Creature with the Atom Brain (1955)

A low budget, entertaining, fast-paced and tongue-and-cheek horror/sci-fi film. A film that has much to say to us.

An exiled American gangster!

A former Nazi scientist!

Revenge!

Radio-controlled atomic-powered zombies!

Directed by Edward L. Cahn
Produced by Sam Katzman
Written by Curt Siodmak
Screenplay by Curt Siodmak
Story by Curt Siodmak
Cinematography: Fred Jackman Jr.
Edited by Aaron Stell
Production company: Clover Productions
Distributor: Columbia Pictures

Cast

Richard Denning : Dr. Chet Walker
Angela Stevens: Joyce Walker
S. John Launer: Capt. Dave Harris
Michael Granger: Frank Buchanan
Gregory Gaye: Dr. Wilhelm Steigg 
Linda Bennett: Penny Walker
Tristram Coffin: Dist. Atty. MacGraw
Harry Lauter: Reporter #1
Larry J. Blake: Reporter #2 
Charles Evans: Chief Camden
Pirre Watkin: Mayor Bremer

Trailer

Spoiler Alert!!!

Creature with the Atom Brain opens at night with the steady menacing approach of a lone silhouetted figure accompanied by the rhythmic sound of a heartbeat,

A car then drives down an empty highway and comes to a stop near a lamp post. The driver possessing a long surgical scar on his forehead exits the vehicle. We are given point of view shots of his destination as he walks with a blank expression on his face towards a building which turns out to be a casino. The man, Willard Pearce is being monitored remotely in a lab.

In the casino, a cashier hands his boss, Jim Hennessey a case containing $20,000. Hennessey places the cash into the wall safe. Pearce smashes through a window and enters Hennessey’s office. He tells Hennessey, "I told you I'd come back….Remember Buchanan?....I promised to see you die and I will!” Hennessey then fires three bullets into Pearce but with no effect. Pearce picks Hennessey up and breaks his back, the full horror of which is suggested via shadow-play on the wall. Pearce grabs the cash from the safe and exits as two casino employees enter the office and fire at him.

At the lab, gangster Frank Buchanan directs Pearce to return. Ex-Nazi scientist, Dr Wilhelm Steigg takes the microphone and directs Pearce to get into the car. Steigg explains that Pearce will automatically return to his source of feeding when his energy runs low. Steigg and Buchanan put on radiation suits and crawl through a tunnel into the main lab where we see two men with surgical scars on their heads sitting hooked up to IV lines.

For Steigg, such creatures can be used to “help people live.” For Buchanan, on the other hand, they are to be used for the removal of “particular people.” The creatures however can only be kept going for a few days as their “glands deteriorate” and the “brain always dies first.”

Here we have an instance of technology not of itself being inherently good or evil. Instead, it is the use to which the technology is put that determines how it is to be assessed.

At the casino, the burglary and murder is being investigated by the police. Dr Chet Walker and Capt Dave Harris discuss the case with District Attorney MacGraw. Chet discovers that the killer’s fingerprints on the windowsill are luminous, and Dave notices that the footprints and blood are also luminous. During a forensic examination of the evidence, Chet concludes that the blood is a “chemical composition” possessing “no haemoglobin” and that the “so-called blood is highly radioactive - +9.”

Forensic science at the time was becoming an established method of criminal investigation employed by the FBI and law enforcement agencies. The kind of impact such technologies were having then is akin to the kind of impact that the use of DNA technology is having on 21st Century criminal investigations and their depiction in films.

The story is so unbelievable that even seasoned reporters don’t initially take it up when they are informed in an off-hand jocular manner that the case involves “a creature that cannot be killed by bullets” and that it is “charged with atom rays.”

Unlike depictions of the restriction of press freedom to report the truth in many films at the time and the practice of authorities since then to suppress certain kinds of information, the biggest scoop in history is at first virtually ignored by virtue of its being so unbelievable!

Later on at Walker’s place, Dave reveals that there was a match on the fingerprints. Astonishingly, they match a dead man's prints. It turns out that according to the “Bureau,” the dead man is Willard Pearce, who was tubercular, had died from asphyxiation and had been dead for 24 days!

After receiving a phone call, Dave and Chet leave to listen to a Dictaphone recording made during the casino robbery and murder. On the recording they hear Pearce’s mechanical-sounding voice, “like a recording of a recording.” 

Meanwhile, District Attorney MacGraw is confronted and killed by another zombie-like creature, in his garage at home. Before dispatching him, the creature informs MacGraw that “I’m from Buchanan. If you know that then you know why I’m here.”

