Some Sci-fi/horror from the 1950s.

Project Moon Base (1953), directed by Richard Talmadge. The story of the first moon base was supposed to be a TV series in the early fifties, but it did not make the cut and so producers pieced pieces of the TV episodes together and came up with this film. It has its charms – a person walking on the ceiling of the space station, a sign saying “Don’t Walk on the Walls,” and some nifty special effects of docking in outer space. The acting is pretty bad, and the ending calls up thoughts of Adam and Eve. We also have a woman as Commander, and, even more surprisingly, a woman as President of the United States. Of course, we also have agents of a foreign country (guess which one) who wish to destroy America’s Space Station. This one is not particularly well filmed or acted, but somehow it manages to overcome its liabilities. Taken in the right spirit, it is fun.

 

The Magnetic Monster (1953, directed by Curt Siodmak and Herbert L. Strock. This is an intelligent low budget science fiction film about the dangers of nuclear radiation; here it runs amok. We have no giant insects or oversize robots or creatures from the deep. What we have is an atomic isotope that devours energy and doubles its size every 12 hours. If not stopped, this thing will send earth spinning out of control and way into space. The end! Trying to solve the mystery of how to get rid of this thing are Jeffrey Stewart (Richard Carlson) and his colleague Dan (King Donovan) who work for the Office of Scientific Investigation. What they learn is that the only way to rid the world of this thing is for them to take it to Nova Scotia. I’m not kidding – Nova Scotia. Canada’s maritime province saves the world. What could be better? The spectacular climax here is actually lifted from the 1934 German film, Gold, directed by Karl Hartl. This is an earnest little film that somehow works. It also can claim to initiate a cycle of films about the dangers of nuclear research. The early scene in the appliance store is fun. Also fun is the large computer that assists the scientists; it is called MANIAC.

 

Stranger from Venus (1954), directed by Burt Balaban. Made just three years after Robert Wise’s The Day the Earth Stood Still, Stranger from Venus revisits the story of an alien come to earth to warn the people of earth to cease and desist when it comes to nuclear bombs. Unlike the earlier film, this one has a miniscule budget, hardly any special effects, and a cast of humans who prove their ignorance and stupidity. The Stranger here is a man without a name (Helmut Dantine) who has the power to heal, and who likes gardening. What’s not to like. He also seems to have a force field around him that impedes people from touching him, that is all people with the exception of Susan North (Patricia Neal – yes, she was in The Day the Earth Stood Still too). Susan can embrace and even kiss this stranger with a green thumb. Most of the action takes place in an out-of-the-way English pub. Why the alien decided to drop in to this place remains unclear, but he is not going to save humankind from a lonely pub in the “wilds” of England. The film is noteworthy precisely because of its lack of production flourishes and for its earnestness. Oh, and for its unflattering picture of our species.

 

Them! (1954), directed by Gordon Douglas. This is one of the best known Sci-fi/horror films of the 1950s, and for good reason. The production values are excellent, the creatures impressively believable, the characters interesting, and the locations nice. The films opening with the little girl wandering the desert, unable to talk, vacant and then that sound, so chilling. The creatures, by the way, are large ants, and the film lets us know quite a bit about ants and their ways. The ants are large because – you knew this – of atomic testing back in the 1940s. This film is one of many in the 50s that dealt with the atomic bomb and the consequences of radiation. It is also one of the best ones. Edmund Gwenn as Dr. Harold Medford gives a great performance as the person who, along with his daughter Patricia (Joan Weldon), who is also a doctor, figures out what is going on. He also delivers the sobering news that humanity is in a precarious situation now that the nuclear genie has been loosed. Other stalwarts in the cast include James Whitmore, James Arness, Olin Howland, Dub Taylor, Walter Coy, Sean McClory, Fess Parker, Sheb Wooley, Dick York, Jack Perrin, Leonard Nimoy, and Willis Boucher, familiar faces all. Sidney Hickox is the cinematographer, and his work here is sharp and impressive.

