ALL SCI-FI

[Maurice]

Its preposterous locomotion is the one thing that makes it really laughable.

About 41 minutes in Dr. Stern is looking at a newspaper with an "artist's conception from reports" that looks nothing like the actual Kronos, which leads me to wonder if the drawing was an early design. The thing has four legs, no central cylinder goes to the ground, and a pair of armlike protrusions.

https://youtu.be/XQKEX7Y9eHc?t=2484
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"The absence of limitations is the enemy of art."
― Orson Welles

[Bud Brewster]

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Hey, wait a minute! I think we misunderstood what Morris Ankrum is looking at. The newspaper headline doesn't seem to be about Kronos at all!

The text above the picture says, "Giant Sea Creature Washed Up On Mexican Shore".

So, instead of this being a very inaccurate artist's conception of Kronos, it's a very inaccurate artist's concept of the octopus in It Came from Beneath the Sea!


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And at the 47:45 mark a smiling, dimwitted TV anchorman glibly holds up a picture and says, "Here's an artist's conception based on Dr. Gaskell's description." Then he grins like an idiot and says, "Pretty scary looking, isn't it? Perhaps a gift from another world to ours. Who knows?"





He acts like the whole matter is about as important as the sighting of the Loch Ness monster by a drunken group of Scotsman.

Can you imagine what the news media would do with a story like this today? A giant machine appears on a beach the morning after a huge UFO drops down into the ocean!

I can just hear Wolf Blitz now.





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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[alltare]

obama:
"It's Bush's fault!"

[Gord Green]

I bet most "Artist interpretations" from witness descriptions are just as vague and inaccurate.

[Bogmeister]

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____________________ Kronos movie trailer


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This is the one with a huge square-shaped robot-thing threatening Earth — different from the standard monsters or aliens which usually threaten us in these kinds of films.

It begins with a 5-mile asteroid hurtling towards Earth. and it ends in the ocean off Mexico — but doesn't cause the devastation we might expect.

At the same time, a man in a pickup truck driving through the dessert is possessed by a ball of electricity — an alien we assume — which then transfer to a scientist, who then is obviously possessed.

The main characters include Jeff Morrow from This Island Earth as a scientist. Barbara Lawrence is his girlfriend, and George O'Hanlon is a fellow scientist. They go to Mexico to see what's what, and (the next morning) see that a 100-foot high cube-like robot has appeared on shore.

For the rest of the film, we see this thing marching across the Mexican landscape on four pistons which function like legs, even though they move up and down.

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Visually and conceptually this is an unusual idea for a film of this sort — it's a trip to watch this thing move across the landscape, and the idea is that it's here to absorb all our energy. It reaches a power plant, for example, and extracts all the energy. The highlight is when the military try an atom bomb against this thing.

But, for some reason, the resulting execution of all these ideas is not that exciting. Maybe it's just that monsters and/or aliens are just more exciting than this type of contraption. It's a widescreen picture and looks bigger budgeted than the norm for these sci-fi pics, but it's almost as if Kronos also absorbed some energy out of the film itself. There's too much screen time for the parallel plot of the possessed scientist.

BoG's Score: 5.5 out of 10


BoG
Galaxy Overlord Galactus

[Maurice]

The lack of excitement is largely a factor of the editing, and conceptually this thing absorbing all the energy on Earth is kind of abstract for a threat.
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"The absence of limitations is the enemy of art."
― Orson Welles

[Gord Green]

As far as the piston-like movement.....

If the front piston was programmed to advance a foot or two at a time on each stroke it would propel the body of Kronos forward just as shown in the film.
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There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child.

[Bud Brewster]

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An interesting idea, Gord!

I have a little trouble with the idea that the very clear up-and-down movement of the four pistons were somehow "advancing a foot or two" at a time. But that glowing ray shining down from the bottom was obviously an anti-gravity beam, and if it could hold up that titanic weight, it's not too hard to imagine a lateral force taking place at the same time.

