The Planet of the Apes

This movie is one of my all time favorites because I remember watching it as a kid and loving it.  However I loved it for the awesome costumes and the fact that the white man was getting treated like a slave by apes.  What I didn't know was that the movie actually had a lot more to it besides what I loved about it, it has a story of political power and the strength religion holds within that political power.

The film starts off with a space mission with three men and one woman, they embark on their mission and lay inside their fancy space beds.  They travel to a new planet and crash into a sea, Taylor, the main character, gets out of his fancy space bed to find the only woman on the ship is dead!  How unlucky for those strapping three men.  Also unlucky is the fact their space craft is not made for water, it begins to take on water and the three must escape, but before they do Taylor sees they have traveled into the future thousands of years.  They get their space backpacks and jump into the life raft.  They paddle to the shore and try to figure out where they are.  They decide to wander off into the desert to find something if anything.  They find a plant and continue on their paths leading to more plants and eventually a water fall, they strip and dive in.  All is well until some natives come around and tear apart their fancy space outfits.  They watch the natives and decide they are way smarter until a group of gorillas on horseback come rampaging into the area and start capturing people.  They shoot the poor lone black man, playing into the idea that in horror movies the black person always dies.  Taylor gets captured after he gets shot in the neck.  He can't talk because of the bullet wound.  But he does find a cute little human lady, Nova.  The people of this new place cannot talk, only the apes.  Taylor is pissed because the apes treat the people like animals...mmmm...weird.  Zira is a smart and opinionated scientist female ape and she is engaged to Cornelius this archeologists ape.  Zira knows Taylor is different than the others, he is blonde however, but of course Taylor tries to communicate and eventually does.  A long struggle escalates because Zira wants to know why Taylor is so smart and he knows things that the apes believe to be impossible.  Their social system is intertwined with their religion that holds a tight hand with their politics.  Also what is interesting is the hierarchy the apes have developed by type of ape, the chimps seem to be the more liberal of all, they are interested in science and learning, the orangutans are the religious and political leaders, they are just there to lay down the law, the gorillas are there to do the grunt work, they are warriors and guards.  The film shows that Dr. Zaius knows why Taylor is different than the other people they have encountered when Dr. Zaius crushes a paper airplane Taylor made to show Zira and Cornelius that flight is possible and that is how he got to them, also when he sees that Taylor has written something in the sand and scratches it out.  Eventually Taylor heals and can talk but of course they still try to treat him like a slave/animal.  Zira and Cornelius try to stand up for Taylor in court because Taylor got caught trying to escape ending up in their sentencing of career failure and reputation ruined forever as scientists.  So they make up a secret plan to escape to the forbidden land and to take Taylor with them before the evil blonde monkeys can mess up Taylor's brain so he can't tell everyone about what humans are capable of.  Of course Taylor takes his silent somehow beautiful "lover/mate" Nova with him, they reach the forbidden land spot where Cornelius had found evidence of early civilized humans, a culture different and maybe better than that of the apes.  They take along with them Lucias, Ziras nephew.  Lucias' character is funny and kind of a smart ass.  He represents the innocence of younger people who seek knowledge.  Indeed the do find the spot but they are not alone!  Gorrillas and Dr. Zaius find Lucais who gets his gun stolen by them, Taylor talks Dr. Zauis into going into the cave to see the truth!  And to save Zira and Cornelius' reputations and careers.  But the Dr. knew what was in there and tries to pull a fast one, Taylor ties him up, sooo humiliating for him, Taylor takes Nova along with him because the apes let them go into the unknown to discover their ancestors fate.  Dr. Zauis is a trader and tells Zira and Cornelius he will still ruin their lives.  The ending scene is Taylor and Nova on a horse, they soon discover the remains of the statue of Liberty and Taylor screams "You maniacs!" and pounds his fist into the sand.  He was home all along!!!

The Thing From Another World

The Thing From Another World, a creepy film set in Alaska about an alien that is not that foreign to the people on earth.  It's a story that incorporates science and the military and tries to mold them into one alien fighting team.  But of course those two things are like oil and water, share the same traits but don't like to mix!  However it sure is interesting to see them try and that is whats going on in The Thing.  