 

The Collosus of New York (1958), directed by Eugene Lourie. Here is a 1950s monster film that mixes Frankenstein with Der Golem. The story s preposterous, but somehow engaging. In short, the family of famous scientists comes a cropper when one son, Jeremy Spensser (Ross Martin), a “genius” who is slated to help humanity is hit by a car and dies. His lunatic father William (Otto Kruger) is a brain surgeon, and he decides to remove his dead son’s brain and revive it. Another son, Harry (John Baragrey), is a whiz with robotics and automation. William convinces Harry to fashion a 12-foot body in which to lodge Jeremy’s brain. What could possibly go wrong? Jeremy, now a colossus, finds a way to reconnect with his young son Billy (Charles Herbert), and he is not pleased when others try to keep Billy from him. So he learns how to mesmerize people, making creaking sounds and flashing his bright eyes. The action moves on to a United Nations Peace conference where Jeremy turns up and fries any number of people by sending a beam of light from his eyes. I suspect this film could have had something to say about science overreach, about automation, about family, and maybe other things too. As it is, the film stumbles along delivering one impossibility after another. The bits that deal with Jeremy’s desire to connect with Billy and his family may point forward to Robocop. But this is, perhaps, the least of Eugene Lourie’s four monster features: The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953), The Giant Behemoth (1959), Gorgo (1961), and this one.

 

The Hideous Sun Demon (1958), directed by Robert Clarke. Another 50s cheapie, this one a riff on the werewolf and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde films. Robert Clarke plays Dr. Gilbert McKenna who does research that uses radiation. Somehow, he gets a severe and rare case of radiation poison. His exposure to radiation isotopes proves deadly. Rather than just growing sicker and sicker until he passes, Gilbert discovers his illness only turns him into a hideous demon when he is exposed to the sun. This hideous demon is a throwback to the early stages of evolution. Like poor Larry Talbot, Gilbert is the victim of a terrible affliction. We know how these things turn out. The demon suit here is pretty good, reminding me of a cross between the werewolf we all know and love and the creature from the Black Lagoon. The script has its moments: for example, “I've told him before that bourbon and water go together, not bourbon and radiation!" The focus on Gilbert’s struggle to come to terms with his affliction does give the film a little heft. The finale at an oil field that seems to sit right aside a suburban housing zone is memorable, if predictable. The scene in the shack with the little girl meeting poor Gilbert reminds me of a scene in James Whale’s Frankenstein, although the outcome here is rather more benign. Also memorable is the infamous “rat scene.” Quickly let me add, no rats were harmed during the making of this film. All in all, this is a film for those who like the oddball outings from Poverty Row.

 

Corridors of Blood (1958), directed by Robert Day. I suspect the title caught the eye of Stanley Kubrik. Now I wonder if he was disappointed not to find corridors of blood in this film. This is not to say the film disappoints; it does not. Here Boris Karloff plays the good Dr. Bolton who offers free service to the poor when he is not conducting surgery in a London hospital in the 1840s. In his spare time, he seeks a way of providing painless surgery, or separating the knife from the pain, as he says. This is before the arrival of chloroform. Anyway, you can bet that things go awry for the good doctor who before long finds himself without a job and with an addiction to the stuff he has been inhaling as he tries to find a way to make surgery painless. He also finds himself under the influence of Resurrection Joe (Christopher Lee) and Black Ben (Francis De Wolff). This is all very captivating, but what is even more engaging is the mise en scene. The sets for the London streets and inns are excellent. The film is worth watching just for its visual delight in recreating London in the mid nineteenth century. But we also have Boris managing to convince us of this good man’s turmoil as he descends into addiction and grows more frantic to solve the problem of painful and bloody surgery.

 

The Haunted Strangler (1958), directed by Robert Day. Here is one for fans of Boris Karloff. He plays novelist James Rankin who is convinced that twenty years ago an innocent man went to the gallows, and he, Rankin, is out to exonerate this man and identify the actual murderer. As things move along in dark musty chambers, the Judas Hole, a cabaret with a lively set of cancan girls dancing up a storm and a couple of buxom women followed by someone sinister, and a creepy graveyard with rats, we begin to unravel a tangled plot as Rankins’s detective work reveals the truth. The film gathers elements of the Jack the Ripper story with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and when I tell you this, you will have a spoiler. Sorry. But the film is worth seeing if you like this sort of thing. Karloff, in the late stage of his career, is just fine, and the atmospherics are also just fine for a modest low-budget film. This little horror gem is character driven, and satisfyingly so.

