Got People?

 

 

The best horror movies, in my opinion, are the ones that were "horror" in essence, but also involved some science-fiction aspect (or you might think of them as vice versa; "science fiction movies that had a horror aspect).  Think the Alien series as the benchmark for this idea.  The Alien franchise built on the foundation of the concept of mixing horror and science fiction, although it most definitely wasn't the first to do so.  But who among us has NEVER heard that memorable and unnerving tagline from the first movie in the saga?

"In space no one can hear you scream!"

I'm not sure where the first horror/sci-fi (as opposed to just horror, or just science fiction) story originated. Probably long before Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, although I think many scholars put that novel as the first to do so. That original novel was published long before the invention of film, of course, although many people reading this blog are probably more familiar with the plethora of films that feature Dr. Frankenstein and/or his creation than with the original novel.  

But when it comes to film versions of the blended concept of horror and science-fiction, I think that most people would probably agree that it's first heyday was in the 50's, that era when the drive-in was just as popular as the indoor theater, and many studios had at least a sideline of stuff they cranked out that was specifically geared to the drive-in crowd.

Now, not all of the movies that came out during that decade were low budget schlock that might be normally associated with the drive-in fare.  Some were actually rather well made and well-received. And many are memorable even to those people who might not normally watch such fare.  I doubt I would be mistaken if I said that at least some of you, who would naturally gravitate towards Gone with the Wind or Citizen Kane, have at least a passing knowledge of such films as Invasion of the Body Snatchers or The Thing from Another World or Them!, all of which rate highly on the Tomato Meter scale.

 

The two movies reviewed today were indeed originally paired together as a double feature. According to an article I read on Wikipedia, the studio originally planned to release them with I Married a Monster from Outer Space as the lead movie, with The Blob as the second feature. But because of circumstances  they decided that the color movie, The Blob, would be a better choice as the lead-in feature and to make I Married a Monster from Outer Space the second feature. Both were fairly well received by the public, and in retrospect, the critics deemed the second movie the better of the two.

The Blob had the better cast, whether or not it was a better movie, however, simply because it was the first feature film to star Steve McQueen (credited as "Steven" McQueen). Most of the cast of I Married a Monster from Outer Space had no real impact on the screen, either before or after this film. At least in the acting sense. Tom Tryon made a bigger impact as an author, having written two novels that were later made into films, The Other and Harvest Home (published under his full name Thomas Tryon),

 

The Blob (1958):

Two young lovers, Steve (Steven McQueen) and Janie (Aneta Corseaut) are out at a remote place, ostensibly, according to Steve's insistence, to check out shooting stars (yeah, right) when they see a meteor hit the Earth.  

 

Meanwhile, an old man, (Olin Howland) who lives in a nearby cabin has also heard the meteor and decides to investigate. (Bad idea!) What he finds is what looks like a small rock, but it cracks open and a gooey substance comes out, which immediately attaches itself to him. He runs away and into the road where Steve and Janie almost hit him. They rescue him and take him to the doctor.

 

That's Dr. Hallen (Stephen Chase), who was just about to leave his office for the night. (I guess doctors in those days were more accommodating to possible patients coming in at odd hours...) After checking out the old man, Doc tells Steve to go back up the road and see if he can find out if anybody else knows what happened. 

 

Of course, there's an obligatory confrontation with the cops. For some reason, Steve decides to take time out to race another car.  After he has a nice conversation with the cop (Earl Rowe), he convinces the guys in the other car, Tony (Robert Fields), Mooch (James Bonnett) and Al (Anthony Franke) in the other car to accompany him in his errand.  They get to the site and find the remains of the meteor.

But back at the Doc's office, things are starting to get a little weird, as that gooey substance (hereafter referred to by it's name, The Blob) has expanded as is now covering more of the old man's body. This is curious indeed, and he calls another doctor, but that doctor has gone, So he gets his nurse to come in because he is thinking he may have to amputate the arm to save the old man. The nurse, Kate (Lee Payton), ever faithful, shows up, but disaster which has only been biding it's time, strikes, and not only is the old man subsumed by The Blob, but so are Doc and Kate. Part of the attack on Doc is witnessed by Steve through a window.

