The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
Disney’s adaptation of Jules Verne’s novel is a lavishly produced period adventure. This became the definitive version of the book and inspired a string of other period-set Verne adaptations over the next decade
A classic 1950s monster movie where an expedition up the Amazon discovers a Gill Man. Here an average story is propelled into the memorable by Jack Arnold’s moody direction. Two sequels followed.
The very first Godzilla film. Essentially a copy of The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, it has incredibly stark effect despite the primitiveness of the effects. In it you can see Japanese nation struggling to expiate the pain of the Atomic Bomb.
Them! and The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms created the 1950s atomic monster movie. Them’s particular spin was to create the giant bug film. Unlike the B movies that followed, it is played with realism and sober conviction
Vivid, well written production from George Pal with Charlton Heston as the owner of a South American plantation who faces an unstoppable horde of marabunta ants that are devouring everything in their path
Lavishly made Greek myth adventure, an adaptation of The Odyssey with Kirk Douglas as Ulysses/Odysseus
The Bowery Boys were a poor man’s Abbott and Costello; here in one of their most entertaining outings they try to compete with Abbott and Costello’s monster bashes
Cinema’s first cuddly, friendly robot that is programmed according to Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics, predating Forbidden Planet’s Robbie the Robot. A modest overlooked film of the 1950s SF era
Underrated 1950s SF film, a murder mystery as the equipment at a space research laboratory tries to kill people. Contains the first ever depiction of a computer virus
An film from the early days of the Space Age about the attempts to capture meteorites to use as building for rockets. The basic premise is scientifically preposterous but the film is not uninteresting
Film version of a classic play about an inspector who calls to expose the sins of a wealthy family and their involvement in the death of a girl. Comes with a fantastical twist in the tale.
A sequel to the charming British mermaid comedy Miranda with Glynis Johns again owning the show with her flirtatiously coy sparkle as she swaps places with a lookalike relative
An entry from the 1950s alien invader film fad. This starts well with survivors finding themselves in a deserted city but takes a nosedive with the introduction of a clunky robot
A British-made ripoff of The Day the Earth Stood Still. Slow, plodding and talky without the action ever seeming to move beyond the confines of a country pub
Animated adaptation of George Orwell’s fable that was intended as a satire of the Soviet Union. Being rendered as cutsie children’s animation necessarily bluntens the book’s bite
A version of Edgar Allan Poe’s Murders in the Rue Morgue that was made for the original 3D fad. That is to say, it is more a case of some elements of the story having been shuffled around into a new story with Karl Malden as a mad zookeeper using a hypnotised ape to kill women
One of the first films produced by Roger Corman, a routine B monster movie that has mostly been made around obtaining the use of a one-man submersible
British entry in the 1950s alien invader genre with a female invader come to Earth to select male breeding specimens. The invader looks like a dominatrix from outer space who comes accompanied by a ridiculous robot
The film adaptation of a hit musical from Alan Jay Lerner and Fredreick Loewe in which Gene Kelly discovers love in a village that exists outside of time in the Scottish highlands
Vincent Price had success as the mad waxworks curator in the 3D horror House of Wax. This cheap copycat casts Price as a mad stage magician and is also served up in 3D
Perhaps the strangest film Mickey Rooney ever made, a comedy in which he is a prospector caught in an atomic explosion and afterwards gains the ability to cause things to explode