Francois Truffaut’s, Fahrenheit 451 (1966) - Part 2

 

Commentary

(Some spoilers below...)

Background & Production

Truffaut’s film is based on Ray Bradbury's famous novel, Fahrenheit 451. It was Truffaut's first color film and his only non French-language film. At the 1966 Venice Film Festival, Fahrenheit 451 was nominated for the Golden Lion.

In a detailed diary Truffaut kept during the production, he referred to Fahrenheit 451 as being his "saddest and most difficult" film-making experience, mainly because of intense conflicts between Werner and himself, about which much has been made by others. For instance, Oskar Werner supposedly cut his hair for the final scene to create a continuity error, being motivated by his hatred for the director. For the last two weeks, both men reportedly didn't speak to one another. Still, what work place doesn’t have conflict and difficult interpersonal relationships? Not all films that have cast and crew holding hands and singing Kumbaya turn out to be masterpieces. It’s the end result that counts and in the case of Truffaut’s film, it’s a pretty good result.

Julie Christie was originally cast as just Linda Montag, with the part of Clarisse being offered to Jean Seberg and Jane Fonda, with even Tippi Hedren being considered. Truffaut ultimately decided that Christie be cast in both roles as two sides of the same coin so to speak. Julie Christie agreed to star in this film for $200,000, while her asking price at the time was $400,000.

The film was shot at Pinewood Studios in England. The monorail exterior scene was taken at the French SAFEGE test track in Châteauneuf-sur-Loire near Orléans, France. It was dismantled shortly after filming. The film featured the Alton housing estate in Roehampton, south London, and Edgcumbe Park in Crowthorne, Berkshire. The final "Book People" book reciting scene was filmed at Black Park near Pinewood. It was hoped the weather would improve for the final days of shooting. Instead, it had begun snowing during the night. The presence of snow in the final shots was unexpected and unplanned but proved to be effective.

The production work was done in French, as Truffaut spoke virtually no English but co-wrote the screenplay with Jean-Louis Richard.

The movie's opening credits are spoken rather than displayed in type, which suggests what life would be like in a society in which the printed word is banned.

Truffaut’s “Fahrenheit 451” doesn’t offer us a sleek whiz-bang typical sci-fi 'futuristic' view of the future. Unlike Bradbury’s book, there is no deadly mechanical hound. Bradbury wasn’t focused on anticipating the possible great technological advancements of the future. Instead of such details, he would focus on presenting “what if?” scenarios and considering implications and consequences for humanity. What we do have though in the film version are commuters traveling via monorail and living rooms with wall screens uncannily resembling our own 21st century HDTV sets. The houses are uniform ‘60s style modernist functional but soulless structures that seem to contain retro gadgets like the wall phones. Even the red fire engines look like dinky Tonka toys rather than massive high-tech futuristic beasts. Such elements seem to suggest to the viewer that we are dealing with a world that is not too far removed from our own experience.

Read on for more....

Sci-Fi Stories That Inspired Classic Sci-Fi Films: “When Worlds Collide” (1933) by Philip Wylie and Edwin Balmer

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3574871

Hello readers! Good to be back after a bit of a break from all matters blogging. I thought I might start off with a novel I have just finished reading which I hope you will enjoy if you haven't read it yet.......

Spoilers follow below......

“When Worlds Collide” is a 1933 science fiction novel co-written by Philip Wylie and Edwin Balmer. It was first published as a six-part monthly serial (September 1932 to February 1933) in Blue Book magazine, illustrated by Joseph Franké.

The story was adapted into a film in 1951 with George Pal’s sci-fi classic version of “When Worlds Collide” which is featured in this blog. The film was produced by George Pal and directed by Rudolph Maté.

In both the book and film versions, a select group of humans with superior intelligence are to board a spaceship constructed to escape the earth which is destined to be obliterated by an oncoming planet. If they survive the initial escape into space, the remnants of the human race will settle on another planet where they will found a human colony.

In Wylie and Palmer’s book, Sven Bronson, a Swedish astronomer working at an observatory in South Africa, discovers a pair of rogue planets, Bronson Alpha and Bronson Beta,both of which will soon enter the Solar System.