When informed of this latest crime, Chet and Dave go to MacGraw’s place. The coroner is able to determine the cause of death, but cannot explain how a human grip could cause such severe injuries. After examining MacGraw's car with a Geiger counter. Chet instructs Dave to call the inspector to meet with him and to “ask him to have the Mayor and the commanding General of this military area” in attendance since “we're going to need all the cooperation we can get on this one."

A KXIW-TV television broadcast announces a “fantastic story” involving crimes being perpetrated by dead men who are charged with atom rays making them “impervious to bullets.” After watching this broadcast, Steigg and Buchanan conclude that Chet Walker knows too much about their diabolical plans and therefore must be eliminated.

Chet, Dave, Mayor Bremer and General Saunders gather at the office of Chief of Police Camden. Taking a leaf from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Chet uses the Faraday experiment involving the use of electricity on a frog's leg as a way of illustrating the principle of using radioactivity to animate dead tissue. Chet stresses the need to find the source of radioactive emanations by using planes and the resources of the military.

When Chet returns home. His wife Joyce is shocked to read the headlines in the local newspaper;

Chet believes that there is a pattern to the deaths and that their daughter is in no immediate danger playing outside. Dave then comes by and informs Chet that there is a connection between Hennessey and MacGraw as they both had ensured the conviction of Buchanan a decade earlier leaving Hennessey to become the top mobster. Buchanan swore revenge, “I’ll get you for this!”

Once a story of this nature falls into the hands of the tabloid press, rational, considered and well-informed thought is soon replaced by superficial, sensationalist, and minimalist ranting that plays on and fuel people’s emotions, especially their fears. Pick up a tabloid today (say, from the latter half of 2014, for instance) and feast your eyes on the visual, graphic and textual manipulative muck that purports to be news…..

Three men are later brought in to police headquarters for their own protection: Lester Banning, previously assistant D.A. on the Buchanan case and currently a lawyer in private practice; Jason Franchot, Buchanan's accountant; Tom Dunn, Buchanan's gunsel, slang euphemism for a hired gun or "paid killer." The three men refuse to be incarcerated for their own protection, but they reluctantly agree to around the clock police protection.

Later on a creature disguised as a policeman arrives to relieve the officer protecting Franchot. He kills both Franchot and the officer he was supposed to relieve. One down, two to go.

KXIW-TV television news presenter announces: "...with the murder of Jason Franchot last night I must apologize for my recent scepticism regarding these radioactive creatures. It seems they do exist and are prowling the streets."

While the military use their vehicles and aircraft to locate the source of the radioactivity, Dr. Steigg notices a search vehicle outside the bar at which he is having a beer. He hurriedly pays for the beer leaving a $10 bill in his haste to avoid detection. A sergeant carrying a Geiger counter enters the bar and obtains strong readings on both the glass of beer and the sawbuck.

At the office of Kenneth C. Norton, M.D. at City Hospital, Norton informs Chet that Steigg was a German scientist who had conducted dog and monkey experimentation overseas. Norton then shows Chet an informative film (an almost obligatory feature of sci-fi films of the time) on brain implant research. The film shows a dog with 18 electrodes implanted in its skull and how ultra-sonic waves and impulses of different frequencies are used to induce hunger and other states (amygdala stimulations)

The amygdala is an almond shaped mass of nuclei located deep within the temporal lobe of the brain. It is involved in the processing of emotions such as fear, anger and pleasure, as well as helping to determine what memories are stored and where they are stored in the brain.

When Chet touches on the possible extension of this technology into the realm of human mind control, Norton almost ominously replies;

“We haven’t arrived at that stage of our experiments – yet!”

It is astounding how much scientific inquiry is devoted to better understanding how the human mind and body works which serves to do so much to improve the human condition but which also provides potential tools with which to control, manipulate and enslave people.

Back at the lab, Buchanan directs one of the creatures to contact Chief Camden and tell him to withdraw all trucks and planes or many people will be killed. They have one hour – by 3 o’clock – to comply. The authorities refuse to comply with the ultimatum resulting in a series of violent and destructive acts.

PLANE, BUS, RAIL CRASHES STIR PUBLIC!

“As governor, I’m declaring a state of emergency….If you go outside, have identification papers with you!”

Such a depiction sits uncomfortably close to our modern-day scenario (as if history has not provided enough examples!) involving the perceived threat from certain overseas and domestic extremist groups. In such cases we seem to be confronted with a group of almost mindless brainwashed thugs being manipulated into committing atrocious acts of violence against innocent people. They appear to be manipulated by those who have perverted the true purpose and direction of that which underpins and motivates their actions. They seem to have been seduced and directed by those who have become adept at using technology to spread their world view of fear and hatred. Unfortunately such messages resonate with a minority of the intellectually and morally deceased of our world. In addition to the violence and destruction caused by such extremist organisations, we now have in response whole nations succumbing to fear, panic and paranoia. Those on all sides are indeed turning into different creatures seemingly intent on creating hell on Earth.

