This Island Earth

Last Exeter 
To Metaluna

This Island Earth
Directed by Joseph M. Newman
USA 1955
Universal Blu Ray Zone B

Warning: Very minor spoilers.

It’s nice revisiting old movies you haven’t seen for a while and especially interesting when, as in the case of this absolute science fiction classic, This Island Earth, you have somehow wiped out most of the movie (apart from the last ten minutes), from your memory. So much here is not as I remember it but, of course, it has some iconic moments in it, largely due to the make up worn by Jeff Morrow as Metalunan scientist Exeter and also, naturally, one of the most recognised screen monsters of all time, the single (I remember a whole army of them from when I was a kid, the mind plays strange tricks), solitary Metalunan mutant. Even if people don’t, for whatever reason, remember the picture, everyone surely recognises the monster. It’s also guest starred in a cameo or two over the years and I’ve even seen it being used to sell whisky back in the 1980s, if memory serves. 

The plot is very simple... a scientist, Dr. Cal Meacham (played by Universal regular Rex Reason), after being rescued from a failed test flight by an unseen alien force, finds some ‘electrical components’  have been sent to his laboratory. Components he’s never seen which, eventually, lead him to construct an otherwordly technical gadget called an interocitor. Then, an alien called Exeter (played by Morrow), tells him he has passed his intelligence test and recruits him to join his scientific commune, some hundreds of miles away. He does so and he, and two other scientists, including his eventual love interest Dr. Ruth Adams (played by Faith Domergue), suspect there is a less benign agenda to their goal of manufacturing unlimited reserves of atomic power. 

Without going into much more of the plot, this leads Cal and Ruth to being the only two surviving scientists left, who are whisked away to the planet of Metaluna in a fruitless attempt to save Exeter’s race from being exterminated in an interplanetary war. It’s not long, however, before Exeter is the last survivor of his race, desperately trying to get Cal and Ruth back to Earth while keeping out of the pincer like claws of the Metalunan mutant that has stowed away on their space craft. 

So, yeah, it sounds fascinating and it is... it’s also a little dull in places too, it has to be said. The chemistry between some of the actors doesn’t seem all that great, truth be told but, what it lacks in emotional drama it certainly makes up for in all the other technical departments. It’s quite spectacular to look at, not only for it’s sophisticated special effects (for the time) but also in some nice clean, simply constructed shot designs, good editing and sound and, of course, the hotch potch soundtrack, half composed as an original score by Herman Stein and half recycled Universal sci-fi horror scores by the likes of Hans J. Salter and Henry Mancini (there’s an absolutely beautiful, authentic, modern re-recording of the score on David Schecter’s label Monstrous Movie Music which is well worth having. Schecter is also included on a commentary track and making of documentary on this wonderful Blu Ray transfer). 

I’ve not read Raymond F. Jones original omnibus novel version of his three serialised stories which make up the story This Island Earth (yet, it’s now on my radar) but the classic Metalunan mutant, who chases Faith Domergue around the flying saucer while she’s waiting for the men folk to be released from their decompression tubes, in a sequence which was absolutely the epitome of suspense to me as a kid in the 1970s (nowadays, perhaps less so) was actually designed, as is my understanding, not by the credited Bud Westmore (I don’t trust that name when I see it on credits at all) but by the lady he got fired for being a much better designer than him years earlier, Millicent Patrick. I think she pretty much designed a prototype of this (if memory serves and, see the fantastic book The Lady From The Black Lagoon, reviewed by me here) before she started working on her similarly iconic design of the Creature From The Black Lagoon (reviewed here). Either way it’s a classic monster and always fun to see around. 

There are some other interesting things to note... 

The enemy ships are also unusual in that the way they try and destroy the Metalunan saucers and, indeed, the planet itself, is by picking up and then hurling asteroids, more or less. And the mechanism used for the beautiful glass version of the Universal picture logo at the time became the mechanism for the spinning, atomic symboled Metalunan control machine on the saucer. And, of course, the interocitor can destroy things by triangulating three laser beams... surely an influence on George Lucas’ vision of the laser cannon on the Death Star in his Star Wars films.

All in all, This Island Earth is... in some ways a bit clunky and, I honestly can’t see it going down well with kids today. People who are slightly older, however, should enjoy this relatively fun romp and the Blu Ray version has an absolutely beautiful transfer of a mostly untroubled print. Definitely worth some of your time if you are a lover of 1950s sci-fi movies and the Blu Ray even includes a reminiscence about the film by Italian writer/director Luigi Cozzi (who directed such movies as Star Crash and Contamination). Definitely worth picking up on Blu Ray if you get the chance. 

