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    You Won't Believe Your Eyes! A Front Row Look at the Science Fiction and Horror Films of the 1950s
    You Won't Believe Your Eyes! A Front Row Look at the Science Fiction and Horror Films of the 1950s
    You Won't Believe Your Eyes! A Front Row Look at the Science Fiction and Horror Films of the 1950s
    Ebook679 pages11 hours

    You Won't Believe Your Eyes! A Front Row Look at the Science Fiction and Horror Films of the 1950s

    By Mark Thomas McGee

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    About this ebook

    Walking out of the theater showing Viking Women and the Sea Serpent and The Astounding She-Monster, one disappointed lad was heard to say, "They might as well have mugged us in the parking lot." This was Science Fiction's Golden Age, when giant bugs, prehistoric left-overs and  creatures from other planets filled the giant theater screens, movies that were usually made outside of the studio system on the cheap.

    Horror-hungry kids soon realized that nine times out of ten, the movie would be little more than a pale suggestion of what the posters promised. Nevertheless, we kept coming back, week after week, ever skeptical, ever hopeful, and then went home and read about the movies we just saw in Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine.

    This revised and expanded "Monster-Kids" edition of You Won't Believe Your Eyes! is an affectionate and funny look at the movies your parents didn't want you to see. You will hear from he actors who were in them, the people who made them, the critics who reviewed them, the exhibitors who showed them, and the children who saw them back in the day.


    "McGee knows this genre upside down and backwards, and writes with real authority. He loves these movies, and celebrates them as much for their goofy failings as for their imagination and entertainment value. Best of all, McGee is a terrific colloquial writer of great wit; I laughed out loud as I revisited many of my favorite pictures. You will too."
    David J. Hogan, author of Dark Romance and Film Noir FAQ

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBearManor Media
    Release dateMar 11, 2019
    ISBN9781386266631
    You Won't Believe Your Eyes! A Front Row Look at the Science Fiction and Horror Films of the 1950s

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      Book preview

      You Won't Believe Your Eyes! A Front Row Look at the Science Fiction and Horror Films of the 1950s - Mark Thomas McGee

      Part One: Riders to the Stars

      The first country that can use the Moon for the launching of missiles will control the Earth. That, gentlemen, is the most important military fact of this century.

      General Thayer, Destination Moon

      President Harry Truman was told that the best way the keep the money pouring into the war machine was to keep the American people terrified. So when the Soviet Union exploded their first atomic bomb in 1949, Truman made the most of it. It was an event that marked the beginning of The Cold War, a war between two political ideologies.

      Things really heated up when the Soviets put the first artificial satellite into orbit. Sputnik they called it. Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev said he’d bury us and it was beginning to look as if he might. We had to launch our own satellite to show them they weren’t so hot. And the space race was on.

      Ten…nine…eight…seven…six…five…four…three…two…one. Uh oh!

      Kaputnik.

      That’s what the British press called our rocket after it toppled and exploded on the launch pad. The egg was still dripping off our faces when the Soviets put a larger satellite into space…with a dog in it! President Dwight Eisenhower immediately diverted more money to the space program and before long the U.S. had its own satellite in orbit. And people began to think that maybe, just maybe, we might actually explore other planets one day, old business to sci-fi fans. We weren’t quite as excited as everyone else when Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, Jr. did their little moon walk. We’d seen it all nearly twenty years earlier in George Pal’s Destination Moon.

      I don’t know about you but whenever I think of rocketships and outer space and such, I always think of hot dogs. The two just seem to go together, don’t they? Anyway, the folks at the Luer Meat-Packing Plant in Los Angeles thought so. As a way of promoting their hotdogs, the Luer Spaceship would travel from town to town, stopping in supermarket parking lots along the way, offering free rides to children. It was a miniature version of the rocketship in Disneyland’s Tomorrowland, with sound effects and vibrating seats and outer space images on the viewing screen. It was pretty neat. And it all came about because a rival meatpacker, Oscar Meyer, had something called the Wienermobile. It was an eye-catcher all right, but it was a little unnerving to see a hot dog the size of a big-rig working its way through the city streets. Five’ll get you ten the son of a bitch was radioactive.

      The Space Patrol TV series (1950-1955) was my first exposure to outer space adventure. I watched it religiously and yet it’s as if I never watched it at all. I only have an impression of the show. It was live. I remember that. The actors would flub lines and knock over what few props they had and carry on like troupers. I remember that too. I’m sure the special effects were miserable. What I do remember vividly was their ray guns. I so wanted one of those. And then, miracle of miracles, one could be had for a few cereal box-tops and a small pittance. Like most of the things we sent away for to Battle Creek, Michigan, the gun was a major disappointment. It didn’t look anything like the guns they used on the show. But on this rare occasion, it proved to be even better. Never mentioned in the advertising, you could load the sucker with flour and shoot a stream that went a good ten feet. White smoke everywhere. I knew it wouldn’t be long before this wonderful weapon would be placed in protective custody. It was too messy. So I made the most of it while it was still in my possession. I no longer remember how many of my friends took a blast in the face, but it was enough to make me the envy of the block. I can’t recall any toy ever giving me so much pleasure. And from Battle Creek of all

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