So things start off when Scotty, a journalist, meets up with some airforce men at a club of some sort.  The guys are playing card and get a call to fly up north to some spot in the middle of no where Alaska to investigate some mysterious aircraft.  They get up there and land at a camp of scientists, among the scientists is a woman named Nikki, with whom Captain Hendry has had some romantic drunken past with.  Nikki's character is interesting because she takes the upper hand with Hendry at some points in the movie, and her "domesticity" shines through later on to lead to their win over the alien.  They eventually go out and find the downed aircraft, its some how frozen in the ice.  They all circle around the shape and look at each other and excitement/horror when the scientists are excited thinking this aircraft is a UFO.  They decide to use some heating device to melt the ice and recover the aircraft, but something goes wrong and they accidentally blow it up.  Scotty is all mad because they are ruining world changing discoveries!  The ship was not the only thing they found however, someone spots a figure in the ice!  They order some men around and they chip the figure out of the ice and dog sled it back to the science camp.  Immediately once back at the camp the scientists and the airforce men are on opposing sides.  Hendry is hellbent on following orders and Carrington wants to thaw the being out for the sake of scientific discovery!  Thus the start of the battle between the military forces and the scientists.  So Hendry takes the body into a room and breaks a window to keep it frozen.  He sets his men up to do intervals of keeping watch over the alien, meanwhile they are trying to radio out but are having a hard time.  One of the men set to watch the alien gets creeped out by the alien looking through the ice so he throws a blanket over it.  He of course doesn't realize that the blanket is a heating blanket and its turn on!  So the ice melts and the alien is alive!  The military man freaks out and shoots the alien but nothing phases it.  Everyone comes to see what the commotion is about and the alien has escaped to the outside where he is battling the sled dogs.  A few dogs get the short end of the deal and get their blood sucked by the alien, but they did rip off one of his hands.  The scientists are checking out the arm and find out it is some sort of plant, like a horrible carrot creature.  They find some blood on it and the arm starts to move on its own!  The scientists discover a dead dog in the greenhouse drained of its blood and come to the conclusion the alien had been in the greenhouse and will come back.  Carrington puts three people on watch to wait for the alien to come back and to not tell Hendry.  They also discover that the arm has seed pods on it, and of course Carrington who wants to study this alien because they must be much more advanced than us here on earth takes some seeds and starts to grow his own aliens in his little greenhouse in the arctic.  The alien comes back and attacks the men and kills two of them.  The remaining survives with flesh wounds, also he tells everyone the alien had the others hanging to drain their blood.  (The early obsession of zombies?  Blood sucking aliens...mmm.)  Hendry finds out the blood supply they need to help the injured man has gone missing, Nikki discovers where it is going however when she finds some of Carringtons notes.  She shows Hendry and all hell breaks loose.  Everyone finds out what Carrington has been doing with the blood supply, feeding alien pods!  Hendry gets orders from the man on the radio telling him he must keep the alien alive.  Hendry thinks this  is the worst possible idea and decides to go against orders.  Finally a moment where the military is betraying itself!  The time comes when Nikki saves the day, they are all gathered around trying to think of how to kill the alien, Nikki is filling coffees or something.  They are thinking of how to kill a vegetable and Nikki just blurts out "Boil it!", brilliant!  They stage a death scene with kerosene and a flare gun.  The alien comes barging in and they douse him and shoot away, they whole place goes up in flames and Nikki almost burns down in a couch cushion mess.  It doesn't really work that well because the alien gets away and runs into the winter abyss.  So they must make up a new plan, electrocute it! The alien starts to show intelligence and cuts the gas line or something, Hendry must use the generators.  While waiting for the alien to come in and get killed, Carrington pulls the plug on the power, holding people at gun point.  Things escalate into Carrington running into the alien confessing his love for science but getting swatted away like a bug.  Guess the alien doesn't really care about science and wants blood!  Hendry successfully electrocutes the alien, actually he burns the crap out of him.  Nikki and Hendry start to take things a little further and Scotty finally gets his big story!  Ending the film with the phrase "Watch the skies, everywhere, keep looking, and keep watching the skies"

The Thing was a jam packed movie, the dialogue was so new and fresh than what we have watched.  They talked smart but it was entertaining and kept my attention.  I do with the alien looked more scary or different than Frankenstein's Monster.  The alien just was not that scary, to me the best part was the interaction between the rest of the cast.  Nikki and Hendry's relationship was fun and I felt like they genuinely liked each other as friends also.  The alien being a sort of vegetable was pretty funny as well, although he resembled nothing like a vegetable.  The idea of something growing and thinking is something Them! and The Thing have in common.  Although a vegetable growing and ants growing are very different its still something that seems not so scary in it's "natural" state as tiny ant and a carrot.   

