It Came from Outer Space (1953)

Film: It Came From Outer Space (1953)
Stars: Richard Carlson, Barbara Rush, Charles Drake, Joe Sawyer, Russell Johnson
Director: Jack Arnold
Oscar History: Weirdly enough, while it didn't win any Oscar nominations, the film did score Barbara Rush a Golden Globe for Best Newcomer.  Rush would become more well-known to audiences for her TV work in soaps like Peyton Place and All My Children, and we discussed her cinematic work more extensively here.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

If you're hearing this title and thinking "where do I know that from?" I will not keep you in suspense. I have loved doing this marathon even if I didn't have time to get to as many pictures as I had hoped (we still have a few more before it closes down on Thursday, though), and have been brainstorming ideas for a future, similar series, and think perhaps seeing every movie referenced in the opening number of The Rocky Horror Picture Show's "Science Fiction Double Feature" might be a cool idea to try at some point (I have always meant to go to a midnight screening of that movie, and this would give me a perfect way to do it since it's at the end of each month in my area).  Cause "then at a deadly pace, it came from outer space" is of course one of the key lyrics in that song, and this is the film that originated the lyrics.  This was also Universal's first foray into the brief 3-D fad that stormed cinema houses in the mid-1950's, and is our first look at not a classic horror monster or motif, but instead at creatures from another world storming our shores.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film centers around a small desert town in Arizona where we meet amateur astronomer John (Carlson), who is romancing the beautiful local schoolteacher Ellen (Rush).  They see what they assume to be a meteor land in the middle of the desert, but when they go investigate with a friend, John sees that it is in fact an alien ship that has crashed.  An avalanche covers the crater it's created, leaving him without proof.  However, several of the aliens have escaped, and have the ability to mimic the townspeople in appearance, though not in vocal cadence.  As the town becomes restless, turning into an angry mob, John tries to understand the aliens, who it turns out landed on Earth by accident, and were instead headed to a different planet.  John tries to stop a battle between the two, and largely does, with the aliens eventually leaving for that distant planet, and John proclaiming to Ellen in classic 1950's mansplaining "they'll be back."

The film is very different than the other films that we've seen.  While some of our monsters (like Frankenstein) are clearly more victim than actual monster, they're all violent and to be feared even if they aren't at fault.  Here, though, the aliens (strange, squid-like creatures in their natural form that surely would have been fun to see in actual 3-D), are genuinely nonviolent.  In fact, while two aliens perish in this movie, no human being actually dies, and barely any are even hurt other than one or two concussions.  It should be noted that the film's story was written by Sci-Fi master Ray Bradbury, who likely drove home the film's clear xenophobia metaphor, as was his wont.

Because while It Came from Outer Space is ridiculous to modern audiences, there are parts of it that are really good, mirroring in many ways a solid episode of The Twilight Zone.  Made at the height of the Cold War, these outsiders coming to America with their weapons and strange ways are not, in fact, dangerous at all but just being misunderstood.  This was a pretty profound concept to be spouting in the era of Joe McCarthy, and a lot more nuanced than you'd see in even mainstream cinema from the era much less a B-Movie.  The film is hokey, but it's genuinely thrilling in some parts.  It also has arguably the most hilariously over-the-top sequence with Kathleen Hughes as a buxom blonde who is dating Russell Johnson's George (who knew the Professor from Gilligan's Island was once such a BAE?), but throws herself at Carlson's John with Rush's Ellen just looking on aghast...and then we never hear from her again.  Seriously-she's even in the promotion for the film, and yet she never has anything else to do with the movie.  But that hokeyness aside, this is a good movie-not a particularly noteworthy one, but a fun one to watch late at night if you want a scary movie but don't want to actually be scared.  I give it 3-stars, but know that it's more 3.5 than 3, for the record.

This Month We Are Seeing As Many Classic Horror Movies from the Pre-1970 Era as Possible.  If you want to check out some of our past reviews, here they are:

Frankenstein, The Bride of Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, Dracula, Mad Love, Son of Frankenstein, Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Mummy, Freaks, The Ghost of Frankenstein