ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

This is a movie I look forward to watching (for the first time) on Jimbo Berkey's website, Free Classic Movies. It's called Invasion U.S.A, and based on his description and the pictures shown below, I'm definitely interest!
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A-Bombs dropping like rain . . .

World War II ended in 1945 and Johnny came marching home from war . . . and America began a period of prosperity and the great Baby-Boom generation was being conceived every day.

In 1952, when this movie was filmed, I was one of those baby-boomers, born just a few months before. Our World War II ally, Russia, formed the Communist Soviet Union and became an enemy of England, France, and particularly the United States. The Soviet Union had discovered the Atom Bomb and we were convinced that our ultimate doom was only minutes away.

This cold war atmosphere continued well into the 1960's and I have sharp memories of Wednesday nights at 9pm and my intense fear of the Russians.

Papa was a preacher and in 1960 he was preaching in Meadville, Pennsylvania. In that town the Civil Defense network would test the town's air raid sirens every Wednesday at 9pm. Many times I would have just gone to bed, and as I lay trying to fall asleep the air raid sirens would wail in the night.

Although I had been told many times that it was just a test, only a test . . . even at that young age my mind thought that it would be just like those dastardly Commies to attack Meadville on Wednesday Night at 9pm . . . just to take advantage of that timing. My next breath as a nine year old might well be my last breath.

Well, in this 1952 tale of Communist Attack on the United States, the premise is just that . . . Americans have become fat and lazy and look for profits and wealth instead of staying well-armed for war. Factories are making tractors instead of tanks, and that is a very dangerous thing.

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As a handful of people drinking in a bar next to Rockefeller Plaza watch, the television screen comes alive with special bulletins about planes flying from Russia to Alaska and down the west coast, dropping A-bombs and destroying Seattle, San Francisco, and all the military bases in between.

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Enemy troops in U.S. uniforms surround Washington D.C. and the Capitol building and all of the Senators and Congressmen inside.

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Of course, we also have A-bombs and we send a flock of jets to Russia to drop bigger and better A-bombs on the Ruskies, but the enemy attacks continue unabated.

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Finally, New York City is hit with A-bombs and two of our main characters are clinging to life in the rubble outside the bar, and it appears that the end of the world as we know it is at hand.

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I've gotta tell you that if I had seen this movie when I was a young pre-teen I would have been scared out of my skin. How can a movie like this end? How much death and destruction can we watch and still leave the theater with a clear head?

Pop a big bowl of white kernel popcorn with plenty of warm melted butter drizzled over it and find out.[/size]

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

[orzel-w]

[Bud Brewster]

Why you commie pink-o sympathizer! Don't you know that the Reds are just waiting for America to relax so they can annihilate us! All that stuff about the fall of the Soviet Union is just part of their clever plot to lull us into a false sense of security!

I think what we need to do is build farm tractors that miraculously transform into . . . well, Transformers.

Then let those damn commies just try to attack us! The American Farm Army will teach them a new meaning for the term Grim Reaper.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Robert (Butch) Day]

I can't find the picture, but shouldn't that harvester look more like the 'Martian Modified Harvester' in Spaced Invaders?
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[Bud Brewster]

It looks like an innocuous piece farm equipment until the Russians show and want to crash the hoedown with their sneak attack.

When that happens, Old McDonald just presses a button and this American-made combine harvester goes completely U.S. Postal on those commie bastards!

In other words it goes from tractor to this.


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

[Eadie]