Invasion of the Saucer Men [Invasion of the Hell Creatures] ** (1957, Steven Terrell, Gloria Castillo, Frank Gorshin, Raymond Hatton, Lyn Osborn, Russ Bender) – Classic Movie Review 3,759

Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957) has irresistible ingredients: a flying saucer landing in the woods, tiny aliens with giant heads and exposed brains, a creature run down by teens, a mobile alien severed hand, and death by alcohol injection.

Joan: ‘I expected to be frightened on my wedding night, but nothing like this.’

Director Edward L Cahn’s no-budget 1957 American black-and-white comic sci-fi horror thriller movie Invasion of the Saucer Men has some irresistible choice ingredients on offer: a flying saucer landing in the woods, tiny aliens with giant heads and exposed brains, a creature run down by teens, menace by a mobile alien severed hand, and death by alcohol injection via aliens’ retractable needle fingernails.

It stars Steven Terrell, Gloria Castillo, Raymond Hatton and Frank Gorshin, and is written by Robert Gurney Jr and Al Martin, based on the 1955 short story The Cosmic Frame by Paul W Fairman.

It all starts when a flying saucer lands in the woods and a couple of American teenagers, Johnny and Joan (Steven Terrell, Gloria Castillo), making love in the woods, accidentally run over one of the little green men alien creatures with their car. The responsible teenagers leave the scene to report the accident and the deceased alien.

Frank Gorshin plays town drunk Joe Gruen, who stumbles across the alien’s corpse and plans to store the alien in his fridge. Joe returns back to the scene, but other aliens soon arrive and inject alcohol into his veins and Joe dies happy of alcohol poisoning. The aliens remove their dead friend and replace it with Joe.

Johnny and Joan return with the sheriff, and find Joe’s body at the scene of the accident instead of the alien’s. The dead creature’s hand falls off, but it comes alive, and begins to stalk the teens.

Of course it was all originally intended to be deadly earnest and serious but the movie ends up too funny not to be called a comedy, though it was X rated in its day. Never mind, whichever way you look at it, it is a lot of amusing campy fun, especially for the alien creatures, with their hideous looking bulbous heads.

It also stars Raymond Hatton as Farmer Larkin and Lyn Osborn as Artie Burns.

Also in the cast is Russ Bender, Douglas Henderson, Sam Buffington, Jason Johnson, Don Shelton, Kelly Thordsen, and Ed Nelson.

The monsters are created by the legendary special effects creator Paul Blaisdell, who also created the flying saucer that was later re-used in the opening scene of The Outer Limits: Controlled Experiment (1964) and designed the iconic Tabanga monster for From Hell It Came (1957). He is also known for his work on The She-Creature, Not of This Earth (1957) and It! The Terror from Beyond Space.

The film, which takes place on one night, is almost entirely shot on a large studio sound stage.

Invasion of the Saucer Men is directed by Edward L Cahn, runs 69 minutes, and was made by Malibu Productions, is released by American International Pictures, is written by Robert Gurney Jr and Al Martin, based on the 1955 short story The Cosmic Frame by Paul W Fairman, is shot in black and white by Frederick E West, is produced by James H Nicholson and Robert Gurney Jr, and is scored by Ronald Stein.

Release date: June 19, 1957.

The cast

The cast are: Steven Terrell as Johnny Carter, Gloria Castillo as Joan Hayden, Frank Gorshin as Joe Gruen, Lyn Osborn as Artie Burns, Raymond Hatton as Farmer Larkin, Sam Buffington as Colonel Ambrose, Douglas Henderson as Lt Wilkins, Kelly Thordsen as Sgt Bruce, and Ed Nelson as Tom.

Paul Blaisdell and his assistant Bob Burns III play two of the aliens. Dwarf actors Angelo Rossito, Eddie Gibbons, Dean Neville and Lloyd Dixon play the others alternately.

Paul Blaisdell provided four alien costumes, a mobile severed hand and a flying saucer. He recalled that the film was intended as a serious horror film but gradually developed into a comedy.

American International Pictures released it in a double bill with I Was a Teenage Werewolf (1957), advertising: ‘We DARE You To See The Most Amazing Pictures of Our Time!’

It was remade in 1965 as the much more terrible The Eye Creatures [Attack of the Eye Creatures], with exactly the same plot and much of the same dialogue.

Morbo in the animated series Futurama is modelled on the aliens in this movie.

Invasion of the Hell Creatures is the UK title.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3,759

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