Les envahisseurs invisibles

Invisible aliens stationed on the moon have had enough of Earth's atomic tomfoolery. So they use reanimated dead bodies of humans to let the nations of the world know they mean business, delivering an ultimatum that Earth better surrender to them or else! Now a group of people gather together in a bunker laboratory to work on a way to defeat the invisible invaders while zombies lurk outside.

Edward L. Cahn directed this campy and cheap sci-fi movie with a muddled anti-nuke message. The special effects are poor with an overuse of stock footage and a monotone narration (one of the staples of no-budget sci-fi flicks back in the day). Still, Cahn produces a reasonable amount of atmosphere and it kept my interest throughout. The short runtime helps. It stars washed-up stars John Agar, John Carradine, and Robert Hutton, along with Jean Byron (of Patty Duke Show fame) and venerable character actor Philip Tonge. Other reviewers have pointed out that the movie might have inspired Night of the Living Dead. Whether that's truly the case or not, I don't know, but it is certainly something for movie buffs to chew on. Not a particularly good picture but fun in its way. Fans of '50 sci-fi will like it more than most.

This is typical 1950's B movie fare but I think it is a few notches above the rest. Ok, the acting is a bit hammy and campy even with the talents of John Agar, John Carradine and Jean Byron. The idea of the film is unique. Aliens, invisible to humans land on earth, inhabit the bodies of the dead to take over the planet. There are some stretches of boredom as frantic scientists and military personel try and figure out a way to combat the "invisible invaders", but at certain times this movie can give off a few chills. The reason for this is because at certain times, the movie resembles "Night Of The Living Dead" some 9 years earlier. The scenes of the "invaders" rumbling around as the recently revived dead are quite effective. The dead are almost as convincing as they were in "NOTLD". They roam around seemingly with no purpose though they do have one, arms outstreched, emotionless faces with darkened eyes. Quite effective and chilling in certain areas. Rest assured this movie is not "NOTLD" and pretty much is typical B fare but it does provide glimpses of a soon to come clasic and can give you a chill or two. I'd say rent it or better yet, buy it for your collection. It's fun!

Invisible invaders arrive in invisible spaceships and warn Earth they can and will take over the planet in three days. To do this they take over the bodies of the recently dead. Sound familiar? Well hold on because this 1959 thriller got here before PLAN NINE FROM OUTER SPACE (1959), LAST MAN ON EARTH (1962), and NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968). John Carradine picked up a quick paycheque playing Dr. Karol Noymann, a scientist killed in a lab explosion who becomes the first one resurrected by the aliens. (Interesting enough "Karol Noymann" was also the name of a scientist in the 1957 sci/fi'er THE GIANT CLAW directed by Fred F. Sears. Coincidence?) Air Force officer John Agar and spineless scientist Robert Hutton spend way too much of the 66 minute movie fighting over who gets to fall in love with femme physicist Jean Byron. The briefly seen alien invaders look suspiciously like the title monster in IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE; and since Edward L. Cahn directed both pictures it is highly likely that he did not want to waste a chance to re-use the costume. Many movies ask us to suspend our disbelief but this one demands we leave all logic outside before we enter the cinema. The aliens, via Mr. Carradine, inform us that they invaded the moon 20,000 years ago and destroyed the civilisation living there. They have also managed to make everything on their planet invisible, which probably means they spend a lot of time bumping into things. The destruction of Earth is accomplished by stock footage from action serials and newsreel footage of real life disasters. B-movie fans will note that Hal Torey, playing a farmer killed by Agar in self defence and then returned to life as an invader, proved such a memorable figure that MTV exploited his image in commercials and on t-shirts for much of the late 1980's. Also showing up briefly is Chuck Niles who played the mad hunchback in Jerry Warren's memorable TEENAGE ZOMBIES. John Agar had fought monsters before in TARANTULA, THE MOLE PEOPLE and many others. He finally became a monster himself in the rarely seen 1962 thriller HAND OF DEATH. Robert Hutton would soon meet up with THE MAN WITHOUT A BODY (1959) and THE SLIME PEOPLE (1963). For all it's low budget short-comings this is a fun film; just the sort to make a Saturday afternoon enjoyable.

We don't see too much of John Carradine, but we sure hear a lot from him as the disembodied voice of the Invisible Invaders coming to a planet near you.

Carradine's a scientist who is killed in a lab explosion. His cadaver is then used by a group of aliens who are invisible to communicate with fellow scientist Phillip Tonge. Tonge's a Linus Pauling type, wanting the world to disarm before Armeggeddon. Of course one encounter with the invisible crowd and he's seen the error of his ways.

The aliens attack, opening the cemeteries and letting loose a gang of zombies on the world. Humans retreat to the underground and in one such bunker is Tonge, his daughter Jean Byron, fellow scientist Robert Hutton and John Agar to lend some military muscle to the project of finding the weapon that will destroy the invisible fiends.

Though it's not quite as campy as Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, Invisible Invaders is right up there. If I had to make a guess as to which player appeared in more garbage in his career, the answer would be John Carradine. His film career lasted over 50 years and a voice that gave life to Shakespeare was used for science fiction at it's worst.

I think Carradine just liked the paycheck and he also probably just loved hamming it up in parts like these. He made a lot of these awful films somewhat endurable.

Robert Hutton and John Agar were a couple of once promising players who had seen their best days and now were scratching out a living in science fiction. Jean Byron though would shortly see her career part as Patty Duke's mother in the Patty Duke Show.

But I'll bet she never saw sights in Brooklyn Heights like these invisible ones.

I have to admit this was fun to watch despite how ridiculously silly it was or maybe because of that. This isn't a zombie movie in the modern sense, but a sci-fi alien offshoot of the mind-controlled zombies out of the voodoo genre. It's a big slice of black & white American cheese all the way which seems to use a lot of disaster stock footage for invasion scenes that involve conventional sabotage, but it manages to be pretty entertaining anyways.

The director also made 50's sci-fi movie "It! The Terror from Beyond Space" (which helped inspire lots of trapped on a spaceship with a creature film, including "Alien") and the swimming zombified sailors guarding buried treasure film "Zombies of Mora Tau" (which I still haven't seen yet as of writing this review).

THE PLOT: A scientist ditches out on his gov't job because he opposes nukes. A fellow scientist killed in an experiment walks up to his house and has a chat with him, but its not his friend. It's an alien who is none too happy with where out technological advancements are headed (reaching nuclear technology and space travel) and the threat they could pose to their outer space alien race and they want us to surrender or die (this was a common sci-fi plot thread back in the day). They are apparently invisible as are their spaceships awaiting us at their hidden base on the moon and the aliens can take over corpses and walk around in them sabotaging our planet. It's a race against time for the scientists to find a method to combat the alien menace before the walking dead breach the military bunker.

It doesn't have a lot of the elements of modern zombie films like gut munching or turning from being bitten (though the aliens will inhabit your body if you are killed), but it's kinda fun and has some good silly quotes. So bad you might think it's good 50's sci-fi fun.