation bits, like the first victims making out in swimwear, and the ample shake-n-jiggle in the dance hall. Less conservative, and more bizarre, is Nelson's fixation on seeing women's butts and bare legs sticking out of the carpet monster's mouth. Viewers get quite a few repeats of this, yielding a lot of screen time. The monster does eat men too (equal opportunity) but they are off-camera and assumed.

Germ of an Idea -- Lost in all the cheap production, was a somewhat intriguing idea by the writer, Robert Silliphant. Knowing the biological make-up of earth beings, they could engineer a bio-weapon to either clear the planet turn us into willing slaves. This would save on all that expensive blasting famous landmarks. Dr. Bradford's reassuring last words -- that earth will be okay because the aliens probably live far far away (so might be dead by now) -- seem like small hope. Whose to say the rest of them aren't halfway to earth in the mother ships, or even in orbit already?

Bottom line? TCT is definitely not a movie for people offended by cheap production values and weak acting. For fans of low-budget sci-fi, or just fans of bad movies, TCT has tons to love.

Golden Age Motivation

Having thus far watched over 250 sci-fi movies made from 1950 to 1967, it's clear that Cold War themes did animate a majority of the sci-fi of the 50s and 60s. These themes fall into a few shared categories: armageddon imagined, invasion fear, radiation dangers and spy worries. Science fiction movies certainly gave an artistic expression to these fears, but they were not the only movies doing so.

There were non-sci dramas, thrillers and docu-dramas focusing on similar themes. Those films were not included (initially) in this study because they were not sci-fi. No saucers, no aliens, no monsters. Yet, looking back, they seem helpful for understanding the "fire in the belly" that drove much of Golden Era sci-fi. For children who practiced Duck and Cover in school, and families who practiced bomb shelter drills when the sirens blared, the Cold War was not a vague geo-political notion. It was unavoidably center stage.

Non-sci-fi Atomic Angst films fit into similar categories of Atomic Angst themes as did Golden Era sci-fi. These are, briefly:

Armageddon Imagined -- Some films explored the "what if" of a global nuclear war and the end of civilization as we know it. There were pessimists who prophesied doom and optimists who imagined a phoenix among the ashes. Rocketship X-M ('50) was an early example of the former. Five ('51) was more optimistic that some remnant of mankind might survive to rebuild. Classics such as When Worlds Collide ('51) were both.

Invasion Fear -- Some films played out scenarios of enemy invasion -- often with aliens or monsters standing in as metaphors for the anticipated communist hoards. The Thing ('51) kicked off this theme which carried through into the mid 60s. The invaders were sometimes humanoid, but often monsters -- giant dinosaurs, giant bugs, robots, etc. No matter the form, the terror was the invasion.

Radiation Danger -- School children during the 50s and early 60s (the audiences of matinee movies) were routinely shown "educational" films about terrible things radiation could do. Duck and Cover. Build Your Own Bomb Shelter. The movie monsters were outlandish, but even in their exaggeration they expressed the almost crippling fear people felt about the dangers.

Insidious Infiltrators -- Enemy spies and fifth columnists were bringers of all the fearful things mentioned above. Spy themes hooked adults more than children. McCarthyism was more of an adult phenomenon. The most gripping movies in this theme were the alien-takeover stories. Invasion of the Body Snatchers ('56) is the classic of this sub-genre. Yet, the theme had such power that it was made, remade and rehashed many times.

Coming Up: The Bad Old Days
Between the upcoming reviews of sci-movies, I will be inserting reviews of related Atomic Angst films. They dealt with the same fears, the same anxieties, but they had a couple other theme categories of their own. There were "Apocalypse Averted" movies, in which mankind pulled back from the brink, and "The Trigger Pulled" movies in which he didn't.

Modern (younger) sci-fi fans place great importance on a movie's special effects. So, they usually kvetch about the older movies. The quality of the special effects was not their prime value consideration. Giving voice to the fear was. Review of these movies can help sci-fi fans born after the mid-60s to better understand the power and magic of old sci-fi.

I hope you'll agree.

