Lobster Man from Mars

It took two weeks to write and ten years to finish. In 1977 writer Bob Greenberg and I were offered $50,000 to make a science fiction movie. We thought that instead of trying to hide the low budget, we would make it a central theme using the gimmick of a film-within-a-film.

Such was the genesis of Lobster Man From Mars. We wrote the screenplay in two weeks, but the money to shoot the movie never appeared. The project was set aside until the tragic demise of Bob Greenberg in an auto accident. I was determined to get Bob's name on the screen as a writer, and thanks to the efforts of producer Steven Greene, this became a reality.

Production began during the summer of 1988 --- a mere 10 years after writing the screenplay --- and culminated with the world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival six months later. The version shown at the festival was a 95 minute "first cut", later revised to 81 minutes, then released to theaters, television and home video in the shorter format.

The special director's edition DVD is one that has never been seen by the public, having only existed on a computer editing program! I've taken some of the better moments from the long version and have integrated them with the shorter version. And now, thanks to the modern miracle of computer editing, I've added new low-tech, even cheaper looking special effects, never before possible. Once again, the Lobster Man lives!

Voracious flesh eaters from Mars invade the Earth! A very funny bad movie made for the cost of coffee and donuts on any of today's blockbuster epics. The film's star Tony Curtis puts this picture right up there with "Some Like It Hot" and "Spartacus" - he says so right there on the DVD edition this movie.

If you are a fan of trashy science fiction, you will most certainly enjoy this humorous spoof of such classics as "Invaders from Mars", "Night of the Ghouls" and "Teenagers from Outer Space".

It can all be summed up in this typical line of dialogue spoken by Professor Plocostomos (Patrick Macnee)... "If you were a Lobster Man, would you enter a haunted house surrounded by artillery?"

Well, would you?

i just bought this movie for 2bucks thinking that it will surely be worth it's cost... and i was so right!! i saw it with a friend of mine and we just loved it's (mostly intended) badness. There are movies that are just bad and then there are these flicks that are so freaking' bad that they are really entertaining. the movie made me really laugh hard a couple of times and Tony Curtis just rocked being this bad producer. the day after i watched it i immediately wanted to watch it again.. and if that's not positive about a film.. for a movie as "b" as one movie could be, the cast isn't that bad: Tony Curtis and Patrick McNee are two stars of the 80ies, starring here and they do a good job (being bad). the story is really strange: i mean a lobster man and his adjutant, an ape with a spacehelmet, stealing earth's air for the mars is not a common thing in Hollywood. the characters are all very funny and the story is except for some lengths in the middle very amusing.. i'll give it an 9 out of 10

Stanley Sheff's goofy sci-fi take on Mel Brooks' The Producers is smart enough to not take itself too seriously, nor too self-consciously play up how "bad" it is. As opposed to such contrived "cult" films like the crass Sharknado series or the ineffective likes of NAKED MONSTER, GIANT PAPIER MACHE BOULDER, this one just hums along gleefully to its own beat.

The title is attributed to Orson Welles who originally was slated to play JP Sheldrake, a film mogul who buys the cheezy movie, 'Lobster Man From Mars', as a tax shelter scheme. Tony Curtis enjoyably chews the scenery as Sheldrake. Anthony Hickox and Deborah Foreman (VALLEY GIRL) play the couple who made the film within a film. Patrick Macnee and Billy Barty play actors in the crustacean epic and Bobby Pickett is the King of Mars. It's all done with tongue firmly in cheek, but, humbly and amiably so. The cast, SFX, Music, Costumes and Cinematography follow suit.

P. S. I knew a good number of people who worked on the film including lead actress Debbie Foreman and had worked with Tony Curtis. I even got to visit the set. Gives it a bit of extra nostalgia to me.

A film within a film; a producer needing a tax write-off agrees to screen and buy the rights to a student film called LOBSTER MAN FROM MARS. Most the of the film spent viewing the film which about an alien lobster man wrecking havoc on Earth. The producer finds the film so shoddy that he agrees to buy it in order to lose money so he doesn't owe the IRS so much money. The film is obviously inspired by the producers. The film is loaded with many jokes that only buffs of horror and science fiction films would get. For example: the colonel is named "Ankrum", after Morris Ankrum who played military men and other authority figures in dozens of 1950's science fiction and horror films. The film is loaded with gags like these that most viewers probably would not get. I would mention any more as I would not want to spoil it for people who are in the know.