It is calculated that in eight months’ time, the two intruding planets will pass close enough to cause catastrophic damage to the Earth. After they swing around the sun sixteen months later, the larger of the planets, a gas giant called Bronson Alpha will return to destroy the Earth before it leaves. On the other hand, Bronson Beta which appears to be more Earth-like and potentially habitable will remain and achieve a stable orbit. It is on Bronson Beta that hopes for the continued survival of the human race will depend.

Cole Hendron leads a group of scientists who work desperately to build an atomic rocket that will contain a select number of people, together with animals and equipment and transport them to Bronson Beta before the earth is destroyed. It turns out that only 100 out of about thousand people Hendron had recruited will be able to take up places on the rocket. It seems also that other nations have similar projects underway.

Hendron is assisted by his daughter Eve who forms a relationship with young business man, Tony Drake and a kind of complicated love triangle develops between Tony, Eve and Ransdell during the course of the story. Not to mention the complicated moral and ethical questions that arise with having to start civilisation from scratch on a new planet with a limited number of people. Monogamous love relationships and pairings may not suit the new circumstances!

In preparation for the first encounter, vulnerable coastal regions in the US are evacuated along with the “planting vast areas of land in crops.” When the expected planetary encounter occurs, massive tidal waves sweep inland and the earth is wracked by tremendous volcanic eruptions and earthquakes accompanied by raging wild weather. The images conjured up by the descrption of the upheavals and destruction are more vivid than what appeared on screen in the film version.To add cosmic insult to injury, Bronson Alpha approaches close to and destroys the Moon.

Meanwhile, the US President has taken up residence in Hutchinson, Kansas, which has become the temporary capital of the United States. Massive geological transformations have occurred with flooding of the entire Southeast region along with the Great Lakes emptying into the Saint Lawrence region, and Connecticut turning into an island archipelago.

South African pilot David Ransdell and two comrades use a plane to survey the scenes of destruction. During a battle with a desperate mob, the three intrepid souls are wounded but are able to bring back to the encampment a sample of a rare and essential heat-resistant metal which can be used to make rocket tubes capable of withstanding the heat of the atomic exhaust.

With just five months to go before the final encounter, a desperate battle erupts between attacking mobs and those defending the camp. Over half of Hendron's people perish in the assault before they use the rocket in a novel way to defeat their assailants. Look for the wonderfully ‘surreal’ description of the man on horseback at the end of the battle! The sheer desperation involved in the fight for survival is very effectively conveyed in the story.

With the newly acquired metal helping to solve the rocket tube heating problem, a second, larger ship is constructed that can carry all of the remaining survivors in Hendron’s camp.

With the end of the earth imminent, both rockets manage to take off but lose contact with each other. Other ships also manage to launch from Europe but the French rocket is seen to explode in the upper atmosphere.

The first rocket rocket carrying Hendron makes a successful landing on Bronson Beta, which appears to be habitable. It is not known however if anyone else had made it.

************

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11348604

The 1951 Technicolour Paramount Pictures film version “When Worlds Collide” starring Richard Derr, Barbara Rush, Peter Hansen, and John Hoyt is as has already been noted based on the 1933 science fiction novel of the same name.

The film version tells the story of the Earth being destined to be destroyed by a rogue star called Bellus and of a space ark being constructed to transport a select group of men and women to Bellus' single planet, “Zyra.”

South African Pilot David Randall is given the task of flying top-secret photographs from South African astronomer Dr. Emery Bronson to Dr. Cole Hendron in the United States. Hendron, with the assistance of his daughter Joyce, confirms the undeniable fact that a rogue star named Bellus is on a collision course with Earth.

Hendron warns the United Nations that the world will end in eight months’ time and makes an appeal for the immediate construction of "arks" to transport a select few to Zyra, the planet orbiting Bellus. Despite it being the only hope for the human race to be be saved from extinction, Hendron’s claims and appeal are rejected by the UN delegates.

Wealthy benefactors step in to arrange for a lease on a former proving ground to build an ark while wheelchair-bound business magnate Sidney Stanton offers to finance the construction of the ark on condition that he select the passengers. Hendron insists he only has the right to buy a seat aboard the ark. The ugly and selfish nature of the Stanton character is focussed on to a greater extent in the film version as opposed to the rather brief treatment of a similar somewhat mentally warped and deranged character in the book.

