Les monstres sur notre planète

This has to definitely be one of the better science fiction films of the mid to late 1950's. The only thing that hurts this film is the lousy title. The thing that really impressed me about it is the fact that this film isn't a typical B-movie. In fact, this film gives you a very thought provoking story as well as what another person said, a kind of poignancy that you never would expect from this type of film. In fact, you pretty much feel that towards the end of the film that Marge is actually falling for the alien posing as her beloved Bill. Also, you pretty much feel sorry for the impostor at the end as he is beginning to experience the emotions that he never had, especially love. Unfortunately, the film is undone by its typically lousy 1950's B-movie title. However, once you look past the title and look at how good the story is, you will see that this film is a pretty decent film.

Often over-looked gem from the 1950s, in which Gloria Talbott plays a young bride who discovers that her husband is actually an alien impostor, a member of an advance force of alien invaders who are secretly replacing the male populations in Gloria's town.

The female population on the alien's home planet has been wiped out by solar radiation prior to a nova, so their race is dying out. Now the aliens hope to `alter' the bodies of the Earth women so they can produce alien children. The script by Louis Vittes does a good job of dealing with the most unsettling aspect of the plot; alien husbands doing things with their human wives that only HUMAN husbands are supposed to do.

Vittes also manages to weave some very sly humor into the story. When Gloria goes to the local doctor for help in battling the aliens, he quickly realizes that the only men in town who are verifiably human are the ones whose wives are pregnant. So we see him hurrying into the waiting room of the hospital's maternity ward to round up a pose' to battle the aliens! Funny.

The aliens are scary and well designed, and the ray gun effects by ace effects artist John P. Fulton are above average. Don't be fooled by the unfortunate title; this is a fine entry to the list of 1950s sci-fi films.

Some of those sci-fi movies from the '50s linger in the memory because of the way they dramatize our most personal fears. "The Incredible Shrinking Man," for example, plays upon a man's fear of becoming weak and inadequate. "I Married a Monster from Outer Space" deals with a woman's fear of entering into a relationship which proves disappointing or even disturbing. (Some say the movie is a disguised account of a woman's marriage to a gay man.) I'm not sure I'd call the resulting movie a "classic," but its quiet, moody, and compassionate quality clearly puts it above most of the noisy, special-effects extravaganzas of today.

Gloria Talbot is both persuasive and appealing as the puzzled but faithful wife. (None of the shallow, comic-book character of Lara Croft here!) And the almost-too-good-to-be-true looks of the sexually-ambiguous Tom Tryon are put to effective use as the husband. As usual, the film's makers find an excuse to get his shirt off so we can get another look at that much-photographed torso. In this same scene, you'll also spot a bare-chested Ty Hungerford, just before he changed his name to "Ty Hardin" and became "Bronco" on the TV series. (And no, there's nothing sexually ambiguous about Ty.) Curiously, both men are included in the book, "Lash! The Hundred Great Scenes of Men Being Whipped in the Movies." Hardin's flogging in a "Bronco" episode ranks 26th and Tryon's whipping in "The Cardinal" ranks 46th.

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.