Monster That Challenged The World

This movie isn't particularly well known (or at least well remembered) but is actually a reasonably good example of 50s monster sci-fi. The Monster That Challenged The World (MCW) fits somewhat into the classic "big bug" sub-genre by its situation and plot. The monsters are called giant mollusks, though amount to 20' monster aquatic caterpillar things. Just what they are doesn't matter too much, though. Like any good big-bug movie, they arise, terrorize and must be stopped. The monster is actually pretty well done for its day. The acting is reasonable too. Overall, this makes MCW a good watch for a 50s sci-fi fan.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Some mild earthquakes rumble through southern California. A naval lab tests parachutes with jumps over the inland salt lake, Salton Sea. A jumper disappears, as do the two sailors sent to pick him up. Their bodies are found, shriveled, drained of all fluids. A gooey slime on the boat is the only clue. The slime turns out to be mildly radioactive. Next, a young woman and her boyfriend are lost, swimming at night. The same slime is found. Divers look for the bodies and find a strange sack-like "egg" but also a giant creature in an underwater cave. One diver dies, the other escapes. The egg is taken back to the lab. Dr. Rogers (Hans Conried) theorizes that eggs from ancient sea mollusk (he calls the Kraken?), but the mildly radioactive waters of Salton Sea have mutated them into giants. They are voracious eaters and lay thousands of eggs. If they escape the lake into the canals, and thence to the ocean, they could threaten the whole world. Sure enough, they do get into the canals. The navy finds their 'nest' and blows them up. All would be well, except for the egg back in the lab. The secretary's daughter innocently turned up the holding tank's heat, so that egg hatches. It quickly grows and chases the secretary and girl into a back room. Just as it appears the beast will get them, the hero arrives and distracts it. Just as it appears the hero is about to be eaten, sailors arrive with guns and kill it. Hero and love interest are saved. The end.

Why is this movie fun?
For a low budget movie, MCW is pretty well done. The early movie attacks are kept suspenseful. The monster itself is well done for the pre-CGI era. MCW is a worthy addition to the big-bug family.

Cold War Angle
Other than the common source thread (radiation caused the monsters), the story is much more a monster tale than a metaphor for the Cold War. The prominent and heroic role of the American military was completely acceptable to 50s audiences.

Notes
Better Monster -- The animatronic giant "sea mollusk" is fairly convincing and reasonably well done. This monster stands in stark contrast to the bizarrely bad space bird in The Giant Claw, released around the same time. Having a huge real beast model helps the actors relate, much as having the giant ant models helped in Them! ('54). The giant mollusks are reasonably scary looking.

Special Locale -- The movie is set on southern California's Salton Sea. Part of the explanation of the monsters' origin is that they were ancient life mutated by mild radiation (bad ol' nuclear testing) and water seeping underground via new earthquake fissures. Salton Sea was a dry salt flat until 1905 when the Colorado River jumped its banks and flowed via an irrigation canal to flood the flats. Tiny dormant shrimp were revived from the last time the flats were flooded. This happened periodically over the centuries. This becomes the premise to explain the 'new' monsters.

Nuke Legacy -- Even though nuclear test explosions weren't done at the lake (the area is far too populated), the crew of the Enola Gay did do practice bomb runs over the lake. No "live" bombs, of course, but it's still a connection to the nuclear age.

Pre-Jaws -- One scene features two young lovers going for a night swim. First the man disappears. While the woman is treading water, frantically calling for him, she feels a tug at her leg. She screams and is pulled into the inky water. It's a very Jaws-like scene, but almost 15 years earlier.

Star Watch -- Tim Holt, as the cranky Commander, was a staple of B-westerns since the late 1930s. This was the last of his regular work movies. He did only a few bit roles afterward. Hans Conried, who normally plays comic roles, such as in The Twonky ('53), gets a serious role as the all-knowing, if a bit testy, scientist.

Bottom line? MCW is a pretty well done B monster movie from the later 50s. It follows the formula plot of Them! in several ways, but in a fresh enough form to not seem like a rehash. It's worth watching for monster movie fans, provided one isn't too jaded by modern CGI and expectations of salacious gore.

The Navy vs. The Night Monsters

The style of cheap 50s B sci-fi was gone yet. 1966 saw the release of The Navy vs. The Night Monsters (NvNM). Essentially, NvNM a recasting of the popular people-trapped-with-a-monster trope. Instead of an arctic base, such as The Thing ('51) or in a rocket It! Terror From Beyond Space ('58), NvNM is set on a tropical island. Mamie Van Doren stars, but not in her usual way. Anthony Eisley plays the reluctant hero. Bobby Van plays the incongruous comic relief. The navy personnel on the base, and later from an aircraft carrier, must battle the killer trees.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Antarctic scientists discovered some odd plant forms, so loaded them on a plane to ship them to the States for study. As they planned to set down on remote Gow island for refueling, all heck breaks loose. A crewmen goes berserk after visiting the cargo hold. Shots are fired. People fall out. The pilot regains control, but lands gear-up on Gow. He's in a catatonic state, so can explain nothing. With the disabled plane on the runway, no one can come in, or leave. On the island, there is a complex web of would-be love triangles and macho rivalries to distract the viewers. Spaulding has the hots for Nora, but Nora is smitten with Lt. Brown. While fond of Nora, Lt. Brown has commitment issues. Since Spaulding and Brown are rivals for Nora, they don't get along. The island's biologist, Dr. Beecham has the "trees" planted near a hot spring to preserve them. After awhile, one by one, people who walk into the jungle at night, disappear. The catatonic pilot is a suspect, since he periodically gets up and attacks people. This is a red herring. It's the trees. They can walk (sort of),have grabber arms and secrete a powerful acid Several more people are killed and absorbed by the trees. The trees ruin the base's generator.The islanders fight back with molotovs. Doc theorizes that the trees needed to be mobile and carnivorous to survive the 60 months of antarctic winter. The darkness in the cargo plane "awakened" them. The navy dispatches an aircraft carrier to the island. Jet fighter-bombers drop napalm on the hoards of walking trees. The bombers eventually wipe out the trees, saving the day. Cue triumphal music. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
NvNM is almost pure 50s B sci-fi, with all its warts and foibles. This far into the 60s, it's like finding a dollar between the couch cushions. It can be enjoyed as such.