 

 

The kids try to tell the police about what Steve saw at the Doc's office, and despite the fact that the police think it's all hooey, two of them go to the Doc's office, but neither the Doc, nor his nurse, nor even The Blob are there, so of course they think it's all a prank.  This despite the fact that both Steve's and Janie's fathers show up and tell the police that pranks aren't a part of their kids' repertoire. 

Both Steve and Janie sneak out of their respective houses and gather a few friends to try to warn the town, but nobody believes them.  When Steve and Janie realize that Steve's father's grocery store is still open they investigate and are trapped by The Blob. They hide in the freezer.  The Blob tries to get at them, but retreats from the cold. The kids do everything they can to call attention to the threat, including setting off the town's air raid siren and going to the center of town and blowing their car horns.

Meanwhile back at the theater, The Blob has come and is munching on the smorgasbord of people.  The theater evacuates in a panic and the police show up.  

 

The police finally see The Blob and realize that Steve was telling the truth.  Their plan to electrocute The Blob proves fruitless, however. But then Steve remembers what happened in the freezer and realizes The Blob doesn't like it cold. So now it's just a matter of trying to isolate The Blob by freezing it. 

It was a great plan by The Blob and it would have worked... if it hadn't been for those meddling kids... and they did it without the help of a talking Great Dane...

Much like the end of The Thing from Another World, the movie ends with a classic ending...

 

One question that occurs to some who watch this movie is: Is The Blob a metaphor for the Red Menace (the fear that the Russians might be infiltrating American society and assimilating them?  I guess you COULD make a case for that, since The Blob is RED., and it does assimilate the people in it's own world, so to speak. AI says that it can be construed as such, but I couldn't find anything that stated that was the makers' intentions. 

The Blob was filmed in the Philadelphia area.   One neat little tidbit: the theater where the theater invasion scene was filmed is a real theater, The Colonial, that still exists today in a town called Phoenixville. Since 2000, the town has had an annual Blobfest, events include recreating the mob scene evacuation of the theater, and the screening of the original movie. (Google "Blobfest". There is a current upcoming one as of this writing,)

According to what I read, McQueen was not a big fan of the movie.  But it was popular enough to make a decent profit ($4 million against a production cost of only about $100 thousand).  Is The Blob a good movie?  I say yes. 

It had a sequel (just to prove that ? at the end of the first film wasn't just a tease, I guess).  It was directed by Larry "J. R. Ewing" Hagman, and had the frozen creature unearthed in the Arctic and brought back to a warmer climate. Not as good as the first, by any shot, but... Warning! Don't bother with the remake from the 80's.  It stars Kevin Dillon who, although I don't dislike him, as an actor he leaves a lot to be desired...

I Married A Monster From Outer Space (1958):

Bill (Tom Tryon) and several friends are at a bachelor party for Bill, who is the bachelor in question. Bill leaves early to go home, having had a few drinks.  On the way he sees a body in the road.  When he gets out to investigate, the body is gone.  It turns out to be a ruse to get him to stop, and an alien appears.  In short order his body is encompassed by a fog. (Gotta love these 50's sci-fi movies. It only takes 4 minutes of running time to get to the point.)

 

Segue to the wedding where the bride-to-be, Marge (Gloria Talbott) is getting a little flustered because her enamorata is late to his own wedding.  

 

She just got married, but already there is a problem, because Bill snaps at her when she points out that he is driving without headlights at night. Odd things continue to happen that don't seem right with Bill.  Such as his confusion when he hears thunder in the distance and asks what it is.

Of course, we as the audience are privy right away.  Barely ten minutes into the movie lightning flashes across Bill's face, revealing that it is not Bill, but an alien in disguise (thus from here on out I will refer to the alien as "Bill", since it is obvious that an alien has taken over Bill's place).

