The Earth Dies Screaming

Damn, you simply have got to love these glorious paranoiac Sci-Fi/horror productions of the 60's. Not only because they have the most appealing sounding titles in cinema, but also because they don't ever waste a single moment of playtime and come straight to the confronting point. "The Earth Dies Screaming" opens with a frightening series of disastrous accidents, like a train crash, multiple car crashes, a plane crash and ordinary people dropping dead in the streets. I know we have seen this before in other movies (like "Day of the Triffids" or "Village of the Damned"), but it remains thrilling to observe. Hundreds, thousands, millions of casualties and not a single word of dialog has even been spoken yet! I realize it's an often abused expression but … they really don't make movies like these anymore nowadays! On with the story, a small group of survivors painfully come to realize alien robots targeted the entire earth's population for extermination, and nearly succeeded as well. The menace of prowling aliens is constant and needless to say the stressful situation also causes conflicts and hatred between the few remaining survivors. The concept loses quite a bit of its fantastic impact once the enemy has been identified and declared invincible, but the escalating interactions between the protagonists sustain the tension more than enough to keep you close to the screen. The always-reliable director Terence Fisher adds even more flair to an already astonishing film and never once loses his grip on the subject matter. "The Earth Dies Screaming" isn't the most startling Sci-Fi slash Horror highlight of that period, but it's undoubtedly a masterful achievement and one of the films that helped to define a cinematic era.

A low-budget film directed efficiently by British horror master Terence Fisher. The cheesy special effects and the poor aliens design don't ruin in any moment this very attractive science-fiction movie. Although the first part of the film is higher up of its last thirty minutes, the movie keeps the interest until the ending. Atmospherical shots, a conventional plot line ( a group of survivors of an environment disaster fight for their lives against an alien invasion )supported by a convincing script and fine actors direction. Not so fine as other science-fiction titles by Fisher himself as " The night of the big heat " or "Island of terror "it contains some splendid, very creative moments like the astoundin gopening credits where we assist to a chain of strange and apparently disconnected accidents ( including a train derailment ): a lesson of cinematographic economy and atmospheric invention worthy of this subversive and very talented director .

A warm-up by director Fisher for his "Island of Terror"(66) and "Night of the Big Heat"(67), this is a template for alien invasion pictures: there's a small group of survivors (in rural England) and marauding invaders, here in the form of slow-moving robots. Since the invaders never do move beyond a slow walk, they never seem to pose a serious threat unless you happen to run right up to them (which one of the characters does indeed do). Then they zap you with a touch of their cold hand and you eventually turn into a controlled zombie. It sounds a bit silly, but the film manages to convey an eeriness to the whole setting. Maybe because it's in black & white, it also reminded me a bit of "Night of the Living Dead"(68). The sense of isolation and the threat are very similar.

What sets this above other sci-fi films of the fifties & sixties is the lack of clunky, melodramatic dialog. The intent by the filmmakers and actors is that this is really happening. The survivors are an average group of citizens, caught in a traumatic situation. None of them are prepared or trained for something like this. There's always that one troublemaker in the group, of course, brandishing a revolver and behaving like an ass. But the story needs that extra tension to make it more interesting. It's low budget, but they didn't really need a lot of money to show empty streets or just several bodies littering the landscape. This one, though, really begs to be remade with a decent budget, as a full throttle invasion story. A similar Americanized version was the earlier "Target Earth"(1954).

I watched this movie late on cable and enjoyed every minute. It had all the ingredients of a classic B Movie. Aliens,Zombies,Quaint english village,Survivors of an environmental disaster,Hapless females,and dodgy acting. You have to love the old B Movies to really enjoy this film.

This is a great movie. I stumbled upon it in my quest to see all of the "1950's SciFi" movies. I was also drawn to it since the great Terence Fisher directed it.

The plot about a group of people trying to come to terms with an alien invasion has been done before and done since however for what ever reason this film just plays out fantastically well.

Certainly its no better or worse than many other films in the genre, but during the 60 odd minutes that it unspools it holds with rapt attention, something that many other supposedly better films fail to do.

I know that once seen it may fall from memory but while it may not remain foremost in your brain it will forever spring up when you see the title with a "Hey that was a really good film".

If you can see it, preferably late at night with all of the lights off.