Product description

Earth vs. The Flying Saucers [1956] (REGION 1) (NTSC)

Price: £13.58
Average customer rating: 4.5

Binding : DVD
EAN : 0043396226197
Label : Sony Pictures
Manufacturer : Sony Pictures
Publisher : Sony Pictures
Release date : 2008-01-15
Title : Earth vs. The Flying Saucers [1956] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actor : Array
Format : Array
Languages : Array
Number of items : 2
Original release date : 1956-01-01
Region code : 1
Running time : 83
Studio : Sony Pictures
Theatrical releaseDate : 1956
MPN : COLD22619D

Editorial reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
Notable neither for its director nor its stars, Earth vs the Flying Saucers has been given the widescreen DVD treatment rather because of its special-effects man, the legendary Ray Harryhausen.

A Twilight Zone styled voiceover introduces Dr Marvin Russell and his wife of two hours as they're buzzed by an overhead flying saucer--the first of many. When a translation device reveals the saucer-occupants' fiendish plan to take over the world, it's time for a good old army-alien punch-up. Cue screenfuls of avuncular patriarchs, loads of techno-flannel space-speak and plenty of gratuitous American-monument destruction.

A by-numbers B-movie, this is only really notable for Harryhausen's stop-motion FX work--and though this, his fifth feature, isn't a patch on his later Technicolor masterpieces, his trick of demolishing facsimiles of recognisable landmarks is cited by many premier filmmakers as being hugely influential on their work. This is very much of its time, the saucer-people arousing few of the thrills engendered by his later creations (Sinbad's Cyclops, for example). And with Cold War fears now just a memory, the Ruskies, or rather aliens, can no longer prevail upon a zeitgeist of xenophobic paranoia for their power.

On the DVD: Earth vs the Flying Saucers's black-and-white picture is clean and crisp in this anamorphic 1.85:1 widescreen transfer and the Dolby digital mono soundtrack is clear enough. The theatrical trailer will please fans of kitsch, as will the featurette "This Is Dynamation" produced at the same time as the first Sinbad movie. The real corker here though is the generously proportioned documentary "The Harryhausen Chronicles": narrated by Leonard Nimoy, it features a stellar cast of devotees (George Lucas among them) waxing lyrical about the influence of Harryhausen's films, and allows the man himself to ramble fascinatingly over clips of his filmic canon. If you're a fan, it's Harryhausen heaven. --Paul Eisinger

Customer reviews

review by: droogzilla date: 2008-09-25 rating:

'If they land on the White House lawn uninvited, we won't meet them with tea and cookies;'
----the above statement---lifted wholesale from actual dialogue within the movie itself-----sums up perfectly the overall tone of this lurid but luxuriating, epic opus from RAY HARRYHAUSEN.

Essentially a briskly bludgeoning comic-strip treatment [riddled with dubious 1950s Mc Carthy-style paranoia] the entertainment level never seriously relents, and the whole is a vigorously dynamic, one-off romp, in which RAY'S ingenious skills are utilized to novel, highly unusual effect: ie, the animated attractions are spinning saucers, with not a whiff of a 'standard' articulated model-creature.

I ntruiging use of actual mid-air carnage [in which there MUST have been some real-life casualties] are used as background plates to the animated mayhem, which perhaps raise some ethical questions as their suitability as 'entertainment', but overall, HARRYHAUSEN works true miracles of epic destruction on a shoestring budget, and even the wholly cheapskate scenes possess an inherent period charm which add greatly to the finished article, and there are several eerily-effective, atmosherically-lit setpieces, including a vast saucer docked on a midnight beachfront, and a forest-fire stagily done, but still the stuff of lurid pulp that I for one certainly appreciate.

MARLOWE'S performance is instilled of stoney-faced, macho-posturing bravauda, and his heroine composite opposite is a darkly dusky, beautiful 50s babette. What more can you ask for? A personal highlight in the HARRYHAUSEN canon; with characteristic vision stamped all over the splendid project; an impossibility in today's overstaffed Hollywood extravaganzas, which employ up to a thousand SPFX employees, to sterile, mind-numbing effect.

TERIFFIC FANTASY FILM.

review by: gavbro date: 2006-01-29 rating:

They don't make them like this any more!
Fans of Ray Harryhausen may want to know that there are none of the monsters that make his work so well loved in this film. His work in this film is on the flying saucers, and the various scenes of them crashing.

The story line is entertaining, and the acting is not bad. The aliens are pretty low budget, which to new viewers will be funny, though obviously this was not the intention at the time.

There are none of the stupid gung-ho type charecters we get in such films now (Will Smith, I'm looking at you!), and there is a little more depth in terms of exploring the reaction to finding the existance of aliens.

Good family fun.

review by: theoriginalnooj date: 2005-01-10 rating:

Mars Attacks??
Tim Burton, see me after class for copying someone elses' work!
This has to be the inspiration for Mars Attacks, the spinning saucers, translating the alien language, the saucers flying over the cities and landmarks of the world, especially the Washington Monument scene, the Death-Ray the saucers use, even the way the saucer-men are beaten in the end. If you've seen Mars Attacks, you need to see this as well.
The big difference being though, that this film isn't a comedy. Well, not intentionally, the usual 50's Sci-Fi bad acting, laughable dialogue and ridiculous costumes are all there, but this film has an ace up it's sleeve, the hero of the film. Not the lead actor, oh no, the special effects guy.
Ray Harryhausen's effects make this film 10 years ahead of it's time. People are knocking out less convincing animation today, the guy is a genius in his field. Also the direction has quite a 'modern' feel to it, the story flows like something from the 90's rather than the 50's, perhaps helped along by the way Harryhausen shoots his scenes, his lighting and timing are spot on.
These two elements make this film stand head and shoulders above its contemporaries, it's 50's Sci-Fi, B-movie trash for the thinking man.

review by: date: 2004-10-18 rating:

Awesome scifi
Whatever your prejudices against the genre, this is one 1950s scifi that you owe it to yourself to watch. I am only gradually becoming convinced that the genre is worthwhile, and this title is a jewel in its crown. So what if the director and even all its stars are complete unknowns, and that the special effects director Ray Harryhausen is the most household name here.

The film is so well-scripted that modern-day scifi epics ought to take notice and make a little more effort. Relationships are beautifully and organically interwoven, and the spectacular scenes of destruction are sublimely imaginative and astonishingly well-crafted, not likely to be forgotten any day soon.

review by: date: 2003-09-10 rating:
Ed Wood would be proud
A really ripping yarn in a 50's sci-fi kind of way.What really cracks me up though is some of the effects, no doubt outstanding and acceptable in their day -they now make you laugh out loud.
Watch out for the guy trying to start a generator -at one point you can clearly hear the motor turning over while all he does is fiddle with a rubber hose."But wait there's more" who could forget the hero trying on an alien helmet -ClearlY a plastic bucket!How the other actors kept a straight face in this scene i'll never know.
Its a must for any sci-fi or "its sooo bad its good" fan.

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