I realize the pistons were just done for looks, but we all know it's fun to figure out legitimate purposes for the things we see in sci-fi movies. Having said that, maybe the pounding pistons were meant to regulate the speed of the robot. With nothing but wind resistance to slow the floating robot, the pistons would keep it moving at a steady speed by briefly striking the ground with each downstroke.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Bud Brewster]

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IMDB has 10 trivia items for this movie. Here’s a few of the ones I found the most interesting, in the blue text.
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~ The communication console and screen from Klaatu's saucer featured in The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) can be seen directly in the background of Labcentral's "Astro Physics" Laboratory where Vera Hunter and Dr. Hubbell Eliot have their confrontation. A map of the world has been placed behind the glass.

Note from me: I think I might have submitted this item to IMDB years ago, but I'm not sure. My list of contributions doesn't seem to go back far enough.

~ Before production began, the budget was cut. This required a second draft of the script which eliminated some character development and some expensive special effects sequences.

Note from me: This is consistent with what I mentioned recently about how 1950s science fiction movies were often hamstrung by budgetary restrictions.

~ Baxter Ward, who played a TV news anchorman, was a real life TV news reporter at the time.

Note from me: Good grief! I commented earlier that the newsman's report seemed remarkably unrealistic! But if the item above is accurate, that guy should have known better!
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Krel]

It occurs to me that the scientists that landed their helicopter on Kronos were very lucky. The energy draining beam didn't harm them. But if the beam had been used on the helicopter, they would have been stranded on Kronos.

Although it would have been a wild ride for as long as they survived.

David.

[Eadie]

[filmdetective]

Bud, I liked KRONOS!

I don't see why Dave Szurek — a Monster Kid from Way Back, who Met Forry and Wendy on their 1963 Tour of the USA from LA to DC, "Project 8500,"and who has written for many fanzines, well into his Old Age — called KRONOS a "turd."

I didn't look at Kronos that way at all.

I've got the letterboxed proper aspect ratio version of the film (not sure if it has stereo sound or not).

I really can''t say anything bad about KRONOS.

Bill Warren, in Keep Watching the Skies, says KRONOS would have been a better film with a bigger budget.

But I don't look at it that way.

I don't think a larger budget would have made KRONOS any better.

It is just right the way it is, and with a bigger budget I feel it would have been a worse film, not a better one.

Don't know if many of you other Board Members remember the documentary film Gizmo! about old-time inventions that never Made It, but that film had footage of a Walking Truck which was just like Kronos.

[Bud Brewster]

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Thinking Outside the "Plot"!
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~ A Question for the Members: Would the aliens who brought Kronos to Earth in their giant mothership to steal our energy (because their civilization desperately needed it) simply give up after we discovered an "Achilles heel" in their power-draining machine?

~ My Theory: No. Of course not.

They would learn from their mistake and send one-or-more "power collectors" to suck our planet dry!

In fact, the giant mother ship which brought Kronos to Earth and placed it on the beach in Mexico is shown submerging itself in the Atlantic! Do we have any reason to believe that it left after that?





No!

Therefore, gentlemen, I submit that the mother ship remained on the ocean floor and monitored Kronos' progress right up until the time it was destroyed by a lucky maneuver which mankind discovered!





When that happened, the aliens evaluated the situation, determined what caused the failure . . . and made alterations in the other Kronos "energy collectors" which the giant ship had in it's cargo hold.

If Hollywood had understood the value of sequels in the 1950s, they could have made two or three more follow-up movies for Kronos, each one featuring an increasing number of the giant robots . . . until we finally see a climax in which mankind is faced with a dozen of them — all marching in formation across the landscape as they relentlessly stole the energy we possessed, without even slowing down!

Thoughts, gentlemen? (Heck, I've got more ideas I didn't even include here! I sincerely hope you guys do as well.)
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

One issue I have with the premise is that aliens require our electricity in the first place.

The alien civilization is capable of constructing star ships and then journeying light years. But they cannot create their own electricity? Seriously?

Would such a civilization even still be using electricity?

Electricity could be some form of archaic power system to such a planet that can build gigantic robots and star ships.

What in the world do we have that's of any value to offer such a society?

[Bud Brewster]