BS: favorite old sci-fi movie

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: GUEST,robomatic
Date: 01 May 04 - 02:18 PM

Any of you remember the Goons? They did a wonderful radio show take-off of Quatermass, O.B.E.

Old Guard: The men from the press 're 'ere. I wouldn't let 'im in but 'e broke 'is way through by puttin' money in me 'and.


Bluebottle: I'm from the paper!
Seagoon:    Which paper do you represent?
Bluebottle: BROWN Paper!

Minnie:    Henry! This skull is ten million years old!
Henry & Min: Happy Birthday to you, happy birthday to you......

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 01 May 04 - 01:17 PM

Cluin knows what I mean, Little Hawk.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Cluin
Date: 01 May 04 - 01:17 PM

The confield line was from the Billy Mumy episode, LH.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:56 PM

Huh?

I suggested making love in a cornfield one time to my girlfriend. She didn't want to, because she was worried about "bugs". Too bad.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:51 PM

"I am going to have to put you into the cornfield."

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:49 PM

Nothing is ever the same after Shatner. I used to want to have sex with Cher for the same reason...

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Cluin
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:41 PM

I remember that one too, Martin. Twilight Zone was the perfect vehicle for Shatner's original brand of emotive over-acting. Apart from Star Trek, of course. And that Billy Mumy episode where he is the "wishing kid" still freaks me out just remembering it.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:37 PM

You are right about that Cluin.

Actually William Shattner was famous for another Twilight Zone episode beside the airplane wing/gremlin one.

He played a man who along with his wife went for a meal in a small town diner that had a coin-operated fortune teller machine on each table with a devil's head. He kept feeding it coins, asking questions, reading the perfect answers to his questions that the machine spit out, and of course, completely freaked out.

Twilight Zone was so finely written and acted by so many. Most of the stories have held up so well 40-45 years later.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Cluin
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:20 PM

One more bit of trivia, re: Quatermass. When "Quatermass and the Pit" was released in the States, it was retitled "Five Million Years to Earth". That was the title I saw it under.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:20 PM

That was Shatner! No one, but no one, freaks out quite as wildly as William Shatner. Check out the bulging eyeballs. Now that's emoting, baby!

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: annamill
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:12 PM

The spelling on Netflix is Quatermass. I don't know if that is right or not, but thats how they spelled it.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Cluin
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:11 PM

And wasn't it Shatner who was in the original Twilight Zone episode (later redone in the movie with John Lithgow) where he was the airplane passenger freaking out when he saw a gremlin out on the wing? That was a pretty good episode.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Cluin
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:05 PM

Professor Quatermass had made an appearance in at least 2 pevious Brit scifi films: The Quatermass Experiment (1955) and "Quatermass 2" (1957). I haven't seen either of these films but I would love to.

One question: Is it Quatermass or Quartermass? I don't remember.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 01 May 04 - 11:52 AM

I also remember Quartemass and the Pit. This was a fine movie that stayed with you. It did not need a lot of special effects to be a great story. Thanks for bringing it up.

Also thanks for the remembering the Gamera name.

Does anyone remember the movie "Gog" ?

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 May 04 - 11:11 AM

Lepus Rex lives again! Scary, scary...

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: The Walrus
Date: 01 May 04 - 10:52 AM

Hey! How come nobody had mentioned 'Night of the Lepus' ?
How can you beat the concept of an attack by giant carnivorous rabbits.

Walrus

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: annamill
Date: 01 May 04 - 10:34 AM

Thank you for reminding me of "Quatermass and the Pit (1968)". I saw this great movie long ago, on late night TV, and I never saw it again. Of course, I forgot the name of the movie. Well, I belong to Netflix, the internet video store, and i just ordered it and it should be coming very soon. I just can't wait to see it again.

They didn't have Day of the Triffids. Drat!

The very first Sci-Fi movie I ever saw in the theatre was "original version of Invaders From Mars". Scared the hell out of me. I was a youngen then.

Love, Annamill

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: DonMeixner
Date: 01 May 04 - 09:23 AM

Little Hawk,

The last man on Earth was based on Richard Mathieson's novel, I Am Legend and it was remade as The Omega Man by Charlton Heston. Richard Mathieson also gave us many Twilight Zone episodes and one of the great Sci Fi stories "The Incredible Shrinking Man" , One of my top ten favorites.