Universal Terrors 1951-1955

Terror Forming

Universal Terrors 1951-1955
By Tom Weaver with David Schecter,
Robert J. Kiss and Steve Kronenberg
McFarland Books
ISBN 9780786436149

A quick shout out to a great book which is actually so dense in content and information that, with my lack of amount of free time these days, it took me a fair amount of time to read and absorb. Subtitled Eight Classic Horror and Sci-Fi Films, Tom Weaver’s Universal Terrors 1951 - 1955 is an exhaustive tome written by the same team (with one addition) behind The Creature Chronicles (reviewed by me here).

This one is pretty much a ‘making of’ style book about the production (plus pre and post) and making of eight specific movies, most of which I knew fairly well. These include three which I wouldn’t necessarily myself had counted as being typical of the films Universal were churning out to their horror fan base in the 50s... those being The Strange Door, The Black Castle and Cult Of The Cobra. The other five are all ones which I would instantly associate with that decade’s predilection for atomic aged monsters... either rediscovered, mutated or out of this world... namely It Came From Outer Space, Creature From The Black Lagoon, This Island Earth, Revenge Of The Creature and Tarantula.

The lion’s share of the volume is written by Weaver with his usual doses of humourous writing and the occasional judgemental eye at the behaviour and credibility of cast and crew, many of whom he has interviewed in his many years over his career as a film historian specialising in such B-movie gems... for instance, you can tell how he feels about director Jack Arnold and the stories he’d spun throughout his life (and perhaps he’s right to make that judgement call). Other writers also have their own specialist sections within the chapters, with the layout of the book being an introduction (including a great, hand drawn map of the Universal International front lot at the time) followed by eight big chapters with sub sections by Weaver, followed by the great David Schecter (who I have a lot of respect for in his coverage of the music, considering how many of those film scores he’s rerecorded and raised from the dead on his CD label Monstorus Movie Music), Robert J. Kiss and Steve Kronenberg.

Each chapter is split into sections being Full Credit Information, then Weaver’s big chunks following Production History, which includes sub sections on Synopsis, Cast Biographies, Production and Marginalia (with some wonderful doses of interesting trivia)... before going onto the other writers’ sections exploring The Release (including Critics Corner which quotes various quotes from reviews from the films’ initial releases), The Music Score (very detailed breakdowns including many notes on who wrote what and which bits were tracked in from other identified movies) and a final Analysis section.

And, yeah, it’s pretty thorough. If you want a blow by blow account of which actor or stuntman ‘so and so’ were doing on 3pm on a given day on the shoot, if that was of any interest... you are going to find it all in here. It gets very interesting when the notes from the day’s shooting doesn’t correspond to how people later remembered things from that day.

Among many nuggets which I learned for the first time (except from the two chapters on Creature From The Black Lagoon and Revenge Of The Creature, which are cut down versions of the chapters in the book on the trilogy of movies covered in the aforementioned The Creature Chronicles) are such gems as the fact that long standing Robin Hood actor Richard Greene was actually the grandson of motion picture pioneer William Friese-Greene. Or that Charles Drake (no, not Charlie) was sometimes a drunken mess and once assaulted an actress outside her home for publicity. And I also didn’t know that Jeff Morrow went on to become the face of Suntory Whisky in Japan for a while (just like director Akira Kurosawa was and, fictionally, Bill Murray’s character was in Lost In Translation... from what I remember). There’s also some criticism thrown into the mix on the extent of Ray Bradbury’s involvement on the screenplay for It Came From Out Of Space.

And, like I said, a short review and that’s all I’m going to say about Universal Terrors 1951 - 1955 other than to say that, if you were a ‘monster kid’ as many Americans are fond of labelling a certain kind of horror movie enthusiast (as I guess I was, to the extent that you could be in the UK) then you are probably going to love this book and should maybe try and grab a copy. It’s a long read with many facts and figures (and previously rarely seen photos from the productions) plus it’s entertainingly written and certainly an enlightening experience, for sure. Definitely worth the price of admission.

The Creature Walks Among Us

Gone Gill

The Creature
Walks Among Us
USA 1956 Directed by John Sherwood
Universal Blu Ray Zone A

John Sherwood directed the third and final of the Creature From The Black Lagoon trilogy. He would go on to shoot a much more interesting monster B-movie the following year, The Monolith Monsters but I have to say that, after the amazing first film in the Creature franchise (reviewed here) and the not so terrible follow up called Revenge Of The Creature (admittedly an aquatic retread of King Kong in a way, reviewed by me here), The Creature Walks Among Us is a pretty terrible movie and a terrible swan song for the creature who has not, to date, made a reappearance other than in a guest spot on the old Abbott And Costello TV show... despite his iconic status as one of the ‘big five’ classic Universal monsters.

