1964 | "DESTROY ALL FANBOYS!"

*For the next few days, I’m going to add a random film the great Ray Harryhausen worked on. The legendary special effects MASTER passed away on May 7, 2013 at age 92 in London and yes, the film world has lost a true giant as well as a fine and talented gentleman…

First Men in the Moon It’s actually pretty fun to watch early 50’s to mid-60’s sci-fi films for their historical as well as entertainment value because the space race was in full blast and Hollywood was finding out fast that NASA was making most of what they were doing obsolete. Granted, other than the opening few minutes, Nathan Juran’s excellent First Men in the Moon doesn’t need to juggle much in the way of realism other than making sure its 1964 astronauts (made up of members of UN countries!) making that moon landing were wearing gear that at least looked up to date.

Once that’s out of the way, the film lets the imaginations of H.G. Wells and Ray Harryhausen (interpreting the author’s words into Dynamation) take over as the story shifts back in time to 1899 and tells the tale of man’s “real” first trip to the moon. Juran’s direction and his solid cast provide the proper Victorian tone and Harryhausen’s great effects add the perfect amount of rustic charm that propel the films wildly fanciful “science” into the plane of believability…
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An old favorite of mine from the days when it was in near constant rotation on Chiller Theater (on Channel 11, WPIX), The Flesh Eaters manages to mix campy humor and skin-crawling (albeit cheesy by today’s standards) shock effects. The script, by DC and Marvel Comics writer Arnold Drake, manages to be weird, funny and unsettling as it tells the tale of three people stranded on a small island after their small plane flies into a bad storm and is forced to land. They meet a German-accented mad scientist working on a rather nasty little project in the form of a massive bacteria colony that can dissolve flesh within a few seconds of contact. Unfortunately for the travelers, the doc has unleashed his experiment into the water around the island, making enjoying a quick swim kind of a no-go.

While the trio is trying to figure out how to get off the island and the doc is scheming away, they run into a shipwrecked beatnik who adds some comic relief to the proceedings. He’s also the victim of one of the surprisingly gory (for the time) death scenes, but I’ll let you check that out yourself. Anyway, things come to a head as the survivors need to deal with the mad scientist AND getting the hell off the island as one of their plans to destroy the microbes actually make it much stronger. Memorable cinematography and extremely well composed scenes give the film the look of a horror comic book, and at a relatively quick 87 minutes, this is one of those films that’s worth checking out if you’re curious about “B” movies of the era, the evolution of special effects or even how well a comic book author could do at scripting a film.