Posted on 05/24/2016 12:33:44 PM PDT by EveningStar
Were the 1950s the Golden Age of Science Fiction Cinema? I think so. What do you think?
List of science fiction films of the 1950s
A list of science fiction films released in the 1950s. These films include core elements of science fiction, but can cross into other genres. They have been released to a cinema audience by the commercial film industry and are widely distributed with reviews by reputable critics.
This period is sometimes described as the 'classic' era of science fiction theater. Much of the production was in a low-budget form targeted at a teenage audience. Many were formulaic, gimmicky, comic-book style films. They drew upon political themes or public concerns of the day, including depersonalization, infiltration, or fear of nuclear weapons. Invasion was a common theme, as were various threats to humanity.
Two of the films from this decade, The War of the Worlds (1953) and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954) won Academy Awards, while Destination Moon (1950) and The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957) won Hugo Awards.
“Welcome to California!”
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
The Incredible Shrinking Man
Have you read the book?
Did so for the first time around Christmas. Well worth it. Different in many ways, the title is well defined and explained as it relates to American history.
Sorry, no mutant ant, although it’s on the cover for cinematic posterity.
2001 was definitely concurrent since they were done at basically the same time. But at that point concurrent wasn’t that evolved from the state of everything else (getting to 1969 from the 1950s isn’t that big a jump) and I don’t think anybody expected that to be a hit. Blade Runner just about invented cyberpunk, and while massively influential and worshiped by many today was actually a flop. It’s kind of an example of why SF movies don’t evolve, it’s the “sure I could green light an amazing movie hailed 30 years later for its vision... and get fired opening weekend... or I could green light something that makes a lot of money”. That’s kind of how it’s going for cinema SF, the ones pushing forward are either arthouse movies (not expected to make any money) or should have been because they don’t make any money.
And I’m just as guilty as anybody. Much as I love to find the ones pushing to new (for cinema anyway) territory I just bought my ticket to the new X-Men. Fact is that 50s style exploitation SF is a lot of fun, even if it completely lacks rewatchability. Even gourmands need their Cheetos fix.
Anything ray Harryhausen did in the 1950s was Great!
Others were also great!
Giant Scorpions, Gila Monsters! Tarantulas! Mars Monsters.
Some not so great (The Giant Claw).
Drive in theater movies, but who went to watch the movie!
Sixty years later I still get a thrill watching them, not these silly superhero CGI movies.
Still waiting to see a movie called GOG which I missed back in the 1950s.
Saw this at the drive-in in Denver with my parents! Scared the you know what out of me! I hit the floorboard anytime the monster came on screen! When the monster ate the policeman...WOW!
I think there was another movie about tall men with shiny faces who kept coming back to life. Lots of cave ins, It was almost fifty years later I realized it was INVADERS FROM MARS.
“The Thing From Another World”-(aka “The Thing.”) “The Day The Earth Stood Still.”
Children of Men was a really great sci-fi movie. Like Theodore Sturgeon supposedly said in 1951 when folks complained about how bad sci-fi was, ‘90% of EVERYTHING is crap.’
I would love to know at what point the majority thought of movies/TV when they hear the word ‘sci-fi.’ At Star Wars? I always think ‘books’ when I hear the word. But I think movies/TV when I hear ‘Westerns’, not books. But I was never a huge reader of westerns.
Freegards
Hi, no I haven’t run across the book previously.
Now that you mention it, I’ll put it on my summer reading list.
Thanks!
RE: “Have you read the book?
Did so for the first time around Christmas. Well worth it. Different in many ways, the title is well defined and explained as it relates to American history.”
Yeah that was a good one.
The SF I read and the SF I watch tend to be vastly different. Probably because the SF I read is of a type that they just don’t make into movies. Although the TV side is starting to evolve (turns out plot drive SF is a lot cheaper to make than big budget exploitation SF) so that may be changing.
Westerns for me are entirely a movie genre. Horror is 99% movie for me too, only really started changing for me because I became friends with a really good horror author, of course his writing is evolving more towards military/SF so I’m reading less horror as he’s writing less.
Kinda liked “Devil Girl From Mars”, a British flick that was more psychodrama than SF, though she came to Earth in a spaceship that looked like a serving dish with a rotating rim.
Liked where she stares down an earthling until he’s a gibbering idiot. Those eyes!
The actress is still with us. She’s 97.
Cool! And since we’re on the subject of 50’s Scifi movies...
If you haven’t already read them, When and After Worlds Collide are excellent books.
Fiend Without A Face!!
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