 

Flash forward a year.  Marge is beginning to feel that "Bill" is not the same man she fell in love with, although she isn't quite sure why, and even some of his friends notice the change in their buddy. At a bar two of them discuss the change in their friend.  Pretty much plastered one of them leaves and encounters another alien with a fog machine. (Seems to be a pattern.  Message clear: Don't get drunk... you'll be assimilated by aliens...)

Marge buys a dog as a surprise for "Bill", but the dog obviously doesn't like "Bill", or maybe it's just the the dog doesn't like aliens. Not too much later "Bill" kills the dog, and makes himself the enemy of every member of the film audience, even if he hasn't made an enemy of Marge yet. Marge tries to approach "Bill' about the fact that she had been to the doctor and the doctor had informed her that there was no reason why they couldn't have babies.  But she stops short of suggesting "Bill" have himself checked out because Bill has a visitor.

It's his buddy Sam, but as it turns out Sam is not Sam, but "Sam"... Yes, that means "Sam" is another alien who has taken over a human male.  "Sam" reveals himself to "Bill" and tells him he is due to show up at headquarters, which later is revealed to be a spaceship in the woods. We don't actually find this part out until a bit later, when Marge, who is becoming increasingly suspicious about her husband follows him one night,

Before that however, we are witness to a couple more assimilations.  It appears they are only after men, however. When Marge sees an alien come out of "Bill" in the woods, quite naturally she wants to report it.  Unfortunately many men in town are no longer themselves, and the ones that still are are convinced she is overreacting to something quite normal, since during this era there have been a lot of so-called sightings of flying saucers, aliens and the like. So like, the kid in Invaders from Mars and the small town doctor in Invasion of the Body Snatchers the ones who have not been taken over by the invading aliens are not inclined to accept her story. 

Then again, maybe those we think are normal humans telling Marge she is "overreacting" have  ulterior motives...

Gradually it becomes evident that aliens have taken over nearly every man in town, and we only know how to find out which ones are aliens and which ones are still human by a few things: they don't deal well with dogs and cats, they don't drink and they don't have children with their human wives.

 

That last part is significant. Because as it turns out, the aliens have come to Earth to try to repopulate their planet because all the female aliens have died off.  (This concept would be revisited several times in coming years with movies like Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster and Mars Needs Women, both of which featured Martians seeking women of Earth to take to the home world because the female population has died off. {coming to The Midnite Drive-In some time soon...}).

The aliens are having a bit of trouble figuring out how to use their female companions to repopulate their species however, which is why "Bill" has been unable to get Marge pregnant. (Have to admit I kind of thought up to this point that the problem was they hadn't figured out yet how the process works...)

But before she learns all that, Marge is still trying to get help through regular means.  But the phone lines are down to Washington D.C.... and the telegram she tries to send to the F.B.I. is torn up by the alien posing as the telegraph operator... and the bridge out of town is washed out... It seems that Marge is pure out of luck.

 

But there is hope in how to find unassimilated men because the men who aren't alien have been able to father children. Marge gets to one of them, the town gynecologist, and convinces him of her story.  And he gathers some real human men to lead an attack on the ship.  Finally the aliens are defeated, but not by the men.  The real heroes are a pair of German Shepherds that one of the guys has brought along.  And just before the last of them die, one alien radios the rest of the aliens on the planet that their plans have been foiled.

 

I think that I Married a Monster from outer Space is a much more intense film.  It reminds me a lot of the previously mentioned invasion movies (Invaders... and Invasion of... from the 50's that used a subtle Red Menace.  It's a shame that Gloria Talbott never really made much of an impact in Hollywood.  I would have liked to see her down the road in other films, but she opted to retire and become a family woman by 1966.

There are no other stand out acting roles here besides her. But that doesn't detract from the well plotted film.  The film was directed by Gene Fowler, Jr. whose name might not be familiar, but he did direct another film that has been previously reviewed on The Midnite Drive-In, I Was a Teenage Werewolf, which was the first starring vehicle for one Michael Landon.

Well, folks, time to fire up the rockets and head home.  Drive safely.

Quiggy