THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955) *** "...maybe I should have had a few...maybe I will!" You should, then watch. What a lot of things there are to see and do in the universe. Brilliant ideas didn't just fall out of Raymond F. Jones' quill at the rate of, say, Kilgore Trout, but there are plenty of thoughts to entertain, and not just to laugh at. It's genre representative in all of the right ways. Rex Reason (as Cal, a fine name for a sci-fi hero) doesn't bother cultivating much personae beyond his alpha-male Fritz Wunderlich voice. Clifford Stine may not have had the Harryhausen monster-making touch (though there's no denying the grandeur of the mue-tant), but his special effects more than compensate with resourcefulness and an extended palate (Dali-like painted spacescapes with firecrackers going off in front of them, and the leads emerging into the scene from what apears to be an outhouse propped up in front). It is tempting to become lost in the contemplation of what Stine could present given contemporary budgets and technologies, or whether the relaxation of limitations might have instead stultified his extraordinary repertoire...whether he would have fallen onto big balls of expanding light and gadgetry as a crutch. Joseph Newman plays his modest hand perfectly, including the aesthetic recalcitrance of the actors. When Faith Domergue explains that "we're the geniuses [the aliens are] relying on to help them," it is perfect timing for the first bit of sympathy to be directed towards those extraterrestrials. Jeff Morrow's large tanned forehead shines as Exeter, the most empathetic of the aliens, and the one who might appear least inclined towards Stalinism (always an important consideration in those times).
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