Joyce convinces her father into hanging on to the intrepid Randall (whom she seems to take a liking to), much to the displeasure of her boyfriend, Dr. Tony Drake.

As Bellus inexorably approaches, it becomes evident that Hendron was right all along. Everyone gets into gear with spaceships being constructed in other nations, martial law being declared and populations in coastal regions being evacuated to inland cities.

When Zyra approaches first, massive earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tidal waves occur around the world. Later, Drake and Randall drop off supplies to people in the surrounding area by helicopter. A moment of truth arrives when Randall gets off the copter to rescue a little boy stranded on a rooftop in a flooded area. Drake thinks about resolving the eternal love tirangle situation by flying away, but being the good fella he is decides to return. What a guy!

With a constant, urgent and insistent countdown to destiny, the rocketship is loaded with food, equipment, necessary provisions and animals. The passengers are to be then selected by lottery, with places already reserved for Hendron, Stanton, Joyce, Drake, pilot Dr. George Frey, Randall and the young boy who was rescued. This brings the number of passengers to 45.

Randall, believing he lacks any useful skills for starting civilisation anew, pretends to draw a lottery number, but our “what a guy” Drake informs Randall that Frey has a heart condition and that if he doesn’t manage to survive the blackout during lift-off, Randall will be needed as the co-pilot. What a guy!

Meanwhile, the stone-hearted cynical Stanton has been busily stock-piling guns knowing what measures the desperate lottery losers would be likely to take to save themselves. A student of human nature he fancies himself to be no doubt!

Perhaps….but we see then witness a young man who decides to turn in his winning number because the one he loves was not selected. Suddenly, Stanton's brow-beaten constantly demeaned assistant, Ferris claims the number at gunpoint, but he is then shot dead by Stanton.

Danger for the whole enterprise lies closer to hand when just prior to take-off a desperate mob of lottery losers riot. Using Stanton's weapons, they try to force their way aboard the ark.

In another of those “what a guy” moments, Hendron remains with Stanton outside the ship when it launches so that it will consume less fuel on the journey to Zyra. Besides, he feels that starting a new civilisation should be a task for the young. Impelled by sheer desperation, Stanton manages to stand up and futilely attempts to walk toward and board the departing spaceship.

Unlike the survivors in the book’s story, the survivors in the film verson are rendered unconscious by the g-force of acceleration and fail to witness Earth's destruction. In the book version, the ark’s occupants watch on “as the nebulous atmosphere of Bronson Alpha touched the air of earth and then the very earth bulged.”

Randall comes to and sees Dr. Frey relatively chipper, awake and piloting the ship. He then realizes “what a guy” Drake truly is. But his piloting skills are soon required since the fuel is running low as the ship enters Zyra's atmosphere. Randall manages to glide the ship to a safe landing on the surface of Zyra.

Zyra does indeed turn out to be habitable. We close with David, Randall and Joyce walking hand-in-hand down the ramp as a new day dawns on a very ordinarily painted representation. At least in the novel there was an actual road upon which they walked and indications of a previous civilisation.

Please feel free to read my review of the film, “When Worlds Collide.”

As to the novel? Well, I highly recommend that you read it. It’s a very lively well-paced writtten story but the style of language along with certain references are definitely from a by-gone era. I know that the collective heads of the PC Brigade will explode upon reading about Kyto the “little Jap” manservant of Drake. Then there’s the matter of eugenics with the selection of suitable candidates for the journey to Bonson Beta. Let’s not even get started on the portrayal and role of women despite the inclusion of a quite for the time strong female character in Eve. I can just see idiots trying to slap disclaimers all over the novel or airbrush or burn it out of existence!

What you do get in the novel is strong sense of what the characters are like and the relationships they have with each other. Also, the descriptions of the destruction caused to the Earth by the approach of Bonson Alpha, along with the desperate struggle with the invading mobs upon the encampment were very detailed and vivid. All this and more in a rollicking good almost ‘first of its kind’ story.

It’s worth considering the recent theory that a planet given the name of Theia collided with the early Earth around 4.5 billion years ago, with the resulting debris gathering to form our Moon.

It is believed that Theia was about the size of Mars and that it might have formed in the outer Solar System and that much of Earth's water originated on Theia.

