SCIENCE FICTION CINEMA: THE 1950s: TEN NOT-SO-GOOD ONES

World without End (1956)

Female desire for male virility is the simmering, though not necessarily sniggering, subtext that propels World without End from post-apocalyptic strife toward its dream of utopian harmony. Big ideas, some cribbed from H.G. Wells, clash with the modest budget in Edward Bernds's tidy script, which limits the story's effectiveness, although filming this science-fiction adventure in Technicolor gives it visual richness. The action sequences and special effects betray the limited resources, forcing World without End to rely on exposition whose credibility ebbs and flows, but Bernds, who also directed, supplies cheesecake distraction to ease the sting of the deficiencies.

Returning from a Mars reconnaissance mission, a survey rocket malfunctions and accelerates wildly; it returns to Earth, but it deposits its crew—commander Dr. Eldon Galbraithe (Nelson Leigh), navigator Henry Jaffee (Christopher Dark), radioman Herbert Ellis (Rod Taylor), and scientist John Borden (Hugh Marlowe)—nearly six centuries into the future, on an Earth where deformed humans—"mutates"—inhabit the surface and the unscathed atomic-war survivors live in a sleek underground city. Ah, but while the men below have become weak and nearly sterile, the women have remained young and nubile, and the arrival of the four rugged astronauts—well, you can connect the dots.

Garnet (Nancy Gates), daughter of council president Timmek (Everett Glass), fancies Borden, which makes council heir apparent Mories (Booth Colman) jealous, and his mischief provides narrative catalyst; meanwhile, Ellis's shirtlessness inflames both Elaine (Shirley Patterson) and Deena (Lisa Montell), actually born a surface dweller who proves valuable at the climax. Veteran presence Marlowe steadies the performances while Taylor garners attention in a film that anticipates both 1958's Queen of Outer Space and particularly 1960's The Time Machine, which starred Taylor. Fragmented and fanciful, World without End combines culture clash and chaste prurience into a passable sci-fi distraction.

Why this film is notable: You have to admire the way World without End works in its titillating hook of leggy lovelies providing on-screen distraction: Nothing less than the fate of the post-apocalyptic human race is at stake, a crisis taken seriously by both the ruling council and the stranded astronauts—and yet the conflict boils down to the Jocks versus the Brains. And which group do you think is going to get the girls? Furthermore, writer-director Edward Bernds would revisit this theme—and the parade of beauties—two years later with Queen of Outer Space, though with less, ah, gravitas as he does here.

The Monster That Challenged the World (1957)

Whether the entire world feels challenged by The Monster That Challenged the World depends on the budget: For this earnest science-fiction thriller, that kept the danger restricted to California's Salton Sea, where giant mollusks freed by an earthquake and irradiated by the Navy's atomic experiments menace the locals and threaten to escape to greener pastures through the extensive canal system surrounding the inland sea. Not surprisingly, the creatures have a cheesy appearance both on land and under water although director Arnold Laven tries to frame the scary action for maximum impact.

To distract viewers from the middling effects, Pat Fielder's script, adapted from David Duncan's story, goes the human-interest route, proffering John Twillinger (Tim Holt) as a hard-nosed, newly-arrived Naval Intelligence officer pulled into investigating the disappearance of three Navy men during a routine parachute jump over the sea. "Twill" and crew recover two bodies along with some strange mucus that he asks Dr. Jess Rogers (Hans Conreid) to analyze. It is Rogers who pieces together the prehistoric nature of the creatures—and footage of modern mollusks he shows to illustrate their behavior is the creepiest of all the effects—while Rogers also warns of what could occur globally should the creatures escape to the ocean.

The spiel is suspect but Conreid, best known for comedic roles, is believable as the committed, competent scientist. Meanwhile, Holt, a veteran of westerns best known for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, dives in as the leading man, his Twill also managing to court young widower Gail MacKenzie (Audrey Dalton), Rogers's secretary, whose daughter Sandy (Mimi Gibson) of course meddles in things she doesn't understand. That leads to a climax that underscores the modest abilities of The Monster That Challenged the World, which nevertheless could make you reconsider pouring salt on garden slugs.

