Page 8 - 200712 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - December 2007

8 8 UFOs, Innocence and Movies UFOs, Innocence and Movies How UFOs Lost Their How UFOs Lost Their Innocence Innocence at the Movies at the Movies by Brad Steiger by Brad Steiger It has been fascinating for someone such devastation rendered by the extraterrestrial slowly taking over Earth through the possession as myself, who has been researching the subject invaders left unforgettable images in the minds of human bodies became firmly implanted in of UFOs for over five decades, to see how of the audience. the psyches of millions of men and women who greatly the field of UFO research has been While the film version of Wells' novel now looked even more suspiciously at the skies complicated and confused by popular culture, was very successful upon its release, the impact above them. Invasion of the Body Snatchers has specifically by motion pictures and, more it had on mass consciousness cannot be been remade twice; the third version is about to recently, television. compared to the effect of the radio broadcast of open in theaters early in 2008. Since the majority of Americans learn War of the Worlds on the day before Halloween Such television series as The Twilight their history through the cinematic in 1938. At that time, CBS' Mercury Theatre Zone (1959-1964) and The Outer Limits (1963- presentations provided by Hollywood--whether presented Orson Welles and a talented cast 1965) occasionally featured episodes it is the "truth" about The Alamo, the invasion simulating a live news broadcast of an invasion concerning alien invaders, but it was a series of Normandy Beach, or the collapse of the of Earth by mechanized Martian war machines. aptly named The Invaders (1967-1969), starring Soviet Union--so do the vast majority of men Because the account of unstoppable alien beings Roy Thinnes, that focused on the paranoid and women acquire their facts about the flying landing in the New Jersey farmlands was concept that evil aliens might be living saucer mystery through the flickering lights of depicted so realistically--and because many undetected among humans and conspiring to the movies. listeners tuned in after the Mercury Theatre conquer them. Thinnes was David Vincent, an production was already in progress--the greater architect, who happened to be the only human Invaders from Outer Space part of the entire nation was in panic over the witness of a UFO landing. No one believed his invaders from Mars. account, so once he discovered that the While there have been numerous Invading aliens continued to be a extraterrestrials had arrived with the sole intent science-fiction films that have used the theme of popular theme in a number of motion pictures of taking over the planet, it became his mission alien invaders, there are certain motion pictures throughout the 1950s. Invaders from Mars to stop them, alerting and enlisting whomever and television series that seem to have (1953) remains in many movie-goers' memory he could to assist him. Vincent's task became all impressed the mass psyche of their audiences as the single most frightening film of their the more difficult because whenever he far more than those with simple plots dealing childhood. Perhaps what made the film so managed to kill one of the invaders, their with bug-eyed monsters terrifying the terrifying to young people was the premise that physical body disintegrated, leaving no inhabitants of Earth. one's parents, teachers, and friends could be evidence to convince the authorities that aliens In 1951, Howard Hawks' The Thing taken over by alien life forms and work toward were walking and plotting among them. When from Another World told the story of a small a nationwide conspiracy. the series ended in 1969, Vincent had not been group of Air Force personnel and scientists Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) able to stem the tide of alien invasion, and the stationed at an isolated outpost near the North developed the theme of aliens possessing family stories of extraterrestrials posing as humans had Pole who must deal with an alien that needs and friends to a high degree of paranoia. While received more substantiation from a television their blood in order to survive. The film was a in Invaders from Mars, the extraterrestrials series that many insisted was telling the truth thriller that steadily built tension and attached themselves to their victims' body, in disguised as a fictional presentation. frighteningly portrayed how helpless humans Invasion of the Body Snatchers, they brought Continued on Page 9 might be at the hands of a single powerful alien strange pods with them from their world which life-form. grew into likenesses of those humans whom In War of the Worlds (1953), George Pal they replaced. adapted H.G. Wells' novel of alien invasion and Some social historians argue that the transformed it into a cinema classic. The film UFO craze began when the threat of nuclear war follows the struggle of two scientists (Gene with the Soviet Union hung like a black cloud Barry and Ann Robinson) as they attempt to over the world and many people were desperate help Earth survive a devastating attack by to believe that some force from the skies could Martians. The suspense is intensified by their appear and deliver Earth from nuclear own narrow escapes, and the reality for motion annihilation. Still other scholars suggest that it picture audiences lay in seeing the major cities may have been the U.S. government itself that of Earth lying strewn about in heaps of rubble. began the rumors of flying saucers in order to Although the horror of seemingly unstoppable divert public attention from the development of aliens was a frightening theme, the film is its own secret weapons. Perhaps such a extremely well-presented and won an Academy prevailing atmosphere of national distrust Award for its special effects. While Earth is contributed to the horror of films about UFO saved by the motion picture's end, the invaders, but the unsettling concept of aliens