When it comes to old movies, everybody has his favorites. For some reason, the ones that most impressed me were the science fiction (SF) films of the fifties, possibly because that’s the era when my own conscious perceptions of the world began to come into focus.

I was too young to see these movies on their initial release; I first saw them when the studios re-issued them in the late fifties and early sixties. Even at that relatively late date they still managed to scare the bejabbers out of this jaded nine-year-old.

Viewing these films now after nearly half a century gives a warm, nostalgic glow—but I can remember sliding down in my seat in the darkened theater and trying to hide behind the person in front of me when certain scenes appeared on the screen. My patient mother, calmly and noiselessly, would wrap her protective arm around me and gradually coax me back up when the scary moments had passed.

Here are four movies that still remind me of that time, along with unsystematic, ungrammatical, highly subjective, but mercifully brief commentary:

~When Worlds Collide (1951)
Richard Derr, Barbara Rush, Peter Hansen, John Hoyt, Hayden Rorke, Frank Cady
C-83 mins.

That sleek rocket ship—although a table-top model, somehow you still believe in it (at least if you’re under ten years of age) … The blood-red sky as the star approaches on its collision course with Earth … Years before Peter Sellers did it, a paraplegic in a wheelchair discovers that he can walk … A memorable moment when a character lights his cigarette with folding money … This same character (Richard Derr) undergoes a transformation from self-absorbed playboy to someone willing to sacrifice himself for others … A really suspenseful scene with a helicopter carrying supplies for survivors of the first pass by the star—the pilot leaves Derr stranded on a rooftop of a floating house because they’re both rivals for the same girl and flies off … Based on a book by Philip Wylie and Edwin Balmer … Producer George Pal was known for his kind and gentle nature, but he sure loved to destroy things, at least on film (see also The War of the Worlds, below).

~The Thing (from Another World) (1951)
Margaret Sheridan, Kenneth Tobey, Douglas Spencer, Robert Cornthwaite, Paul Frees, Dewey Martin, James Arness
BW-81 or 87 mins.

"An intellectual carrot—the mind boggles!"
——-
"Twenty thousand tons of steel is an awful lot of metal for an airplane."
"It is for the sort of airplane we know, Captain."
——-
"Pretty spry for a guy with twelve dogs on him."
"… and losing an arm."

This film (like Them!, below) proves that less can be more: The monster (played by a chagrined James Arness) is briefly glimpsed during the first two thirds of the movie, often through gauze filters; only at the end is he a fully realized threat … Unlike most fifties monster flicks, The Thing is shown here to be intelligent … Two particulary memorable moments: In the greenhouse, one scientist (Robert Cornthwaite) opens up a storage bin, which unexpectedly flies open accompanied by one of the most effective musical knife chords ever put on a sound track (I’ve seen this film possibly a dozen times, yet I still jump). The other moment is when the Air Force captain (Kenneth Tobey) opens a door only to come face-to-face with the monster, which takes a back-handed swipe at trying to decapitate him; the captain slams the door on its arm, but the creature jerks it back, spraying bits of the door and its own hand at the camera … This film was loosely based on John W. Campbell’s 1938 novella, "Who Goes There?", which is available on-line … Remade in 1982 by John Carpenter, whose version, while closer to Campbell’s story, isn’t nearly as much fun, being too serious and populated by unappealing characters … Douglas Spencer, as Scotty the veteran newspaperman who’s always trying to get a photo of the creature, has the memorable last line: "Watch the skies, everywhere! Keep looking. Keep watching the skies!"

~The War of the Worlds (1953)
Gene Barry, Ann Robinson, Les Tremayne, Robert Cornthwaite, Lewis Martin, Paul Frees, Henry Brandon
C-85 mins.
(In France: La Guerre des Mondes; in Spain: La Guerra de los Mundos; in Germany: Der Krieg der Welten; in Brooklyn: Da Wah of Dah Woilds.)

"According to intelligence from other nations, they’re working toward some kind of plan. Now, what it may be isn’t clear yet, simply because once they begin to move, no more news comes out of that area."
——-
"They seem to murder anything that moves."
"If they’re mortal, they must have mortal weaknesses. They’ll be stopped, somehow."
——-
"Don’t mess around with something when you don’t know what it is."
——-
"We were all praying for a miracle."

This one definitely had me under the seat: noisy, vivid, frightening—the screaming soldier set on fire by a heat ray, the Marine colonel cooked to death by a skeleton ray (with his own skeleton glowing green), Ann Robinson’s piercing scream when her uncle (a clergyman) is burned down by the Martians, the chilling moment when one of the invaders places its tentacles on her shoulder wanting to know the way to San Jose, the crazed crowds of people fighting for worthless trinkets in a nearly abandoned Los Angeles (with Ned Glass, clutching his few belongings, telling Gene Barry: "You can’t buy a ride for love or money!"), and a nice two-second insert shot of a tabby cat’s fear and disgust at these humans’ insane behavior … The basic plot is rather standard: Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back—during an invasion from another planet … Kudos to Al Nozaki for designing the menacing, manta-shaped Martian war machines. Nothing like them would prowl the
streets of  L. A. until the debut of the Corvette Stingray a decade later … Based on the 1898 novel by H. G. Wells but updated to Southern California in the mid-20th century, with its technical advances (like the Flying Wing) giving at least a glimmer of hope that the Earthlings could possibly defeat this threat (unlike Wells’ Victorians) … You might wonder how the atheistical Wells (died 1946) would have reacted to the religious overtones producer George Pal introduced into his story … Notice how the characters are framed in the closing scene: Barry with Ann to his right and the minister between them, as church bells chime in the background … Remade in 2005 by Steven Spielberg … There is a website devoted to anything and everything related to The War of the Worlds.

~Them! (1954)
James Whitmore, James Arness, Edmund Gwenn, Joan Weldon, Onslow Stevens, Sean McClory
BW-94 mins.

This one heralds the perdurable message of dozens of fifties sci-fi films: With atomic energy, you don’t know what you’ll get (the Frankenstein Problem) … The movie plays out like a Dragnet episode, a smart choice when you think about it (the budget allowing for only so many giant ant props)—the first third is pure whodunit, with the deepening mystery of who is causing these seemingly unmotivated murders (including a night scene that’s straight up film noir); the second third has the perps, glanced only fleetingly, effecting a getaway (with a great scene with Fess Parker as a befuddled pilot); and the final third has the detectives tracking them down in the sewers of Los Angeles … Note the scene with James Whitmore and James Arness firing bazookas at the giant mounds—the rocket exhausts are cartoon animation effects … Less is more: The less the ants are seen, the more frightening they are in one’s imagination; the producers of the original Alien used the same approach … And there is great charm in seeing Santa Claus chasing monsters.

—Mike Gray