It’s also worth mentioning that a book called “Worlds in Collision” by Immanuel Velikovsky was published in 1950. Velikovsky suggests that around the 15th century BC, the planet Venus was ejected from Jupiter as a comet or comet-like object and passed near Earth!

Finally, many readers will recall the events of July 1994 when fragments of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 crashed into Jupiter over a period of several days, providing the first direct observation of an extraterrestrial collision of Solar System objects.

I would definitely put “When Worlds Collide” (1933) by Philip Wylie and Edwin Balme on your sci-fi reading bucket list and then follow it up with a viewing of the film version.

The sequel,” After Worlds Collide,” deals with the fate of the survivors on Bronson Beta.

PDF LINK

Full Film Link

©Chris Christopoulos 2020

“Robert Wise: The Motion Pictures,” by Joe Jordan

Title: Robert Wise: The Motion Pictures
Author: Joe Jordan
Contributors: Gavin MacLeod, Douglas E. Wise
Edition: illustrated 
Publisher: BearManor Media, 2020
ISBN: 1629335363, 978-1629335360
Length: 506 pages

“Robert Wise: The Motion Pictures,” by Joe Jordan is a product of meticulous research by the author, covering a period of over fifty years. It contains detailed plot synopses and commentary of many of Robert Wise’s memorable and important films. 

By photo by Alan Light, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2227156

Robert Wise began his film career at RKO as a sound and music editor. He later became more involved in editing film content and went to work for RKO film editor William "Billy" Hamilton. At RKO, Wise worked with Orson Welles on “Citizen Kane” (1941) and was nominated for the Academy Award for Film Editing.

In his role as producer and director, Wise aimed for establishing a connection to the viewer and had a reputation for a strong work ethic, attention to detail, budgetary thrift and well-researched preparation for a film. 

Of relevance to this blog is Robert Wise’s film “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, a classic science fiction masterpiece that warned about the dangers of atomic warfare.

Other films of Robert Wise that have stayed in my mind over the years are;

• “I Want To Live” (1958)
• “Run Silent, Run Deep” (1958)
• “The Haunting” (1963)
• “The Andromeda Strain” (1971) 

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19705323 

• "Startrek The Motion Picture" (1979)

Joe Jordan's book includes over twenty interviews, as well as presenting a comprehensive analysis of Robert Wise’s work. 

I am sure that after reading this fascinating tribute, you’ll come away with an even greater appreciation of this two-time winner of the Academy Award for Best Director – the legendary Robert Wise. 

*************

A Tribute

Rosetta and Joe Jordan

Joe's Robert Wise book is dedicated to his father and it is very sad to note the recent sudden passing of his father.

Joe's mother, Rosetta preceded her husband in death by 37 years. He missed her so much and never remarried.

Joe has managed to find comfort in knowing that both of his parents are finally together again. It is also of comfort to Joe that his father was able to enjoy the revised edition of his son's book prior to his passing.

According to Joe, "My father was so excited to receive his copy of the Robert Wise book. You should have seen the look on his face when he found out the book is dedicated to him. My father was always a big fan of The Sand Pebbles," (a 1962 novel by American author Richard McKenna about a Yangtze River gunboat and its crew in 1926. In 1966 it was used as the storyline for a movie of the same name starring Steve McQueen and directed by none other than Robert Wise.)

Our condolences go out to Joe for his loss along with our best wishes and kind thoughts. I'm certain his father would have been very proud of Joe.

Sci-Fi Stories That Inspired Classic Sci-Fi Films: "The Day Of The Triffids" (1951)

Steve Sekely’s 1962 film version of Wyndham’s novel is perhaps the best known with other superior adaptations that followed with the 1981 and 2009 BBC TV mini-series. Each seems to approach the story from the standpoint of the prevalent concerns and preoccupations of the era in which they were made.

The 1962 film version seems to opt for a more sci-fi / horror angle at the expense of Wyndham’s story with its backdrop Cold War considerations and fears along with philosophical discussions of the nature of human civilisation.

John Wyndham’s classic science fiction story opens with a man called Bill waking up in a hospital room to find the world he once knew utterly transformed - a world gone blind overnight!