 

The Lost Missile (1958), directed by Lester Wm. Berke. Shot newsreel-style, this little pot-boiler has a rogue missile shooting across Canada and northern United States, leaving a five-mile swathe of devastation in its wake. Ottawa goes up in flames. Where this missile comes from, who controls the missile, its motives, all remain a mystery. Nothing is revealed. The warning about atomic destruction is as clear as it could be. Main characters include Dr. David Loring (Robert Loggia) and his fiancé, Ellen Parker (Joan Woods). As things turn out, only Dr. Loring can save the world, or at least New York City, and to do so, he must sacrifice himself. Special effects are minimal, the acting bellicose, the story familiar. On the plus side, the whole thing is brisk and to the point. The film works as a low-budget precursor to such later films as Dr. Strangelove (1964) and Fail Safe (1964). 

 

The Brain Eaters (1958), directed by Bruno VeSota. Made for a mere $26,000, The Brain Eaters does not manage to live up to its title. It does, however, attempt to cover similar ground to Don Siegel’s The Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), only here the pods are replaced by small furry tentacled parasites who have lived beneath the earth for millions of years and are only now, in 1958, making themselves visible in small town Illinois. If one of these parasites attaches itself to the back of your neck, you become zombified. The acting is worthy of the $26,000 budget. The camera work shows a few nifty tilts just to let us know that things have gone awry in this Illinois town. Like a few other films of the 50s, The Brain Eaters turns to electricity to finish off the parasites. If you are interested in the paranoia of the post-war period, then this film will hold some interest. By the way, Leonard Nimoy turns up as Professor Cole; he is unrecognizable as we see him looking a bit like Gandalf as he sits in a hazy room. This hazy room is inside a strange cone that has appeared for some reason (I may have missed the reason), and the good professor Cole has been taken over by the parasites. But don’t worry, the end here is not like the end of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

 

The Mugger (1958), directed by William Berke. This little police procedural is quite captivating. It is also rather daring for 1958. Well it is 1958, and so the film does exhibit an insensitivity to gender issues, the men here, both good guys and bad, leering whenever a pretty woman is nearby, and making sexist remarks regularly. The story concerns the police trying to identify a man who terrorizes women in the dark streets of an unnamed city. This mugger uses a knife to cut the women’s cheek, and he also steels their purse. Knife and purse, see. As detective and psychiatrist Dr. Pete Graham (Kent Smith) explains, these two objects have a Freudian significance, although he never mentions Freud by name. While looking for the mugger, Pete is asked to help a taxi driver friend, Eddie (James Franciscus), with a problem at home. It seems the sister of Eddie’s wife is giving them difficulty. Meanwhile, Pete’s fiancé Claire (Nan Martin), also a cop, is working undercover at a sleezy dance hall where Eddie’s sister happens to work. Finally, the muggings escalate to murder. The mystery grows deeper. Is the mugger the same person as the murderer? This tangle of a tale is carried out efficiently and, to my mind, satisfactorily. 

 

Giant from the Unknown (1958), directed by Richard E. Cunha. “A very large, degenerate, Spanish conqueror is freed from suspended animation by lightning and goes on a killing spree in a small town.” This is the synopsis on IMDB, and its okay, although the large conquistador does not make it into the small mountain town of Pine Ridge. He stays above the snow line while Sheriff Parker (Bob Steele – yes, that Bob Steele), and others seek him here and there. Meanwhile Dr. Frederick Cleveland (Morris Ankrum) and his daughter Janet (Sally Fraser), accompanied by Wayne Brooks (Ed Kemmer), look for artifacts left by the Spanish in the 15^th century – or whenever long ago. One of these Spanish conquistadors has been preserved in some exceptional soil until a bolt of lightning rouses him from his centuries old slumber. Awake, this large fellow goes about hurling people hither and yon. Jack Pierce provides the makeup for the giant, the same Jack Pierce who worked on Universal’s Frankenstein and Mummy films. This is one of many low-budget monster films tossed off in the 1950s. Despite its budget, this film is well made. The locations are fine, the group of people familiar, the plot predictable, and the whole agreeably hokey. The one quite laughable moment occurs when the giant falls at the end.