Cold War Angle
This is more monster and horror than political metaphor. There is, still, the strong flavor of American military might, as yet untarnished by the Vietnam experience.

Notes
Based on the Book -- Michael Hoey wrote a screenplay based on the 1959 novel "Monster from the End of the World" by Murry Leinster. The novel was, itself, a variation on The Thing ('51). Hoey kept the basics: antarctic plant samples, plane crash en route back to the States, carnivorous trees. He made some of the usual Hollywood additions. Curiously, Hoey kept the pilot alive, perhaps as a plot diversion. In the book, the pilot shoots himself after the crash landing.

Land Unknown, Again -- The central premise in Leinster's book and Hoey's screenplay used the same source material as Land Unknown ('57). A supposed warm area, with clear lakes is found in the antarctic. See notes on Land Unknown for more on that.

Platinum in Decline -- An icon from the 50s was the platinum blonde "bombshell" starlet. Fox had Marilyn Monroe. Warner Brothers countered with Jayne Mansfield. Universal tried to get in the game with Mamie Van Doren. Where Marilyn had an ethereal charm. Mansfield had a huge chest. Despite type casting as the "dumb blonde", both Marilyn and Mansfield showed some acting ability. A more distant third in the "Three Ms", Mamie also had a huge chest, but not as much acting ability. Somewhat surprisingly, Mamie plays a fairly serious role in NvNM with little flagrant exploitation of her famous features. Hoey did put her in a tight sweater for one scene, but other than that, her assets remained unexploited.

Weak Team -- The people creating NvNM did not qualify as a well-oiled-machine. Mamie Van Doren refused to wear the navy nurse's uniform, insisting instead on wearing several sleeveless (and shapeless) dresses. Hoey relented. She'd be a civilian then. Director Hoey and executive producer Broder did not get on well, nor communicate well. Broder changed Hoey's title from a more mysterious "Nightcrawlers" to the flagrant NvNM title. The most glaring example of their dysfunction was the inserted scenes and hokey ending. Hoey was striving for a darker, moodier piece, more along the lines of The Thing. You can tell what he imagined as his ending -- the scene where everyone is standing shoulder to shoulder watching the tree monsters burn. Hoey wrapped it up as a 78 minute film. Apparently he did not believe Broder when he told him he needed a 90 minute film. Broder than had director Arthur C. Pierce film the shots in the admiral's office, insert yet more stock footage of jets, and a few brief (and badly done) clips of the "crawlers" en masse. Broder then wrapped it up with some triumphal music and air show footage.

Bad Plant, Bad -- Plant monsters have a history in classic sci-fi. Of course, the first of them, The Thing ('51) was very humanoid in shape, but made of plant tissues. The pods in Invasion of the Body Snatchers ('56) didn't do much, but produce duplicate humans, but they were plants. More monster-like, was Tabanga, the walking tree monster in From Hell It Came ('57). Then there was the very similar people-eating tree thing in Womaneater ('59) which actually fed on humans, and was destroyed by fire. The Triffids ('63) added the mobility factor. They too were people-eaters.

Plane Crazy -- Like any average 50s B sci-fi, there is ample stock footage in NvNM. In that, there are the usual continuity lapses. The first one is brief, so easily missed. The plane the scientists (and killer trees) are on, is an R4D (Navy letters for the DC-3). A different DC-3 is shot making a gear-up low pass at the air strip. it is a C-46 Commando that is show doing the belly landing. Note too, that all the shots of the supposedly belly-landed DC-3 are with it in a wheels-down stance. Towards the end, in the new footage Broder inserted, we're shown several clips of the Blue Angels team at air shows, sometimes in F9F Panthers (with the tip tanks), or F9F Cougars (more swept wing, no tip tanks). All the stock footage of napalm bombing runs are P-94 Starfires (with the huge tip tanks). A smorgasbord of late 50s fighters, but not the same squadron.

Bottom line? NvNM is not high art. In fact, after the production polish of Fantastic Voyage which was released before NvNM, its cheapness is almost embarrasing. But it is classic low-budget 50s-style sci-fi. Lots of stock footage, cheap monsters, predictable deaths and heroic heros. NvNM is out of its league in the mid-60s. Fans of the cheap 50s films will enjoy it.