The opening chapter contains an atmosphere of dread as Bill senses without the aid of his sight that the outside world sounds more like a quiet Sunday rather than a typical Wednesday. There is an overwhelming feeling of something not at all being quite right.

With only his sense of hearing to guide him, the striking of the clock indicates that it is now nine o’clock. However, the time his bandages were supposed to be removed was at eight – what on earth has been happening in the meantime?

Unknown to Bill, while he had been asleep after his eye operation, a cosmic event caused the majority of the population who witnessed it to go blind.

Added to the horror of mass blindness is the danger posed to humanity in the form of a plant known as a triffid.

Humanity in its complacency, however did not count on a cosmic event causing global mass blindness and providing the triffids with an opportunity to escape their confinement and become THE apex predator with human beings becoming their prey. For the triffids you see, cannot see but are drawn to noise and therefore their prey cannot avoid them for long! 

What of are some of the changes and differences between the book and the movie?

Wyndham’s Novel	Sekely’s 1962 Film Version
The triffids had been contained and were farmed to produce a vegetable oil substitute and help to ease the global food supply problem.	The light show of the meteor shower has caused the triffids and the plants have somehow been mutated by the event.
Bill is a biologist and triffid expert who had been hit by a triffid.	Bill is a merchant navy officer, who missed the meteor shower because he was in hospital with his eyes bandaged after an operation
Central female character is part of the important love story.	Central female character reduced to screaming damsel in distress.
Josella is saved by Bill from being beaten in the middle of the street. -Modern woman for the times. -Unmarried by choice. -Author of ‘Sex Is My Adventure.' -Gained a notorious ‘reputation.’ -Self-reliant Appearance of Susan later in the story.	No Josella! Just a screaming biologist, Karen!
Crowd panic, chaos in the streets with loss of sight and reason. Few traffic accidents due to suddeness of blindness overnight.	Car and bus crashes and wreckage along with train and pane crashes.
Greater sense of isolation and no communication with the rest of the world.	Bill hops across to France and Spain and radios seem to still function
Coker kidnaps Bill and Josella to help with his plan to look after and feed the blind. His plan falls apart when a sickness starts killing off people in London.	Coker is a British tourist in France.

What individuals and a society will do and the choices that are made in the face of a calamity is a central feature of Wyndham’s story. So too is the question of the value of our cherished moral and social belief systems when put to the test by the sheer necessity of survival. Placed along side Windham’s novel, the film version is little more than a disappointing monster movie with ordinary special effects and little substance. Of greater interest are the subsequent TV mini-series versions and their respective treatments of Wyndham’s story.

*************** 

I wonder how long it will be before Wyndham’s story along with the various screen adaptations are consigned to the bonfire by the PC lunatic brigade on the grounds of insufficient minority representation, gender discrimination or cruelty against vegetation! I’m off now to enjoy my copy of the film classic, “Gone With The Wind” while I can before the final Fahrenheit 451 solution is applied.

I'll try not to knock over any statues or monuments on my way by being dragged along by swirling currents in a sea of slogans spewing out of mindless moronic mob mouths whose sense and knowledge of history extends as far back as this morning's breakfast. I may need, however to dodge any microbial passengers that have hitched a ride on them!

Full Movie

Audio drama link

Epub / PDF Link

Audiobook Link

©Chris Christopoulos 2020

Sci-Fi Stories That Inspired Classic Sci-Fi Films: 'The Body Snatchers' by Jack Finney (1955)

In the small Californian town of Santa Mira, medical doctor, Miles Bennell begins to notice that something is not quite right with its inhabitants. On the surface, the good folks of Santa Mira seem to be themselves, but in ways that Miles can’t put his finger on they are definitely not themselves.

Miles, together with his high school sweet heart and returning divorcée, Becky Driscoll and good friends Jack and Teddy Belicec, soon uncover an alien plot involving an invasion of this slice of small town America. They discover that people are being copied by means of large pods and replaced with duplicates who appear and behave just like them but who display no discernible human emotions and seem to lack human spirit and soul.

Can the invasion be prevented before it spreads beyond the borders of Santa Mira?

Can the surviving humans of this town resist the invaders and avoid the fate of their fellow townsfolk? 

Will human individuality be crushed by the forces of alien conformity?

Trailer

Spoilers follow below…..