Why this film is notable: The title alone is a hoot, evoking some beastie issuing the taunt "C'mon, c'mon—put up your dukes!" as its own appendages flail menacingly. And that the "world" is in actuality a literal backwater in the California desert. Tim Holt got to star alongside Humphrey Bogart in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre a decade previously, yet here he gets to battle a giant mollusk while somehow keeping his dignity intact. Finally, the sight of Hans Conreid should cue us for laughter, but he turns out to give a credible dramatic performance.

Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958)

Regarded as one of the campiest of the 1950s science-fiction films—if not of all sci-fi films—Attack of the 50 Foot Woman is in actuality—wait for it—one of the more thoughtful examples of the genre. True, this black-and-white film does end with scenes of a half-naked 50-foot woman stomping through a California desert town. (Sadly, she never does get close to a city freeway as depicted in the iconic poster.) But apart from the lurid ending, 50 Foot Woman is really a psychological study (not atypical of 1950s cinema, either) that just happens to use sci-fi as a vehicle.

At the center of the story is Nancy Fowler (Allison Hayes), an alcoholic wife whose husband Harry (William Hudson) is a philanderer; Nancy's growing desperation with her situation drives her eventual rampage. 50 Foot Woman neatly inverts sci-fi convention: Rather than have the characters' stories be simply exposition to get to the flying saucer climax, this film uses Nancy's chance encounter with an unidentified flying object to further her emotional and psychological distress, namely, her growing exasperation at Harry's cheating, particularly with a hot young chippie (Yvette Vickers) in town. Although Nancy, who encounters a flying saucer in the desert after a fight with Harry, tries to get Harry and the police to find the saucer—and although saucer sightings worldwide are being reported on the TV news—no one seems concerned about this potential invasion. Instead, Nancy's encounter enables her to physically manifest her growing distress.

This isn't a great movie by any measure: The acting is adequate at best, and the special effects (day-for-night photography, crude superimposition, papier mache props) are strictly low-budget. But its relative psychological complexity keeps it from being truly bad, or truly camp—despite those giant images of sultry Hayes stomping by in her white bra and half-slip at the end.

Why this film is notable: Not only does Attack of the 50 Foot Woman smack of lurid exploitation, but the psycho-sexual ramifications are fascinating—what Freudian fears and desires about scorned or powerful women are unleashed by it? And although the psychological underpinning of the film may be obscured by its overall cheesiness, Allison Hayes does look pretty hot in her undies, especially when she is ten times larger than life. You can see why this one got remade.

From the Earth to the Moon (1958)

Jules Verne is the godfather of steampunk; his 19th-century science fiction stories were contemporaneous, and 20th-century cinematic interpretations such as From the Earth to the Moon retained their original settings. For Moon, that resulted in a fanciful telling of Verne's spacegoing story, loosely adapted by Robert Blees and James Leicester, complete with sumptuous Victorian rocket appointed with champagne and cigars, and looking even more resplendent in TechniColor. It is also a vehicle for Joseph Cotten, who easily assumes the center of Moon from the start and remains there to the bitter end.

In the post-Civil War United States, the rivalry between competing armaments manufacturers Victor Barbicane (Cotten) and Stuyvesant Nicholl (George Sanders) becomes intense: Barbicane has created an awesomely powerful explosive, "Power X," while Nicholl has developed a supremely strong metal. You guessed it: Irresistible force meets immovable object. Turns out that Barbicane wins, although when blown up by Power X, Nicholl's metal transforms into a still-sturdy but lightweight ceramic that Barbicane builds into a rocket to be blown into space by a super-cannon igniting Power X. With Nicholl, Barbicane enlists aide Ben Sharpe (Don Dubbins), who has caught the eye of Nicholl's daughter Virginia (Debra Paget), who stows aboard the rocket, which God-fearing Stuyvesant has sabotaged because he thinks Barbicane has been meddling in divine forces.

Treating the actual space exploration as window dressing, From the Earth to the Moon veers from costume drama to parlor melodrama although director Byron Haskin paces the narrative with sufficient care. Cotten, too, develops his Barbicane into a compelling presence; his actions are worth following even if the story and the science are hardly convincing, while Sanders is a crusty foil and Paget is decoration. An unwittingly wry retrospective take on space travel, From the Earth to the Moon looks swell even if it doesn't give Verne his full due.

