Saw this flick when I was about five years old, and it scared the bejabbers out of me. Many years later, when the wave of alien abductions was in the news, I was made even more uneasy, I think, by my unconscious recall of the small, bug-eyed "Gray" in the space capsule scenes. Oddly prescient for its time.
shareI agree with you! This movie scared the hell out of me and I saw it on TV. The suspense was in the fact that they didn't show him right away, they let you linger on until he looks out that port hole.
I finally got the movie awhile back but it is on videotape.
Patrick of Seattle
This film was featured in my Super Cinema Annual of 1953 (a Christmas 1952 present), along with Burt Lancaster's Crimson Pirate and a Johnny Mack Brown film, amongst others.
I remember being scared witless at the stills of Mr X in the annual.
I've never seen the movie but just viewed the trailer on IMDB.
Saw this as a young kid at possibly my first drive-in movie. I did fine with the spooky stuff until the scene where the heroine looks into the ship porthole just as the alien looked out. Scared the living daylights out of me. You could hear screams from half the cars in the drive-in.
sharei laughed at the word 'bejabbers". if you read this, know that i felt the same way. the man from planet x was creepy in his non-expressions and odd hum...bye
shareI am laughing out loud because I had exactly the
same experience with The Thing From Another World.
Scared me very much.
The original The Thing was much better than Carpenter's
movie.
The Thing and the X man were very similar stories. But the Thing was super strong, while the X man was very weak. Both movies are scary in their own ways.
shareI set my alarm clock to wake up at 3 am this morning to see this movie on TCM, because it scared the crap out of me when I was a kid too. It was definitely worth getting up early for, and I don't think it's as bad as some people make it out to be. Yes, it has zero production values and the acting was kinda hokey. But I think the plot is really good, a slightly different twist on Day the Earth Stood Still. In the end you feel sympathy for the X Man -- at least I did. He comes to Earth, who know's what his actual intentions are, but he didn't seem to be that well prepared for his mission where he gets screwed over by one of the locals. Only in the end does he get angry, but it's too late and the army blows him away. What's really surprising is that William Schalert is still alive! Of all the movies Hollywood seems intent on remaking, this is a good candidate. They should've left The Day The Earth Stood Still alone.
sharei agree, the new day the earth stood still doesnt interest me at all.
i tivo'd this to play to my kids with all the lights out. i saw this when i was a kid during the coolest show - sammy terry. he was a host here in indiana every friday night. he played old horror and sci fi shows. i miss those times.
Sammy Terry! Haven't remembered him in years! Oh I wish they had something like that for my grandson lol
shareProblem is, if they remade TMFPX today, it's be loaded with CGI effects and lots of stupid dialogue and idiotic characters, and lose all the sense of intimacy, isolation and wonder that made the one-and-only so good -- not to mention it'd lose the beautiful, fogbound, black-and-white atmosphere! This is one that should be left as is.
But I agree with you about THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL -- some things just can't, or shouldn't, be remade. Look at KING KONG. Remade twice, and both were lousy (to different degrees -- and I know there are lots of fans of the '05 version, of which I'm not one). So let's leave THE MAN FROM PLANET X alone.
Although interestingly, in the late 1970s Robert Clarke tried to interest Sherrill Corwin, the man who bought a 75% share of TMFPX from producers Pollexfen and Wisberg (and who then got United Artists to distribute it), to finance either a remake or a follow-up picture. Corwin wasn't interested, says Clarke, but he still remembered the PLANET X grosses!
Amazing how eerie it was to see the light blinking on and off inside the alien spaceship. A simple, easy, extremely effective special effect. We've lost that in modern movies.
shareExactly. That and a lot more. Too many directors today have too much money and not enough imagination or creativity.
share*****
Problem is, if they remade TMFPX today, it's be loaded with CGI effects and lots of stupid dialogue and idiotic characters, and lose all the sense of intimacy, isolation and wonder that made the one-and-only so good
*****
Don't forget that they'd add an anti-war and/or anti-conservative spin to it...seems a story ain't a story outta hollywood now unless it preaches to or slams one of them
Add me to the list. I last saw this as a child staying up late to watch Chiller Theater, I was probably about ten and this was to me then a really scary movie. The scene with the alien suddenly staring out the porthole has stuck with me ever since.
Staying up late tonight as an adult, this is the first I've seen it since. I didn't jump this time but the movie is still good. The film's misty, mysterious atmosphere and the eerie sound effects though clearly dated hold up well in context.
A thought though that never would have occurred to me then, the "universal language of geometry", isn't it lucky the aliens use the same symbols as we.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
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