The Day The Earth Stood Still

The film begins with a spaceship being tracked down on some sort of radar-like machine.  The ship lands and appears seamless until a door way opens up with a ramp.  Out comes a robot (Gort) and a figure (Klattu).  They have army tanks and men with guns waiting for the alien figure to do something, he whips out a spikey thing and one gunman shoots him in the arm.  Everyone sympathizes with Klattu once he appears to have human emotions and fragility.  He is taken to a hospital to recover, which he does remarkably and freaks everyone out with his age.  Klattu's whole purpose of being there is to warn them before their planet is destroyed!  Other life forms know that Earth has been messing with nuclear power and have been thinking about shooting some into space, therefore the other planets would be forced to destroy Earth before this can happen.  Unless Klattu can warn them and they do what he says, their planet will be destroyed.  Klattu is trying to meet every representative of every culture/country to convince them of this threat, but people are too focused on personal fights and wars to think of the Earth as being a united force.  Klattu takes refuge as a boarder in a house filled with people, some of which are a pretty lady (Helen) and her unsuspecting son (Bobby).  Klattu needs to learn more about humans on Earth so he can figure out how to get them to believe him, so he is undercover from the cops and hospital.  The little boy turns out to be a great teacher because he is so naive and young.  Klattu learns about Professor Barnhardt who is supposed to be the smartest person in all of the world according to the little boy, Bobby.  They happen to break into the Professors house and figure out this long confusing equation.  Of course the Professor is amazed by Klattu and has just happened to be organizing a meeting with some of the smartest people from all over the world and its happening really soon too!  Klattu is one lucky guy I'd say.  So the plan is for Klattu to talk to all of those people and they will believe him and save the world from killing itself.  But in order for everyone on Earth to believe him he has to do something amazing, so he basically makes the world stand still by shutting off all machines and time as people knew it.  Which of course freaks people out but its clear yet if everyone is convinced or just plain revengeful.  Plans never go as planned though so this story is not much different than other disaster stories/films.  Bobby follows Klattu to the spaceship and sees Gort smash some army guys and Klattu get into the ship.  Bobby runs home to tell his mother and her lame boyfriend, they don't really believe him until they piece it all together and the lame boyfriend sells out to the police about Klattu.  Klattu is in the run when he gets shot by a cop!  Helen, the pretty mother, escapes to Gort so she can tell him a message that will save Klattu.  She succeeds and Gort comes to the rescue, getting Klattu back and recovering him from death with the fancy alien magic machine.  Klattu realizes Earth is too stupid so he is going to tell them that in fact the robots are the ones in charge and they are the ones who will destroy their planet so their future is up to them.  He steps back into his spaceship and departs back to some far away land.  

This film probably had the best special effects of all the movies we have seen up to this date.  The robot with laser eyes that melted tanks and the seamless spaceship were all pretty well done.  The actors were good too, they were all pretty silly and likable.  The reading about this film described it as liberal, which stuck with me the whole time during the screening.  Afterwards I could definitely see how liberal could fit into the list of descriptions for The Day The Earth Stood Still.  Sontag's article's scenario types could also be found throughout this movie, two examples could be the Einstein looking professor and the call for other countries to intervene.    

Invasion of The Body Snatchers

Invasion of The Body Snatchers is quite a horrific title to a movie made in the 1950's.  People were just about obsessed with the idea of something taking over their lives and controlling their every minds to all be alike, what everyone thought of Communism.  Also people were obsessed with anything that was fantastical, but horrifying, like aliens.  Some people are still obsessed with ideas of aliens living among us in some form, this particular movie has a concept that some people believe in currently, the idea of pods producing clone-like copies but controlling their minds.  Possibly an idea ripped off from Metropolis by the way the robot stole Maria's identity but had a mind controlled by Rotwang.     