Why this film is notable: Steampunk decades before it was fashionable, From the Earth to the Moon was also directed by Byron Haskin, who helmed one of the decade's premier sci-fi films, The War of the Worlds. Beyond that, it stars Joseph Cotten, who early in his career starred in several classics (Citizen Kane, Shadow of a Doubt, Gaslight, The Third Man), but perhaps his marquee turn here led to later, ah, excursions such as The Abominable Dr. Phibes (which is actually quite entertaining) and Lady Frankenstein (not so much, although it does feature Italian sexpot Rosalba Neri in the title role). Finally, "Barbicane" is a terrific name—I'm not sure whether I'm supposed to snort it or slather it on my jowls for shaving.

Queen of Outer Space (1958)

It's very easy to dismiss this low-budget sci-fi wisp as a Golden Turkey for several compelling reasons: The sets, costumes, and special effects aren't just bad—they're cribbed from other questionable movies (including the "classic" Forbidden Planet); the "name" star here is Zsa Zsa Gabor, arguably the Paris Hilton of her day (fittingly enough, one of Gabor's many marriages was to Conrad Hilton, Paris's great-grandfather); the story is as gossamer-thin as Gabor's costume; and Queen of Outer Space, seen from our time, is a male-chauvinist fantasy, filled with scantily-clad beauties swooning over average-looking men.

Yet Queen of Outer Space, despite its deficiencies—and there are many—remains an endearing and even harmless trifle, provided you put the overt sexism into its proper historical context. (At least it's filmed in color.) The story, such as it is, involves a spaceship crew that, en route to a space station, is attacked and crash-lands on Venus, inhabited solely by women, whose queen, Yllana (Laurie Mitchell), had destroyed the space station with a death ray and now wants to destroy Earth before Earth, as she believes, destroys Venus.

Yllana's face was disfigured by radiation resulting from wars waged against men from another planet, a consequence that colors her view of the stranded Earthmen. Yllana's beliefs are not unanimous, and one who opposes her is one of her court, Talleah (Gabor), who, along with her friends, helps the captured Earthmen escape; the men quickly take charge of the revolt against Yllana ("anally" spelled backwards—just sayin'), which leads to further Venusian swooning over their competence and virility. Whether or not the film is a put-on, it's all very silly yet hardly painful to watch—how could it be with a bevy of leggy lovelies parading by in their short hemlines and high heels? Or is it politically incorrect to notice?

Why this film is notable: Even though Queen of Outer Space screams "camp!" from our vantage point—and it genuinely deserves that overused term—it is hard to think that anyone took it seriously at the time it was released, particularly as it was directed by Three Stooges director Edward Bernds. And how many movies with Zsa Zsa Gabor in them can you name? Furthermore, this won't be the only time we see Laurie Mitchell's name. Finally, looking at all those vampy Venusians eases the sting of the story—and we'll see that aspect again too when we get to the films that aren't even this good.

Closing Credits

Half-baked remakes, ego-stroking male fantasy, ambivalent female psychology mushrooming out of control, menacing mollusks—this batch of 1950s sci-fi introduced a number of dubious concepts, or cheapened them through repetition, that lead us closer to those exquisitely delicious qualities of cheapness and cheesiness.

Stranger from Venus and It Came from Beneath the Sea were knockoffs of a great film and a pretty good one, respectively. And although World without End cribs from the classic sci-fi premise of The Time Machine (the novel, as the film had not yet been made), Queen of Outer Space takes World's premise and slaps together bits and pieces from other sci-fi flicks, but both ultimately rely on lissome lasses to provide the interest. Attack of the 50 Foot Woman might feature only one babe—but she's one who really, ah, grows on you. True, a title like The Monster That Challenged the World cannot help but telegraph the schlocky giant mollusk at its center; similarly, It Came from Outer Space doesn't offer much promise of anything other than a hokey creature, although Invaders from Mars provides a little-used perspective to camouflage its limitations. And while Unknown World might be hostage to its effects, it too tries to introduce some psychological complexity into its (Earth-)boring story. Finally, From the Earth to the Moon is old-school steampunk, space flight in a Victorian drawing room.

What all of these films have in common are notable deficiencies in some aspect of filmmaking, but they also have some redeeming qualities of concept, character, setting, or execution that keep them from being awful. These ten 1950s science-fiction films may be not so good, but that also means that they are not so bad. We'll leave the bad to our final batch of films. You have been warned.