'Invasion Of The Body Snatchers' (1956)

Broadly speaking, there isn’t a great deal of difference between Finney’s novel and Don Siegel’s screen adaptation. One difference involves the Belicecs and Becky who in the film version succumb to the alien pod plot.

Unlike the start of Finney’s book, the film opens with Miles in a hospital emergency room. His appearance is disheveled and his behavior suggests insanity, even more so considering his wild story concerning an alien invasion. The tale he tells doctor Hill is the subject of the film’s plot.

The ending is also different in the film version whereby Miles (the lone voice of truth) is seen desperately flailing about in the middle of the night on a highway screaming at oncoming traffic and directly at the audience, "They're already here! You're next! YOU'RE NEXT!"

Back in the hospital emergency room, evidence comes to light of a crashed truck carrying what appears to look like giant seed pods. Upon hearing this, doctor Hill leaps into action and notifies the FBI who no doubt will get to the bottom of all this and all will be well soon. A relieved Miles has finally managed to persuade the doctors who were about to have him committed that his story is true.

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Finney’s story and the original film adaptation have been viewed by many as being a commentary on Communism, the conformity of 1950s America or even on the paranoia of McCarthyism at the time.

On a more universal level, the story can be viewed as being an examination of the loss of human individuality, sense of identity, and all that constitutes who we are as individuals.

Whatever the case, Finney’s story in whatever format it appears maintains its relevance as it can be viewed through the unique lens of any particular era thereby giving it an enduring quality.

PDF LINK

Audiobook

Film Blog Post

"They're already here! 

You're next! "

With the current Carona-19 global pandemic, you will have already been a part of or at least viewed many Zoom, Facetime or Skype video chats.

Have you noticed what's been going on in the background of so many of them? It would suggest that the alien body snatchers have returned to Earth and taken over the bodies of humans in lockdown, forcing them to feature bookcases in the background of their video sessions!

My guess is that these aliens in their pursuit of trying to imitate our emotions, have somehow turned into anally-retentive entities with a weird obsessive-compulsive disorder. 

How else to explain the plethora of coloured-coded books arranged according to size and other strange criteria? What is it with that?? Could it be that........

"YOU'RE NEXT!" 

Note: Check out the Double Feature Page for a new collection of classic sci-fi films featuring: 

UNINVITED GUESTS FROM SPACE!!!

Sci-Fi Stories That Inspired Classic Sci-Fi Films: “The War of the Worlds” by H.G. Wells

Science fiction novel, The War of the Worlds was written by H.G. Wells and was first published serially by Pearson's Magazine in the UK. and by The Cosmopolitan magazine in the US. in 1897.

The War of the Worlds is set in the late 1890s in England and is one of the earliest stories to feature an alien invasion of Earth and the subsequent conflict between humanity and the invading extraterrestrials

Wells’ novel is a first-person narrative of both an unnamed protagonist in Surrey and of his younger brother in London as southern England is invaded by Martians.

Wells may have used the British impact on indigenous Tasmanians as a model or template for his own story which offers a consideration of what could happen if the technologically advanced Martians did to Britain what the British had done to the Tasmanians. 

The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells (ebook)

or

The War of the Worlds 

(ebook)

The War of the Worlds 

(audiobook)

or

The War of the Worlds 

(audiobook)

Orson Welles' 1938 radio broadcast of War of the Worlds was part of CBS’s "Mercury Theater on the Air" program and was based on the H.G. Wells’ story of a Martian invasion. It achieved notoriety through the widely reported effect it had by frightening many listeners who thought Martians had really invaded and were attacking.

During the broadcast, Welles was to interrupt a music performance with apparent news reports of a Martian invasion in Grover's Mill, New Jersey. Many startled listeners missed the broadcast's opening, which mentioned that it was a work of fiction. The show was supposed to have caused widespread panic and hysteria across New Jersey and the country. More than likely it generated a lot more anger and annoyance!

War of the Worlds 1938 Broadcast
(download)

The year 1953 saw producer George Pal's and director Byron Haskin’s film adaptation of Wells’ novel. In the film, a small town in California is attacked by Martians as a prelude to a worldwide invasion. At first the residents of the town are thrown into a bit of a flap when what looks like a flaming meteor lands in the hills. Scientist Clayton Forrester and Sylvia Van Buren are among the first to arrive at the site of the meteorite crash. Soon after, an alien war machine emerges and begins killing and destroying with a death ray. The aliens possess machines that fly and hover and are protected by force fields. Even the military is no match for these alien invaders. The race is on to discover the aliens' weakness – if indeed they have one!

