ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

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Something for everyone, today!

In the mood for comedy? Watch Abbott and Costello accidentally blast off in a rocket, accidentally land in New Orleans, stupidly think they're on Mars, accidentally blast off again, and accidentally land on Venus.

The movie should have been called Abbott and Costello Accidentally Go Practically Everywhere . . . except Mars.

Next we have Bert I. Gordon's no-budget space adventure to a planet with alleged dinosaurs on a small island in the middle of a lake. The movie should have called Journey to the Small Island of Stock Footage Dinosaurs.

Finally we take a look at the early British sci-fi movie called The Quatermass Xperiment, in which Professor Quatermass hunts for an astronaut who absorbs people. This movie should have been called The Creeping Unknown.

As a matter of fact . . . it was!
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Abbott & Costello go to Mars (1953)



Some refer to this as one of the comedy team's poorest efforts, but if you're also into science fiction (besides being an Abbott & Costello fan), this is an ideal combo.

The duo play their usual doofus characters — they accidentally take off in a space rocket and end up in New Orleans during Mardi Gras.

Since all the citizens are dressed up in bizarre costumes, the two poor shmucks think that they really are on Mars. They also get tangled with a couple of bank robbers. This sequence is actually the better paced portion of the film — and the viewer may think that this is where it all will remain.

But, the story does us one better — they and the crooks get back in the rocket and end up on Venus, where a matriarchy is presided over by a queen (Mari Blanchard) who exiled all males 400 years ago. Lou Costello, as sometimes happens in these comedies, is very attractive to all the females and briefly becomes the new king. There are more inspired sight gags in the final act back on Earth.

BoG's Score: 6.5 out of 10




BoG
Galaxy Overlord Galactus
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King Dinosaur (1955)

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A very low budget first feature from Bert I Gordon (Mr. B.I.G.), not counting his participation in the virtually unknown Serpent Island/1954), with some wild concepts — a planet, dubbed Nova, suddenly enters in our solar system, and 4 astronauts (2 men and 2 women) are sent to explore it.

They find a world very similar to Earth at first glance — it resembles one of our typical forests. They also run across wildlife identical to Earth's — bear cubs and deer, for example, as well as snakes and alligators which menace them unconvincingly. But then a giant bug, resembling a termite, shows up. Later, one couple decides to raft to a nearby island, and that's where the giant lizards live.

The poster, by the way, is misleading — there's no such dinosaur in the film, only stock footage of enlarged lizards.

_______________King Dinosaur (1955) Trailer


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The film's first sequence on Earth is a documentary-style explanation of a space agency's testing procedures, utilizing stock footage. It's actually a bit unusual and interesting. The narration by Marvin Miller, the voice of Robby the Robot.

The rest of the film betrays its complete lack of a budget. There's a reason, for example, that this other planet is identical to Earth — the production had no funds to show anything else. Even the actors (including William Bryant & Wanda Curtis) weren't paid.

There's further stock footage from One Million BC (1940) to show the giant lizards. However, Gordon makes the most of what he did not have, presenting a story of adventure into the unknown, and it explains why he was a success with later low budget innovative features like The Amazing Colossal Man and Attack of the Puppet People.

The final minutes include appearances by a gigantic (50 feet tall) woolly mammoth and an armadillo — these were the early Gordon giant-things FX which weren't quite fine-tuned.

The outrageous conclusion seems like an excuse by Gordon to use more stock footage of the military's atomic bomb tests. One character decides that they may as well use that atomic bomb they brought along and to blow up the offensive island and all its creatures. What a way to treat a new world — mankind has never been more callous and destructive!

BoG's Score: 4 out of 10

______________ King Dinosaur: banda sonora


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Dino Trivia: Screenwriter Tom Gries, who also wrote & directed the previous Serpent Island, went on to a pretty long Hollywood career as a writer and director, notably of some Charlton Heston films in the late sixties, including Will Penny (1968). He died prematurely of a heart attack at age 54 in 1977.


BoG
Galaxy Overlord Galactus
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The Creeping Unknown / Quatermass Xperiment - (1955 England)

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THIS IS A HAMMER PRODUCTION, their earliest Horror effort, in a way.

This predates THE BLOB (1958) as one of those creepy alien things from space invading/infecting the Earth. It's a condensed version of the TV BBC production from 1953. This is also the first film in the Quatermass trilogy.

It gets a bit confusing. The Quatermass Xperimentwas renamed The Creeping Unknown for its USA release.

The 2nd film, Quatermass II (1956), was also a film version of a TV BBC production, and it was renamed Enemy From Space in the USA.

The 3rd film was Quatermass and the Pit (1967), but it was renamed Five Million Miles to Earth!

Like I said. Confusing.



The message of these films, especially in this first one, was that, yes, it's understandable that mankind progresses in its scientific inquiries, such as taking the first steps towards exploration of outer space, but we all better be ready for the inevitable drawbacks or, uh, fallout, so to speak.

At the start of the film, one of our rocketships crashlands to Earth, ending up in a farmer's field. The experiment is over at this early stage of the film. Now begins the negative aspects. Of the 3 astronauts, only one stumbles out of the ship; the other two are mysteriously missing — only their spacesuits remain.

Uh-oh.



The surviving astronaut (Richard Wordsworth) is infected with something. The actor, Wordsworth, gets a lot of praise nowadays and he really creeped me out when I saw this as a kid. (Hey, I guess that's why they renamed it The Creeping Unknown).

He begins to metamorphoses into something else and absorbs other living material. I didn't really get all this when I first watched it at a younger age. He first absorbs a small cactus plant by slamming it with his fist. Thereafter, his hand looks a bit on the monstrous side.


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Brian Donlevy plays the scientist Quatermass in this and the 2nd film. Many fans feel he was miscast in the role. They feel Quatermass should have been more open to thoughtful introspection and even some regret over events in the films, despite his scientific bent. Also, Quatermass is supposed to be British and Donlevy was not.

But Donlevy plays him with bulldog determination, never wavering and never showing much personality beyond a plain ornery attitude. In fact, the wife of the doomed astronaut finds Quatermass to be so annoying and obnoxiousthat she defiantly spirits her husband out of the hospital in an act of petulance, causing all the problems in the 2nd half of the film.

Quatermass, as played by Donlevy, has no sympathy for her later, calling her an idiot. Well, he may have had a point; her action was truly irresponsible.

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The make-up FX involving the corpses were pretty effective for the fifties, still disturbing tooday. Some of this reminded me of the later Island of Terror (1966).

Things get very creepy in the last 15 minutes, when the audience doesn't really see what the astronaut has changed into. All we see is this trail of slime that indicates 'something' has passed through this way. The reveal at the very end, at Westminster Abbey, is naturally a letdown — think basically The Blob with tentacles.

As always, our imaginations work better in cases like this.

BoG's Score: 7 out of 10

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A much later film, The Astronaut's Wife (1999), is pointed out by most familiar with this film as sort of a remake or rip-off of this older film. I also think of Species II (1998), in that the plot in that one also involved an astronaut coming back infected with something. There are also similarities to The Thing (1982), the John Carpenter version.


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