Beside The Day of the Triffids ( not a great film in my opinion) and The Children of the Damned (The Midwich Cuckoos) are there any other films of Phillip Wyndham's work?

Don

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: mack/misophist
Date: 01 May 04 - 08:34 AM

Forbidden Planet had the best graphic design of that era. True, the story sucked, but it's a very old movie.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: GUEST,Crystal
Date: 01 May 04 - 08:29 AM

Thunderbirds are Go!
And Thunderbird 6
Classics!

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 May 04 - 08:26 AM

Was "Last Man on Earth" the Vincent Price one where everyone had been turned into vampires except for Vincent, and all the vampires were slowly starving to death while Vincent went methodically around the city killing them day after day and holing in in a garlic-strewn, mirror-laden house at night? That was one spooky film.

"Quatermas and the Pit" was pretty cool, demonstrating the British penchant for taking their Sci-Fi films a bit more seriously than Hollywood usually bothered to.

The first Godzilla film was great. I recall another rarer one in the "Big Lizard attacks Japan" genre, called "Varan the Unbelievable". It had some wonderful action scenes in it. Varan was a huge lizard who walked on all fours and trashed cities and used the very nasty technique of freezing opponents solid with his icy breath, delivered via a long, stiff tongue. Quite bizarre! He had a big fight with Gamera (I think it was Gamera...) in the middle of Tokyo, and finally froze the poor turtle in his footsteps, but got badly bitten in the process. Gamera later got thawed out and returned to even the score.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Fiolar
Date: 01 May 04 - 08:07 AM

Science Fiction film fans should get hold of Bill Warren's two volume work "Keep Watching the Skies!" It is the ultimate in books dealing with films from 1950 to 1962. Not only does it give the cast for each film but also gives a detailed description. The Best.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: HuwG
Date: 01 May 04 - 04:49 AM

Some of the early episodes of "Doctor Who" i.e. those with William Hartnell or Patrick Troughton as the Doctor.

There was a film made of Doctor Who, which starred Peter Cushing as the Doctor. It wasn't up to the standard of some of the TV episodes, I'm afraid.

Jon Pertwee wasn't a bad Doctor, but I think Roger Delgado as his foe, the Master, rather stole the show whenever he appeared. And Tom Baker appears to be saddled forever with his portrayal of the Doctor, which is still parodied on Radio 4 (in the UK).

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Cluin
Date: 01 May 04 - 03:45 AM

"Quartermass and the Pit" (1968), a British sci-fi flick in which an eons-old spacecraft is unearthed beneath London while working on the undergound, revealing the Martian breeding program origins of human life on Earth. Wonderfully cheesily done (yet far superior to American Sci-fi films of the same time period).

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: LadyJean
Date: 01 May 04 - 01:22 AM

"Forbidden Planet" a space opera based on Shakespeare's "Tempest" is my favorite, Robbie the Robot and all.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Amergin
Date: 01 May 04 - 12:37 AM

Last man on earth

the forbin project.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 11:36 PM

The funny flying turtle is Gamera. He had his own series of movies which were far worse than the Godzilla films (Love 'em all anyway).
I'm afraid good old Godzilla is neither the misunderstood animal making it's way through the city or hero any more. For some reason they remade him and he's an evil lookin critter now. The series all continue over seas. We just don't get them here. Mothra has gone through a few new movies (and new abilities - fish form and space/time travel form as well as some electric beam type weaponry). The Mothra series seems to be aimed more at the Japanese children.
I've got alot of the old films on CD.

I still love War of the Worlds (both versions)- watch it every time it comes on.

The first Godzilla (Duh!)

When Worlds Collide

Oh so many to choose from!


I really miss the Saturday Creature Feature or Sci Fi Matinee on the old UHF channels. It was great getting a scare in the afternoons and play at space rangers, vampire hunters, or whatever after the movie.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Rapparee
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 11:27 PM

Destination Moon. I saw it in grade school and thought it was terrific. It's still pretty good.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: freightdawg
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 11:17 PM

Um, that was "The Andromeda Strain"

Another senior moment, I guess.