In the film it starts with Dr. Miles acting crazy and yelling as some officials arrive to see him.  They ask what has happened and the film does a fuzzy thing and we are in a flash back.  Back to when Miles just returned to his town to find that some of his patients had reported not feeling well but then cancelled their appointments later admitting that they had felt much better than before.  Miles didn't really think too much of it but the people who were living among these people sure saw a change.  They reported that their relatives were impostors, even though they seemed like the real person and had the same memories.  Eventually more and more people were claiming that their friends and family were impostors and then would all of sudden not think that anymore and were happy as can be.  At one point one of Miles's friends finds a body that looks just like him only much more fresh, like it had not lived a day in the world yet.  Convinced something is going on Miles leaves his friend,Jack, and his lady friend, Teddy, to watch over this "body".  Which of course comes alive and they run for their lives leaving the body to roam as it pleases.  Miles flips out because he left his girlfriend, Becky, at her house and so he breaks into her house and sees a body just like hers stowed away in the basement.  Eventually the police get into it but they just make a fool out of Miles and Jack.  Miles, Becky, Teddy, and Jack all find these pods in a green room looking thing and discover that the pods is where the doubles come from, as these pods broke open the bodies of Jack, Teddy, Becky, and Miles are all inside.  Miles and Becky are there after Miles tells Jack and Teddy they must run for it, Becky hangs out by the phone and Miles tries to murder the alien pod bodies.  There is a lot of running around after this and everyone in the town just about is a pod alien now.  They chase Miles and Becky up a huge stair case and down some hills and all over the place but Miles and Becky hide under two pieces of wood so that all of the men in the town chasing them can't see them.  Miles tells Becky to wait there and he runs away somewhere only to come back and find Becky all drowsy and sleepy.  (When you sleep the pod people take over)  He tries to wake her up and he kisses her and then realizes its too late she is a pod person.  Mile's gives some crazy look and is about off the deep end by now.  He runs from her and the crazy mob of people to make it to the freeway.  He is trying to warn everyone but they just think he is crazy, which is a pretty good judgement since he is yelling crazy things at people driving by.  He jumps on the back of a farm truck to see the whole back filled with pods!  Eventually he makes it to the police station and something fuzzy happens to the screen and we are back from the flashback.  The officials look at each other like "this dude is crazy!" and start to walk out of the room when a little one liner character comes around and says there has been a crash and the strangest pod things were in the truck.  Oh no it's true, everything Miles was saying!!  They all rush out and it's the end!  

The idea of another force coming in and taking control over someones own body is widely feared today still.  In this movie it was pod aliens, but for us we fear a government take over of our bodies more than anything else in my opinion.  Which this movie also mirrors because the "government" of the town being taken over was also a part of the take over even though it was against their will, they were still among the ones being controlled, and in turn convincing others to be taken over by the pod person doppelganger.  The movie has some good/creepy effects with the pods bursting in the green house, and for a second they showed Miles stabbing one of them with the pitch fork, which is pretty gory for what we have seen so far in the films viewed from this time period. 

Gojira!

Gojira went along perfect with the films that we were watching just before this.  It had such a direct connection with the fear of nuclear weapon's and their impact on the world and it's people.  It also went along with the things mentioned in Sontag's article.  There was the old professor, the hero with his beautiful lady friend who never die, the doctor who is mysterious, the whole movie was jam packed with what Sontag was writing about really.  

The film starts off with weird explosions and sinking of ships off the coast of Odo Island.  The people on the island all start to blame Gojira, the old atomic monster legend, especially after the monster comes to shore one night and destroys some building and kills some locals.  People from other parts of Japan, and eventually the world, come to investigate, among them is the old professor and his cute daughter who is lovers with Ogata the navy man, but is also lovers with Dr. Serizawa.  Shes two timing these two men and somehow I think they know but don't really care too much.  Anyhow, the professor discovers an extinct animal in the foot print of Gojira, implying that the monster could be an extinct creature coming from the depths of the ocean, which in fact is true.  The monster is confirmed by other officials once a bit more evidence is found, such as this big monster destroying cities and villages.  The old professor wants to use Gojira for research, because when was the last time they had a real live monster around?  Never!  The rest of the terrorized people don't really see it that way so they all want to destroy Gojira.  Dr. Serizawa has a weapon that could destroy the whole sea, he claims.  Much like the claims of the death star destroying a whole planet, or the mass destruction an atom bomb can do.  Dr. Serizawa only tells Emiko, who then in turn tells Ogata.  Once Ogata finds out about the oxygen destroyer he is compelled to speak to Dr. Serizawa and convince him to use it against Gojira because no other weapons will stop him.  Gojira just seems to absorb anything they try to throw at him, the nuclear weapons would only make him stronger.  Dr. Serizawa is pretty reluctant to use it in fear of it getting into the wrong hands.  Once Serizawa is convinced his weapon is their only hope he is set that he shall be the one to kill the monter, but Ogata insists on going with him to help since Serizawa knows nothing about diving.  So they both dive down into the ocean and set the oxygen destroyer, Ogata gets pulled up and Serizawa cuts himself loose and is oxygen destroyed along with Gojira, like a captain going down with his ship.  And Japan/the world is safe again.  

