CREEPING HORROR... From the depths of time and space!
See - Teenagers Vs. The Saucer-Men!
See - Disembodied Hand that crawls...!
See - Night the World Nearly Ended...!
See - Earth Attacked by Flying Saucers!
Also known as
Hell Creatures,
Invasion of the Hell Creatures, and
Spacemen Saturday Night,
Invasion of the Saucer Men is a classic among classics.
As a boy, I was an absolutely
rabid monster fan. On the verge of fanatical. The books at the library about
mythical creatures and
old monster movies had few other names on the
checkout slips except mine. So, when I thumbed though the huge
black and white "
Compendium of
Sci-Fi Films (1937-1962)", I fell in
love. The
poster for
Invasion of the Saucer Men was one of the few printed in full color in the book, but it was far superior to them all. It had everything:
Bug-eyed aliens with giant heads,
UFOs blasting a burning city with
death rays, crowds fleeing in
terror, and a damsel in full
distress, clutched in
slimy green alien hands. I could imagine no better
scene.
Flash forward to the days of
video rental and internet shopping. I buy
Invasion on
VHS and unwrap it like a drug fiend clawing at a
pound of coke when it arrives. What I got was far more entertaining than I expected.
Director
Edward L. Cahn, like most of his contemporaries in 1957, knew that his target audience was
teenagers, primarily those that frequented
drive-in theaters. Cahn entered a market filled to the brim with
monster movies, such as the classics
20 Million Miles To Earth,
The Amazing Colossal Man,
Kronos,
The Unknown Terror,
The Curse Of Frankenstein, and
The Deadly Mantis, all released the same year. These films took themselves very seriously, using
pseudo-science and pipe-smoking scientists to
verify their horrible
plotlines. Cahn stood this concept on its
head. Forgoing the serious tone, his film
walked the line between
comedy and
horror, with amazing success. With just enough
tongue in cheek, Invasion of the Saucer Men is a classic that
jibes its genre, while still fitting in to the stereotypical
template it lightly
spoofs.
Synopsis
Welcome to
Hicksburg. Even the
announcer pauses to say "Yes...
Hicksburg". Local
hood Joe is out cruising when he happens to see a
UFO land outside of town. He rushes back to tell his friend
Artie, passing Old Man Larkin’s Farm. Meanwhile, teenage lovers flock to a
pasture behind Old Man Larkin's
farm, the local
Lover's Lane, for a little private time. Johnny and Joan, a young couple returning from their night of fun, sneak away from the farm in the dark, only to find themselves in the middle of a nightmare:
Alien Invasion! Johnny, driving without headlights,
runs over with he first fears is a
child. The small
green monster that they find stuck in the bumper
freaks the young couple out, to put it mildly. They make a run to Old Man Larkin’s to call the
authorities, but nobody listens to
teenagers. These are the 1950s after all. The kids decide to go back into town to show the cops the
smashed-up bumper as proof of their accident. But, wouldn't you know it, the alien isn't really dead. His
severed hand, complete with
eyeball and retractable finger
needles, pops the tires on the car and runs off in the night to raise the alarm to the
invaders. They return in short order to
hammer in the front to Johnny’s car. Why? Well, it seems they have also killed
Joe, by injecting him with
alcohol from their needle fingers. So, add a dead
drunk, a big
dent and two teenagers out late at
night.
Bingo. Those monster brains aren't just for looks, kids. The
frame job goes off without a hitch and Johnny and Joan are off to the
police station. On a side note, the part of Joe the corpse was skillfully played by
Frank Gorshin, better known as
the Riddler on the campy
Adam West Batman television series.
The film continues on this track, with Johnny and Joan, along with Joe's roommate
Artie, trying desperately to prove to the
authorities that the aliens are
real, and meeting
defeat at every turn. The teens meet up with the
Army, who are covering up the
invasion, and they grow desperate to gain some
proof. They amass a small
army of young lover's from the farm and confront the invaders with the
headlights of their cars, which prove surprisingly
effective. Add in a
drunken bull and some running
3-foot tall rubber-headed monsters and you have a classic that plays it
straight faced to the end, with
glorious results.
Based on the short story "
The Cosmic Frame" by Paul W. Fairman, Robert J. Gurney Jr and Al Martin packed the screenplay for this film to the
hilt with the hallmarks of 1950s monster movies. Blatant
sexism, grotesque monsters as a stand in for
godless communists, dated vernacular, and mind-numbing
stupidity on the part of adults, who religiously defy believing anything some
punk teenagers tell them: its all there. The key difference between Invasion and its contemporaries is that the writers did not travel the same road of
ultra-seriousness, and as such, they created a classic
semi-spoof that shows a
wit seldomly attributed to the
genre.
There was also a terrible remake,
The Eye Creatures (1965). I continue to
hunt for it.
Cast overview:
Steven Terrell as Johnny Carter
Gloria Castillo as Joan Hayden
Frank Gorshin as Joe Gruen
Raymond Hatton as Farmer Larkin
Lyn Osborn as Artie Burns
Russ Bender as
Doctor
Douglas Henderson as Lt. Wilkins,
USAF
Sam Buffington as Col. Armrouge,
USAF
Jason Johnson as Hicksburg
Chief of Police
Don Shelton as
City Attorney Hayden
Runtime
69 minutes
Resources:
IMDB entry
Rotten Tomatoes Review
Compedium of Sci-Fi Films (1937-1962)
My own personal review