1958 The Space Children Trailer

                      Since I have already reviewed The Night Strangler, we will get a podcast about this fairly entertaining movie.

641. Directed by (the great) Jack Arnold - book review!

                        Jack Arnold was such a great director, and I am glad this book exists to see he gets his due.

617. Take a deep dive with an Atomic Submarine!

                        One of the movies I barely saw as a small agent, though I saw the part with the alien!

The Bamboo Saucer 1968

From Wiki- 

The Bamboo Saucer is an independently made 1968 Cold War science fiction film drama about competing American and Russian teams that discover a flying saucer in Communist China.^[1] The film was re-released in 1969 under the title Collision Course with a reduced edited runtime of 90 minutes.

This was the final film for both actors Dan Duryea and Nan Leslie. Back to me:

Calvin Monday 11-29-85

 

The Golden Age of Movie Monsters

                    

Gorgo and Reptilicus

 

Thanks to John Lemay's great zine Movie Milestones #4. I found out that Reptilicus/Reptisaurus made a "blink and you will miss it" cameo in Gorgo #12 "Monsters Rendezvous".  Poor Repti only get s  named in the last panel, despite helping Gorgo and Ogra save the planet from invading Venusians.  It's too bad they didn't have an actual team up, or do a longer story.  Gorgo and Konga both had pretty respectable runs in the comics.  Had Chartlon been more aware, they could have had some more continuing characters in all of their monster books, which would have been more fun for the reader.

This Island Earth (1955)

That is one exciting poster, huh?  Here's a movie I read so much about as a kid but never got to see.  The images of the Metaluna Mutant were everywhere, which isn't surprising since it's such a striking creation.  It was a movie I always wanted to see but it never aired in my area.  I'm thinking I'd like it a lot more than I do now had I seen it back then, but only if I saw it before the superior Forbidden Planet, since it still falls short of that wonderful movie (which I did see several times growing up).  While watching this on Svengoolie I was thinking of why I didn't quite care so much for it like I should.

This Island Earth trailer

Here's the trailer.  This is on Svengoolie tonight,  and I haven't watched it in several years.  I'm not a huge fan of the movie, though I kinda think I should like it more than I do. It's got all the right stuff. Perhaps if I had seen it as a kid?

Warning from Space (1956)

I'll admit I have a soft spot in my heart for this nifty little Japanese movie.  I saw it a few times growing up and it was a cool idea with benevolent aliens out to help humankind endure a runaway planet, very similar to When Worlds Collide and later Gorath.  Good ol' Channel 2 was the station, of course, that showed it.  It's not the most exciting of Japanese sci fi flicks, but like Varan I enjoy it for what it is.  The Paira Seijin are nifty looking, if pretty basic costumes (could be a fun Hallowe'en dressed as one of them.

Ultra Seven vs a Face Hugger

 Tell me that alien doesn't look like one of the "facehuggers" from the Alien franchise of movies.  This is from the fifth episode of Ultra Seven called "The Lost Hours" (or "The Stolen Hours") and it was the first episode of this excellent show I ever saw.  I got it on a VHS tape that had a variety of several other Ultra shows on it.  It wasn't subbed and it's not one of the more exciting episodes that way, but seeing it with subs is pretty cool.  I thought even in 1989 that the Villa aliens looked like the early stage Alien creatures, but trying to get the tape cued up to the right spot could be a pain back then.

Earth vs. the Flying Saucers

Almost forgot to put a Harryhausen movie in here, and since I've never shown this trailer before, here it is! It's a good trailer, but the movie doesn't quite live up to the premise. To be fair, that is a daunting task and the movie is good enough to forgive the trailer's hyperbole.

It Came From Outer Space

I thought that was Rod Serling at the beginning of this trailer. It's such a great movie, and I've written about it in here before. It aired a lot in my area, and it took more than one viewing to figure the movie out. Count me as one of the fans of the xenomorphs. I would have been very disappointed if I had not see it.

Invisible Invaders

Here's a movie I'd never seen until TNT showed it in the mid-90s. I enjoyed it for what it was, but I was also struck at how the invaders possessed the bodies of the recently dead, and how much they looked the the ghouls in Night of the Living Dead. Granted, that was probably because the budget of this feature didn't allow for any elaborate makeup, but it sure looks like it was an influence.

Phantom From Space (1953)

I saw this movie for the first in the early 90s, back on TNT's fun MonsterVision show.  I'll only bemoan the station TNT has turned into now once, as it's nowhere near as much fun as the station it used to be.   I liked it for what it was back then, which is a low budget B picture.  I hadn't seen it in several years.

Joe Dante on IT CONQUERED THE WORLD

this is a fun site, and here's a clip why. Joe Dante speaks on why he enjoys IT CONQUERED THE WORLD, as well he should. I agree with just about every one of his points, including the awful remake. bet they'd call it a reboot now. I'm kind of surprised I've never featured the actual trailer on this blog. I'll have to keep that in mind.

Invisible Invaders (1959)

remember when TNT was fun and used to show cool movies and tv shows? 100% Weird aired many movies I'd never seen before, and this was one of them. I remember it being a neat little yarn about aliens possessing the recently dead so they can take over the Earth. anyone watching the movie will notice similarities to a few other movies that were released later.

Kronos (1957)

this is a good movie- it was made fun of a lot back in the 70s in various monster mags and books, but it's got a higher reputation when seen in it's proper scope. the "monster" is quite unique, and the effects are really well done. to top it off, it's got a decent script and actors.

Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957)

perhaps some of the most iconic of 50s aliens are these Saucer Men. their pictures were always in magazines. oddly enough, it never aired in my area while I was growing up. we got the lousy remake, "Invasion of the Eye Creatures" but not the original. weird, and sad, since this is one cool little flick.

Outer Space Men 1968

never saw these at all growing up. ran a fine article about them in the last issue of Xenorama (#15) some 12 years ago. they are pretty cool looking and have an interesting history.