La morte viene dal pianeta Aytin

In SNOW DEVILS, havoc strikes in the Arctic, and climate change ensues. This has to do with Yeti whom are actually hairy-armed aliens wearing Bigfoot boots.

Apparently, our planet is doomed.

Enter Commander Jackson (Giacomo Rossi Stuart), a man with the most glorious pompadour on any human head. Ever! Jackson is dispatched to engage the aliens on their home turf. He's humanity's only hope.

This movie contains: Absurd action! Ridiculous romance! Dizzyingly dumb dialogue! Catastrophic costumes!

The "special" effects pretty much boil down to miniature displays on someone's billiard table, and outer space models with absolutely no effort made to make them appear even remotely realistic. In other words, this is a must-see for the true schlock enthusiast. So, if you're a connoisseur of crap, this is your BEN HUR!

An astonishing achievment...

The budgets of WILD WILD PLANET(1965) and WAR OF THE PLANETS(1966) ran out in this follow up to those films, using props and situations created in them. This one is earthbound and lacks the terrificly gaudy miniature future-scapes of the last two outings. And lacks the stars(Tony Russel, who actually has screen *presence* in the previous two).

Has a terrific opening score that playable several times, but the whole thing seems terribly set-bound, and small sets at that. But overall recalls to us a time of film-making long gone.

Fun stuff.

Although Italy was known for sword and sandal films (such as the Hercules and Machiste pictures) and the so-called spaghetti westerns in the 1960s, the country made many other types of movies...including some sci-fi. "La Morte Viene dal Pianeta Aytin" ("Snow Devils") is one of quite a few sci-fi movies that were dubbed into English and marketed in the States. While the film would look like absolute garbage when "2001: A Space Odyssey" debuted just a year later, for 1967 the effects are actually generally pretty good...at least when they weren't using cheap and fuzzy stock footage here and there during the story.

When the picture begins, the temperatures around the planet are on the rise and snow is melting everywhere. An expedition in the Himalayas stumbles into the cause...some aliens who have been there for 100 years waiting to unleash their plan. What is the plan of these big, furry blue aliens? To flood the Earth and then quickly freeze it to turn the planet into a giant glacier, as that's the sort of temperatures these aliens like. And, since they also plan on taking over the planet, who cares what happens to the humans?! Can our intrepid heroes defeat the aliens at this base? And, if they do, will it stop the climactic problems...or is there another battle looming in the near future?

The film is modestly entertaining albeit a bit silly here and there. But for a 1960s sci-fi movie, it's actually reasonably good. Too bad the magnificent special effects with "2001" would soon make these Italian exports look mega-crappy in comparison.

...although it frequently crosses over into "so-bad-it's-good" territory.

This Italian sci-fi turkey that's the fourth in a series, released by MGM and from director Antonio Margheriti aka Anthony Dawson, has Giacomo Rossi Stuart aka Jack Stuart starring as Commander Rod Jackson, a man-of-action in the employ of the United Democracies Space Command, aka Gamma 1. He and his sidekick Captain Frank Pulasky (Freddy Unger) are sent to the Himalayas after HQ loses communication with a Gamma 1 weather station. Fellow Gamma 1 employee Lisa Nielson (Amber Collins) tags along to look for her boyfriend, Lt. Jim Harris (Rene Baldwin), who was the weather station chief. When they finally reach their destination, our heroes discover a race of Yetis, snow-dwelling ape creatures with a sinister secret agenda.

The "Gamma 1" series includes The Wild Wild Planet (1966), The War of the Planets (1966), War Between the Planets (1966), this film, and finally The Green Slime (1968). They all have tacky costumes and set design, terrible effects, and laughable plots to go along with the requisite awful dubbing. Stuart and Collins seem to be in a contest for most ridiculous hairstyle, while bad guy Meniconi looks like Zach Galifianakis in bad cosplay. Bradley is also an odd member of the cast as a black Himalayan porter and comic relief (I think).

The Snow Devils is set in the same universe as War of the planets and Wild Wild Planet, but unlike those films, the action takes place largely on Earth. It seems that someone or something is affecting Earth's weather and not in a good way. The intrepid members of the gamma space station set out to find out what's going on. Even for the mid 60s, the special effects in this film are, well, let's say watery. The story is knuckleheaded, but rather fun and there's that killer music score, which probably deserved a better home in another movie. Still, for kids in the 60s, this kind of film was catnip. If you can get in touch with your ten year old self, or are a fan of b movies, you will enjoy 80 or so minutes of silly fun.