Gojira was really entertaining to say the least, the special effects were pretty hilarious at times but the imagination and amount of work that went into it is great and smart.  I thought of these actors to be better actors when comparing them to the actors in such movies as Things To Come.  Maybe it was just the context of the film but they just seemed like a better set of actors, and Emiko's character was fun to think about.  She was caught in a man forest, she had a father, and two lovers and there were no really any other significant women characters.  She was smart and trusted though so it made her character a little more independent.  I want to see the newest version of this film to see what major changes have been made.  Its interesting to know that different versions were made for different countries in mind.  I wonder how much of that could still be found in today's movies...    

Atomic Cafe

Atomic Cafe was a really interesting, depressing film.  It showed clips of the atom bomb and h bombs being tested as well as actually being used against the "enemy".  It also had propaganda footage of special outfits, emergency actions, and bomb shelters.  The most horrifying part of the film was seeing footage of them testing the bombs on pigs and the pictures and footage of victims over seas.  After come of those clips were clips of Americans dancing around and loving life.  For me this is just sick, why would anyone be so happy about thousands of people being killed and injured?!  I know they were all happy about the war being over and such but I feel that a lot of those people had no idea what the atom bomb really was and what it did to everyone in the world basically.  The whole film to me was about propaganda and the lack of knowledge the people had about the atom and h bombs they were making, testing, and deploying.  The power of words of the government and politicians was disgusting, the people just ate it up, spending all their time and money on bomb shelters and things to put in them.  

Things To Come

Things To Come was a pretty intense film, it was like riding a strange roller coaster of power/science/technology struggle.  Entertaining for multiple reasons one of those being the way the actors delivered their lines.  I noticed they were really loud, they were loud talking at each other and putting emphasis on certain words.  

It started out in Everytown (clever, maybe?) as being this real nice stereotypical American town with people all running about buying things for Christmas.  There are other people with signs and flyers all saying things like WAR IS UPON US!  The main group of people are all cozy in their homes listening to radio and talking about whether or not war is going to happen when all of a sudden, war happens.  Everything is destroyed and the special effects were pretty good for this time period.  Buildings were being blown up and people were being smashed, even a little boy was among the rubble.  The heroic Cabal escapes all of this because he is a pilot and flew out of there to fight in the war.  Everytown is destroyed and so is technology and resources.  They are in the processes of rebuilding life as they know it.  They have a terrible chief that is more focused on drinking and looking fabulous than the lives of the townspeople and their future.  In swoops Cabal on a fancy futuristic plane, who gets put into a cell eventually because new things are too dangerous to the "powerful chief".  However his "lady friend" actually knows that Cabal has some good intentions and that Everytown needs a face lift.  Just like Cabal had warned, his people from the fancy flying area come to Everytown to rescue Cabal and "clean up" Everytown.  The people of Everytown are forced to shoot at the new comers which lands them into some more trouble but really for the better.  The people get gassed and all pass out, except the chief who dies.  The town benefits greatly because they rebuild it into something way better than before, all because of Cabal.  Years go by and the town is mostly underground and technology has increased.  The next journey is to the moon, and who better to go than Cabals decent!  His son's daughter is young and fit, as is old Cabals buddys son's son.  An artist decides he thinks this progress is not good so he riles up the troops of his city with a speech that creates a mass crowd to chase down the young fit pair who are going to circle the moon for all of mankinds progress.  Right at the right moment the space gun shoots out the little bullet space craft into space!  The crowd goes away and the movie ends with Cabal and his friend talking about progress or nothing, this or that!  

The movie's story to me was about the fear of technology and what "progress" is.  Loud talking put aside the movies special effects were probably the best part of the whole film.  The plot was a little too roller coastery for me and long.  The outfits were also a really fun part of the movie, functionality must have just been thrown out the window.