Freightdawg

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 11:10 PM

Them (the movie not Van Morrison's group) was also a fave of min. Something about giant bugs I guess.

That old cold war radioactivity thing was a popular theme.

I am suprised that no one has mentioned the whole area of Japanese monster movies, featuring of course:

Godzilla
Rodan
Mothra
Ghidra the Three Headed Monster
That flying spinning giant turtle, what was it's name?

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Bobert
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 11:03 PM

Well, the fisr scarey movie I remember seein' was "Teranchila" which was purdy cool amd then it was on to Dragula and Franhinstien which were purdy scarey, too...

... but then along came the "Twilight Zone" on TV and every week it was not being able to get to sleep...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: DonMeixner
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 10:47 PM

The Original Body Snatchers was Dennis McCarthy and Dana Winter.
The Day The Earth Caught Fire was Edward Judd and Rumpole of the Bailey, I don't recall Steve McQueen in it.

"It, The Terror from Beyond Space" was a fave of mine. I really liked "Them" and "Forbiden Planet".

Don

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: freightdawg
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 10:21 PM

It depends on what you call old, but two of my favorites are "The Thing" (the original, not the recent remake) and "Marooned" starring Gregory Peck. I am not sure of the dates of either of them, "The Thing" is definitely older than "Marooned" though. I was thinking that "Marooned" pre-dated the Apollo 13 moon shot, which gave it a certain prophetic spookiness. However, I could be wrong on that one.

Another wonderful sci-fi pic that gives me the creepy-crawlies is "The Andromeda Factor" because it opens up the concept of ourselves being our own undoing.

And you cannot discount any old Vincent Price movie - his best were the old Edgar Allen Poe stories, although they may not fit the sci-fi category exactly.

Freightdawg

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Amergin
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 09:07 PM

True, Martin...but that is part of it's charm...

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 09:06 PM

I liked The Man From Planet X, which takes place on the Moors. It's out on DVD now, cheap.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 08:23 PM

I do believe that Plan Nine From Outer Space has made some lists as the worst movie of all time.

Another favorite of mine was the original version of Invaders From Mars where martians landed a ship and it was below the surface and you had to cross this bridge to get to it. The martians controlled earthlings by putting an implant in the back of their neck. Not the greatest special effects, but a story that was well conveyed.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 08:15 PM

There are too many good ones but the first one that gave me a nightmare was Triffids.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Amergin
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 08:08 PM

Uh no...the original body snatchers was from the 50's....which is a very good movie.

plan 9 from outer space

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Peace
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 08:01 PM

The original Invasion of the Body Snatchers, assuming that was the one with Sutherland.

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 07:52 PM

They've never topped George Melies' A Trip to the Moon

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: GUEST,MAG
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 07:27 PM

Day the earth Stood Still

..."or we will reduce the earth to a Burned Out Cinder ..."

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 06:44 PM

I thought Steve McQueen's debut was in "The Blob", a classic 50's horror show. I've never seen "The Day The Earth Caught Fire".

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: SINSULL
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 06:42 PM

"The Day The Earth Caught Fire" - amazing special effects for its time and I think Steve McQueen's film debut (the bath scene).

Subject: RE: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 06:37 PM

"Day of the Triffids" had its moments, and so did "War of the Worlds". The original "Invasion of the Bodysnatchers" was pretty neat too.

Subject: BS: favorite old sci-fi movie
From: Once Famous
Date: 30 Apr 04 - 05:44 PM

I find the Sci-Fi cable channel very boring except when they do something like a Twilight Zone marathon. These guys are missing the boat. Anytime I channel surf past the Sci-Fi channel, it seems that I never ever see any aliens, monsters, rocket ships, etc. Worst of all, they never seem to show any of those great old classics many of us grew up with.

One of my favorites was the 1957 release of The Beginning of The End which had giant grasshoppers invading Chicago, which is my lifelong home town. It was fascinating to see these giant bugs crawling up the skyscrapers and looking into the windows of women in their bedrooms.

What are some other favorites out there?