Me casé con un monstruo

This was such a great time to be a kid. We had a constant ration of these cold war movies. We were taught to duck and cover if we saw a nuclear flash. My sister and I went to see this as part of a double feature with "The Blob" about four times. Like "The Invasion of the Body Snatchers," there were aliens who were up to no good. Since they were the incarnation of the communists, they had no soul. They were there to force their ideology on us all, turn us into zombie like automatons. The danger in this movie came from the authorities who had been absorbed by the space critters. You just couldn't trust the police. The good thing was that if you knew who they were, you could kill them pretty much like other humans. And, when they died, they turned into pudding or applesauce or something that flowed out of their sleeves and pants legs. The hard part was like in "Invasion." You had to get the word out and convince people that what you were saying weren't the rantings of a lunatic. Nevertheless, we can take solace that good will out and the good old American way will turn those suckers into pudding.

Another thinly veiled reference to the Communist witch hunt, 'I Married A Monster From Outer Space' is a movie with a cheesy title and a decent story. Aliens have come to Earth to impersonate American men while using a ray-gun on the women (they really don't like hookers). The flip here is that while they ARE taking over the bodies & lives of the men they capture, they're trying to live the way we do. Are they also trying to love? It's almost touching. Even though the classic paranoia sci-fi flick 'Invasion Of The Body Snatchers' is an obvious influence, the second half is where the two movies diverge. You can almost root for the body snatchers in 'I Married A Monster'.

The B cast never humiliate themselves, but none of them are particularly memorable either. Gene Fowler Jr. (longtime editor, sometime director) leads his actors through the paces in competent fashion. Tom Tryon and Gloria Talbott don't cause too many sparks, but they're not really supposed to. Along with the actual subversion of humanity, this is also an allegory for how newlyweds can quickly grow apart and---okay, I'll say it---alienated. And although this movie is classified as horror/sci-fi, the American Film Institute saw fit to nominate it for their list of 400 great American love stories.

Filled with subtext and double-meanings (as so many overlooked B movies are), the flick accomplishes more by saying less. The F/X are about as dated and obvious as such things get, but they weren't perfect in other '50s genre films either. You might laugh at 'I Married A Monster', but you could do much worse for 78 minutes. This can't be said for half the modern movies out there, but you SHOULD look closer at this one.

Despite the fact that this film has a ridiculous title, it really is quite a little gem. During the 1950's the spread of Communism was the great fear in America and many films reflected this through the analogy of aliens infiltrating society. This movie is one of them....aliens taking over the population without being noticed....the guy next door may be a Communist (or a monster from outer space). Gloria Talbot,who appeared in a score of 50's movies (whatever happened to her?) does a good job as the suspicious wife but she wears one of the strangest pointed bras you've ever seen and even wears it in bed! Tom Tryon sleepwalks through the part of the husband, which in this film is appropriate for the role. He was a very bland actor and eventually went on to a sucessful career as a novelist. The black and white cinematography is well done and the film evokes a sense of impending doom. The special effects, which are limited, are not too bad...remember this was 1958. This film is a standout in a series of lower budget movies of the time but the awkward title may cause some to pass it by. Recommend it to a friend.

In Norrisville, Bill Farrell (Tom Tryon) leaves his bachelor party on the eve of his marriage with Marge Bradley (Gloria Talbott). He is abducted by an alien that takes his shape and marries Marge on the next day. Marge feels something strange with Bill and one year later she realizes that he is a totally different man. One day, Marge follows Bill and he goes to the woods; she finds that he is an alien and sees his spacecraft. She tries to tell to Washington and to the FBI, but the aliens have dominated key people in town that do not allow any sort of communication with the exterior world. What is the intention of the alien invasion?

"I Married a Monster from Outer Space" is a great sci-fi movie from the 50's. The storyline is a rip-off of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", with aliens switching places with humans in a small town with the purpose of breeding. But the plot is well-constructed and supported by good performances. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "I Married a Monster from Outer Space"

With a title this corny, I was expecting a lot of laughs, a fun B-movie with Ed Wood-style film-making. Well, I got them, but that mostly in the beginning. The bulk of the film is quite serious and holds up pretty well, even today.

The best lines, in the opening segments, come from "Marge" (Gloria Talbott), the one I quoted for the subject head. She said that on her wedding night at the restaurant, since her new husband seemed to be ignoring her. You see, her hubby had already been taken over by an extra-terrestrial being the night before. He just wasn't himself after that.....but who knew? Unfortunately, nobody for quite awhile in this story, which made life rough for poor "Marge Ferrell."

The lines in this film weren't just corny. Some of them were downright funny. At the guy's bachelor party, which began the show, the men had some humorous lines about marriage and freedom, and later in the show there are a couple of funny scenes. Later one of Marge friends acts goofy and remarks, "I just love to rehearse for weddings, especially when they are my own!" However, the story begins to get serious after the first 10-15 minutes and gets more and more so after Marge follows her husband one night and sees her odd-acting husband is not the man she thought she married. Laser beams and a spaceship will do that to you! From that point, it becomes a very familiar story for fans of sci-fi: something we've seen in a lot of films the past 50 years - aliens transform into humans and one that hasn't gets burned by family and friends she trusts because she doesn't realize they, too, have also turned into aliens.

In other words, this has a lot of "Invasion Of The Body Snatchers" type of paranoia story, just without the pods. "Invasion" was released two years earlier than this in 1956. Hollywood, lacking imaginative writers the past few decades, continues to make films with the same storyline as you see here., but this one can be excused because it was still fairly early in the genre.

Thanks to the actors here, and a few different twists, the movie keeps your attention. The only frustration is to see a person telling the truth and not being believed. Talbott, to me, was a familiar face because she acted in many television shows in the 1960s while Tyron, who got some hype for starring in "The Cardinal," a big-name film that bombed at the box office, wound up being a better writer than an actor. But when it comes to '50s sci-fi films, great acting isn't a requirement anyway, and most of us don't watch it for that.

Overall, this is pretty good, nothing super but certainly worth a look now that there is a good DVD transfer of it available. Yes, it is far better than the stupid title but still: don't take it too seriously - just have fun with it.

Note: the police captain was played by John Eldredge, a regular guest on "The Adventures Of Superman," in which he almost always played a villain. Also ex-boxer Maxie Rosenbloom is his normal entertaining self in here, playing, as usual, a bartender.