There have actually been a few attempts to resurrect the character over the years, including the original script that eventually metamorphosised into the second of the Jaws sequels, Jaws 3D. Alas, the closest thing we’ve had is Guillermo del Toro's wonderful homage to the character, The Shape Of Water (reviewed here) but... well, lets just say that there seems to be an attempt to develop a new Creature movie every decade or so and I keep my finger crossed that, some day, the Gill Man will swim and claw his way back to the silver screen.

However, at time of writing, this is the last of the official Gill Man movies and, like I said, it’s a shame that it turned out the way it did.

The film stars two B-movie sci-fi names of note playing the two genetics professors of the film, Dr. Thomas Morgan played by Rex Reason and Dr. William Barton played by Jeff Morrow. Barton finances a mission to capture the creature for his own twisted purposes and he takes an expedition through Florida, where the creature was last seen at the end of Revenge Of The Creature. However, Barton is a troubled fellow. Not only does he want to use the Gill Man to experiment on in an attempt to mutate mankind into creatures that don’t have to rely on oxygen to breathe so they can go into space (if I’m understanding this movie properly) but also he has a lot of problems with his wife, Marcia, played by female lead Leigh Snowden. In fact she is caught between having feelings for Dr. Morgan and also being constantly hassled for sexual attention by one of the other members of Barton’s team. This causes friction and jealousy galore until Barton murders a guy for his unwanted attention but... I’m getting ahead of myself.

Anyway, in the struggle to capture the Gill Man, it ends up accidentally dousing itself in paraffin and when Barton throws a flaming lamp at it, it goes up like a torch. They take it back to the ship but it’s outer skin has burned off and they have to perform surgery to get the creature’s auxiliary lungs, which can breathe air, to take over from its gills, which are now gone. He is then taken away to Barton’s compound, now unable to breathe the water without dying and as fodder for experimental research.

Alas, the big problem with this film is not its story, at least they were trying something different, it’s the fact that the creature of the title, without its regular visage designed by Millicent Patrick that audiences had grown to love, looks pretty rubbish in comparison to it’s original, beautiful look. It looks ugly and I’d take a bet and say that I reckon the costume design on this version is probably closer to one of the rejected concepts for the first movie. Either way, it’s like promising the audience a Superman movie, taking him away after a half an hour and then replacing him with some other guy in a dodgy cape. It doesn’t really work and, although I love the idea that he wears clothes in this... when the scientists realise his overly sensitive, evolving to human skin needs protection... it would have been great to see the original Gill Man walking around like this... not some ‘creature wannabe’ stand in. I mean, the make up isn’t terrible and certainly you still feel a lot of compassion for the creature, who is actually shown to be non-violent to those not threatening him... but I’m sure, like me, most people miss the original version of the monster after his few quick scenes in this film, before the fiery accident.

The film is put together well, the acting is good and Jeff Morrow makes for a genuinely unsympathetic character who wants to control his uninterested wife... he even plays him very well in a scene where he gets a little tipsy. However, he’s definitely the ‘human villain’ of the piece and, when he murders an ‘admirer’ of his wife and tries to put the body in the creature’s cage (the creature witnesses the murder) in order to blame the death on the titular beast... I’m sure most people feel no regret when the gill man breaks out and gives Barton his deadly ‘just dessert’.

The music in this is interesting. There’s definitely some re-use from the previous films and the uncredited team of Irvin Girtz, Henry Mancini and Heinz Roemheld have a good musical presence but, I’m pretty sure there’s at least a cue or two which have been changed and re-recorded for this film because one of them has what sounds like a slow tempo, slightly more sinister version of the famous three note Creature statement as part of its musical DNA. So, I reckon somebody was actually properly working on the music for this sequel rather than the studio just retracking the music for the entire thing. And, yes, that bass line reminiscent of what would later be associated with John Williams' famous Jaws theme is again prevalent in this one.

Other than all that though, I don’t really have a whole lot else to say about The Creature Walks Among Us. It’s certainly quite watchable but I still feel the pain of that original creature costume being absent from a lot of the running time. It certainly gives what seems like a definitive ending to the three films, with the creature wandering back to the sea where he will presumably drown... and that’s certainly a moving moment at the end. It’s just not a direction I would have liked the writers to go in and I think the fact that this was the last one in the series probably means I’m not the only one who felt like that. If you are into the title character then, of course, it’s a ‘must watch’ movie but, as a 1950s B-movie horror picture... well it’s interesting in the direction it goes but far from essential. It just doesn’t live up to the promise of the previous two pictures, I’m afraid.