Blast in the Depths!, Chapter 12, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 13, Hurled to Destruction.
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Superman’s Dilemma, Chapter 11, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 12, Blast in the Depths!
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Between Two Fires!, Chapter 10, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 11, Superman’s Dilemma.
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Irresistible Force!, Chapter 9, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 10, Between Two Fires!
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What’s the connection between condoms and Martian invaders?
Find out in today’s Trillion $ Movie, Invaders from Mars. The Martians fit the stereotype. Their leader is a little, green man inside a flying saucer who practices mind control on unwary humans by planting an
electrode at the base of their skulls. The Martians don’t wear prophylactics, but body suits with zippers plainly visible on the backs. You can spot the condoms — more than 3,000 of them, all fully inflated — adorning the maze-like tunnels in the sandpit where the alien spaceship is hiding. The prop men first tried out balloons, but then switched to the blown-up condoms, finding they gave off a brighter red glow.
Republic Pictures’ Invaders from Mars, released in 1953, competed at the box office with It Came from Outer Space, Universal Pictures’ first 3-D movie. Invaders was also originally planned as a 3-D movie, but with a production budget of only $290,000, that option had to be scrapped. Still, it’s fun to count how many scenes have protuberances — like test tubes, telescopes and alien probes — jutting out in the foreground.
Invaders has one plot hook that distinguishes it from the many Alien Scare movies that proliferated during the 1950s. The hero is a 10-year-old boy, an astronomy geek, who not only witnesses the Martian landing, but leads the US Army in the counterattack. Talk about wish fulfillment for the kids watching the movie! Jimmy Hunt plays young David Maclean, while Leif Erickson is his father, transformed into an automaton by the “Mu-tants.” Rounding out the cast: Helena Carter and Arthur Franz as David’s surrogate parents, and the avuncular Morris Ankrum as the Army’s Col. Fielding.
The direction is by William Cameron Menzies, better known as a set designer on Gone With the Wind, The Son of the Sheik, The Thief of Bagdad and many other titles. Menzies’ visual flair is much evidence here, as in the scene where David gets hauled into a police station that looks strangely dreamlike and surreal, as if Salvador Dali might have designed it. Enjoy and do return next Friday for another Trillion $ Movie!
Superman to the Rescue, Chapter 8, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 9, Irresistible Force!
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Princess Dragon Mom
Today’s Trillion $ Movie, Inframan, is a 1975 film from Hong Kong that can stake out three claims to fame — some of the wildest mutant monsters on the planet, ferocious kung-fu action and the vixenish villainess, Princess Dragon Mom, a power-mad dominatrix who cracks a mean whip and looks like a cross between a Valkyrie and a K-pop star with bleached-blonde hair.
The film doesn’t waste any time. Hong Kong is practically leveled within the first three minutes, as Princess Dragon Mom awakens from a 1,000-year sleep, causing her volcanic lair, Mount Devil, to erupt and transform before our eyes into a skull-capped peak. She quickly summons her minions — the Octopus Mutant, the Laser Horn Monster, the Giant Beetle Monster, the Driller Beast, the Emperor of Doom, the Iron-Fist Robots, the She-Demon and her hordes of Skull Warriors. They stand ready to back up her nefarious plans for world dominion, which she plainly announces:
“Greetings to you, Earthlings! I am Princess Dragon Mom. I have taken over this planet. Now I own the Earth and you will be my slaves for all eternity.”
Just a few of Inframan’s foes.
Not so fast, Dragon Mom. At Science Patrol headquarters, Professor Chang scratches his loose-fitting toupee as he ponders how to protect the planet from a fate worse than death. His answer: Subject his willing assistant Rayma to a near-lethal dose of radiation. As a result of this bionic process, Rayma will become InfraMan, a flying superhero with X-ray vision, who can withstand “the suffering of hell” and fight back with Thunder Ball Fists.
Inframan was made by the Shaw Brothers, who cranked out fast-punching, hard-kicking kung-fu movies by the dozens. Here, they not only add a cool, sci-fi veneer, but also many wonderful layers of campy silliness. You won’t soon forget the sight of the mutant monsters dancing inside the cave they call home. A Japanese superhero with his own TV show, Ultraman, inspired this Hong Kong knock-off, and both, in turn, served as forerunners for the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Enjoy the fun, and do return next Friday for another Trillion $ Movie.
(EDITOR’S NOTE: The full movie of INFRAMAN is no longer available on YouTube, except for paying customers. Since we can’t show you the full movie, we’ll present the trailer as well as one of the better scenes.).
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Into the Electric Furnace!, Chapter 7, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 8, Superman to the Rescue.
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Superman in Danger!, Chapter 6, in the 15-part black & white series that introduced Superman to the screen in 1948. Visit again next Saturday for Chapter 7, Into the Electric Furnace!
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Today’s Trillion Dollar Movie, Last Man on Earth, has been acknowledged by George A. Romero as one of the major works he “ripped off” in creating Night of the Living Dead. It’s an eerie, atmospheric adaptation of Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend, the first of four movies based on that same tale, also including The Omega Man with Charlton Heston and I Am Legend with Will Smith. Here, Vincent Price portrays the stoic hero, presumably the last man alive, battling to survive against hordes of zombie-like vampires that awake each night to stalk the Earth.
The premise: A pandemic bacterial plague has wiped out everyone except Price, spared by virtue of having once been bitten by a vampire bat in Panama, inoculating him from the disease. He leads a lonely, monotonous existence, scavenging by day for food and supplies, and seeking out the vampire lairs so he can put them out of their misery by driving wooden stakes through their hearts. At nights, he retreats to a boarded-up sanctuary, blaring jazz records and drinking scotch, while the vampires gather outside, clamoring for his head.
The film’s official tagline sets the tone, “By night they leave their graves crawling, shambling, though empty streets, whimpering, pleading, begging for his blood!”
Britain’s Hammer Films originally acquired the rights to Matheson’s story, but passed along the project to American International Pictures, which produced the 1964 film on a shoestring budget in Rome, Italy. Matheson helped to co-write the screenplay, but withdrew his credit (going under the pseudonym Logan Swanson) after having creative differences with Price. Still, this is probably the one I Am Legend adaptation that best captures the mood of the book, while adhering most literally to its narrative twists.
Some modern viewers find it a little too languid and slow-moving for their tastes, but its groundbreaking importance can’t be denied. Its influence can be seen in practically every zombie movie made over the last half-century, notably Night of the Living Dead, but also Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later. Enjoy and return next Friday for another Trillion ($) Movie.
