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In the first few decades of filmmaking, the “monster movie” scene was dominated by classic supernatural creatures. Vampires (Nosferatu, Dracula), reanimated dead men (Frankenstein, The Mummy), werewolves (The Wolf Man), and other fiends culled from legend and Gothic literature were the order of the day. This changed in the wake of 1945’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki A-bombings and the dawning of the Atomic Age. As Martin Landau’s Bela Lugosi lamented in Ed Wood, “Today, it’s all giant bugs, giant spiders, giant grasshoppers…who would believe such nonsense?”
Audiences, apparently, believed it…or, at least, enjoyed watching it. By the early 1950s science fiction was supplanting horror as the more popular fantasy film genre. What’s more, a good portion of the decade’s “out there” fare spotlighted what were affectionately known as “Bug-Eyed Monsters” (B.E.M. for short). Some were radioactive mutations, some were extraterrestrial creatures, and some were even actual bugs. Grab the biggest can of Raid you can find, because we’re taking a look at a dozen classic–and not-so-classic–B.E.M.s of ’50s sci-fi cinema:
Invaders from Mars (1953) – A young boy (Jimmy Hunt) discovers his folks and other neighbors have been abducted and implanted with mind-control crystals by beings from the Red Planet. The eerie cult favorite has drawn comparisons to The Wizard of Oz. Its green Martian “mutant” soldiers have large eyes with small slits in them, the idea being that they can’t otherwise handle Earth’s increased sunlight.
It Came from Outer Space (1953) – Based on an original story by Ray Bradbury, this Universal outing is set in a remote Arizona hamlet where a spaceship crashes nearby. The pulsating, cyclopean aliens take over the bodies of several townspeople, but their intentions remain a mystery until the film’s conclusion. Fun Fact: An unused creature design for the “Xenomorphs” would turn up two years later as the Metaluna Mutant in This Island Earth.
War of the Worlds (1953) – 3-D movies were all the rage in the ’50s. It’s no surprise, then, that producer George Pal and his effects crew came up with a tri-segmented, single-eyed design for their Martian antagonists reminiscent of a camera lens (the aliens also had a robot camera with a similar lens setup). They bear little resemblance, of course, to the gray, tentacled blobs of H.G. Wells’ Victorian-era novel.
Killers from Space (1954) – Well, if the Invaders from Mars aliens had to squint on Earth, the bulgy-eyed beings from the planet Astron in Killers had just the opposite problem! To give his alien marauders their unsettling look, the makeup man for this low-budget shocker used painted compartments from plastic ice cube trays, with pupils poked out by a heated screwdriver. Leading man Peter Graves may be suggesting Visine.
Them! (1954) – See, I told you some of the BEMs would be honest-to-gosh insects. Atomic testing in the Southwest U.S. desert causes a colony of ordinary ants to mutate to the size of station wagons (kids, ask your parents). The final showdown between the insects and the Army occurs in the massive storm drain system beneath Los Angeles. Why do the ants, you ask, have large, single-pupil eyes instead of the compound peepers common to their smaller brethren? Chalk it up to budget demands or to radiation.
This Island Earth (1955) – Monsters don’t get much more “bug-eyed” than the Metaluna Mutants in this Universal gem. With their immense eyes, bulging brain and blood vessels, pincer-like hands, and work pants (!), these insectoid workers only appear in the film’s final 20 minutes or so. They nonetheless made a hit with moviegoers and have been featured in toys, plastic models, masks, and other paraphernalia.
Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957) – More big brains ready to pounce on their human prey! The cat-eyed creatures in this AIP outing were designed by effects guru Paul Blaisdell, who played one of the Saucer Men in some scenes. Another familiar name under the masks was 2′ 11″ Angelo Rossito, whose screen career ranged from Freaks to Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.
Monster from Green Hell (1957) – A U.S. space rocket carrying wasps for an experiment is bombarded with radiation and crashes in the African jungle. When a recovery team reaches the site, the insects have grown into…well, it’s hard to say what the title monster seen here is. Sure doesn’t look like a wasp, though, does it (see The Wasp Woman below)?
The Monster That Challenged the World (1957) – The animal kingdom phylum known as mollusks includes snails, clams, squid, octopuses…and, apparently, whatever this reawakened prehistoric giant is. Several of the caterpillar-like creatures emerge from their long-dormant eggs in California’s Salton Sea and start preying on unwary boaters. The impressive, life-size monster effect puts this “B” chiller a notch above its competitors.
The Crawling Eye (1958) – This English-made, Swiss Alps-set film is also known as The Trollenberg Terror. As you can see, however, its U.S. title is certainly more descriptive. Not only do the mountain-dwelling monstrosities crawl and have one eye, they can also take over humans’ minds and create an eerie mist to help hide their movements.
The Fly (1958) – Now that’s what I call a B.E.M.! Scientist André Delambre’s (David Hedison) disastrous teleportation experiment switches his atoms with those of a common housefly in this classic genre thriller. The big reveal, when we see André’s wife Hélène’s (Patricia Owens) horrified reaction multiplied through his compound eyes, is one of the most memorable moments in ’50s sci-fi.
The Wasp Woman (1959) – Okay, so that’s not how you do compound eyes! Still, at least they tried (the posters for this drive-in delight suggested a woman’s head on a giant wasp’s body). Producer/director Roger Corman once called the mask and make-up used by title star Susan Cabot “rather primitive.” Very diplomatic of you, Roger!
Those were the first 12 bug-eyed monsters that came to our minds. Do you have a favorite ’50s creature we failed to mention? Tell us about it in the comments below…and keep a fly swatter handy.