Trailer

The War of the Worlds (1953)

(My Blog Post)

In 2005, Steven Spielberg released his adaptation of War of the Worlds. The film can be seen as being a reflection of the time and events surrounding the 9/11 terrorist attacks and their aftermath. The story begins in New York City, and this is where the alien attack first begins. The scenes that follow the destruction of the city would remind audiences of the horror and trauma that accompanied the events of 9/11.

Trailer

The new BBC One three-part series is set in Surrey at the turn of the 20th century, in keeping with Wells’ original story. Although I haven’t as yet seen it, I’m hoping that this adaptation does not follow the trend that has been evident in many of today’s film and TV efforts and depictions: an infusion of feminist effluvia, modern PC / inclusiveness check box criteria and inappropriate grafting of 21st century concerns on to a past historical setting. Then again, despite recent sci-fi on-screen disappointments I probably ought to reserve judgment! In the end, it's a testament to Wells' story that it keeps re-emerging so long after its original publication.

The War of the Worlds BBC (2019) Clip

Additional Note:

I have indeed since been fortunate enough to watch BBC One’s War of the Worlds and I must say that overall, it is quite well worth watching. It is good to see yet another well-made science fiction TV series coming out of Britain.

There do seem to be a few references being made back to HG Wells’ original story from the opening narration, setting and time period, to the nature of the alien tripod machines through to the consideration of the effect of British colonialism. I felt that this last point could’ve been made in a far more considered and reflective manner than was the case.

The treatment of the story is not surprisingly made with modern audiences in mind. For instance, unlike Wells’ story, we have in addition to male characters, a central unconventional female protagonist who tries to make her way through a rather admonishing conservative patriarchal society. At least it is not laid on too thickly and rammed too forcefully down audiences’ throats as has often recently been the case in other films and series.

Instead of focusing exclusively on the carnage and destruction being visited on the earth by the aliens, the series almost uses that as a backdrop to an exploration of the relationships between the characters and the kinds of choices they find themselves forced to make depending on the circumstances they find themselves in.

I must say that I had to modify my original preconceptions about the series and found myself being pleasantly surprised. My recommendation is that you should go ahead and enjoy it for what it is and try not to be too nit-picky about it.

BY THE WAY!

Just to whet your appetite......

Here’s a link to a full-length presentation involving a fictional Martian (based on War of the Worlds) invasion of the earth in 1913 in the style of a docudrama. The Great Martian War 1913–1917 is a 2013 Canadian/UK made-for-television science fiction presentation, that appears as if it is an episode from the History TV Channel. WOW!

The Great Martian War 1913–1917

©Chris Christopoulos (2020)

Sci-Fi Stories That Inspired Classic Sci Fi Films: “Deadly City” by Paul W. Fairman (1916 – 1977)

Paul Warren Fairman (1916-1977) was an editor and writer in a variety of genres under his own name and under pseudonyms. In 1955, he became the editor of Amazing Stories and Fantastic.

Fairman's science fiction short story"Deadly City" appeared in the March 1953 issue of Worlds of Science Fiction: If, under Fairman's "Ivar Jorgensen" pseudonym and was made into the motion picture, Target Earth which is features in this blog.

Target Earth (1954) is set in an eerily deserted Chicago and involves a small group of people who have been overlooked during a mass evacuation of "the city that never sleeps." The evacuation has occurred due to a sudden invasion by hostile robots (well, at least one in the film!) possibly from the planet Venus.

Fairman’s story, however focuses less on the alien invasion aspect than the film does. There are no robot invaders. Instead, the invaders are glimpsed once and only from a distance. The printed story is also far more gritty, noirish and brutal than the film version.

Ebook (Public Domain) Download Link

Alt. Ebook Link Project Gutenberg

Target Earth (1954) Full Film Link

NEW!

Two new sci-fi radio plays on the Classic Sci-Fi Radio Play Page.

A new Roger Corman double feature on the Classic Sci-Fi Double Feature Page.