Meanwhile, Franchot has himself been turned into a creature and is disguised as a military officer to be used to kill Chet. Instead, he winds up killing Dave who is then taken to the laboratory for surgery. 

Dave, now a mindless zombie visits Chet Walker’s place. Chet has already left for the office, but Dave sits with Penny in the living room looking and acting creepy which surprisingly goes unnoticed. Dave leaves after receiving information from Joyce concerning the two remaining men under protective custody. Their likely fate is indicated by the crushed and dismembered remains of the doll. Poor Henrietta will no doubt reincarnate into “Annabelle” some 60 years later!

At the county jail Dave kills Banning and Dunn and soon after drives away with Chet who has jumped into the front seat of the car. Dave is directed by Buchanan to crash the car in order to eliminate Chet, but Chet jumps out in time. After Dave's body is brought to the hospital for examination, he escapes, steals a police car, and makes his way back to the lab and his radioactive power source.

As the police and military surround the lab, Steigg panics and is killed by Buchanan who then directs the remaining creatures to combat the police and military personnel. Dave meanwhile attempts to enter the lab through a window. Chet suddenly enters first and grapples with Buchanan. Dave then enters the lab and kills Buchanan. Chet sets about destroying the lab which deactivates the creatures.

Later at Penny’s birthday party, Penny blows out the candles on her cake and there is a camera zoom in on the newspaper headline; 

"CREATURES WITH ATOM BRAINS DESTROYED."

Points Of Interest

In the film Creature with the Atom Brain, we have the concept of "remote-controlled creatures, their brains powered by atomic energy, roaming the streets, directed from a central point," making the title a very aptly named one. We need to keep in mind that in the mid ‘50s notions of radioactive isotopes and atomic power were a source of fascination and fear. Exploiting such fears and adapting the Frankenstein story with an attempt to resurrect the dead using atomic energy and mid-20th century electronic technology serves to make this a very effective sci-fi / horror film.

Spot the oversight!

The film is also very funny (intentionally and unintentionally) especially for modern audiences considering how attitudes have evolved concerning the way in which gender roles and relationships are presented on film and elsewhere. Contrasted with the horror and chaos happening “out there” Chet gets to occasionally seek the sanctuary of his apple pie white-picket fence 1950's domestic bliss complete with a pre-women's lib beautiful blonde wife and a cute but annoying kid. Some might well chuckle when Chet declares, "my wife only talks when I'm ready for bed" and when he arrives home only to be presented with a perfect target of his wife’s backside as she is bent over the doorstep. C’mon, what else was Chet supposed to do?! 

The climactic scene involving the battle between the zombie army and the police / military personnel reminds us of later horror films such as the "Night of the Living Dead." In this case, unlike most of the film, the action switches to extreme close-ups of the zombie combatants making the audience feel like they are in amongst the action.

I recently watched an episode from the excellent sci-fi series, Torchwood which featured the use of alien technology in the form of contact lenses that allow remote viewing and monitoring via a computer screen of whomever and whatever is being looked at by the wearer of the lenses. Rewind sixty years and what do we have in Creature with the Atom Brain? The idea of using a TV screen to receive and view images from the zombie creatures’ eyes! It seems that history teaches us that much of what we do, think and see these days is little more than a variation on an old theme……..

©Chris Christopoulos 2014

GOG (1954)

A successful combination of sci-fi, murder mystery and espionage thriller. Slow-paced at times but raises issues of relevance for today’s audiences.

Director: Herbert L. Strock
Producer: Ivan Tors
Written by Tom Taggart (screenplay), Ivan Tors (story), Richard G. Taylor (dialogue)
Music: Harry Sukman
Cinematography: Lothrop B. Worth
Editing: Herbert L. Strock
Distributed by United Artists
Running time: 85 min.
Budget: $250,000 (approx.)

Cast

Richard Egan: David Sheppard
Constance Dowling: Joanna Merritt
Herbert Marshall: Dr. Van Ness
John Wengraf: Dr. Zeitman
Phillip Van Zandt: Dr. Pierre Elzevir
Valerie Vernon: Madame Elzevir
Steve Roberts: Major Howard
Byron Kane: Dr. Carter
David Alpert: Dr. Peter Burden
Michael Fox: Dr. Hubertus
William Schallert: Dr. Engle 

Marian Richman: Helen

Preview

Plot

The film, GOG is set in a top-secret government facility under the New Mexico desert where a space station (“Man’s first attempt to conquer space”) is being constructed, OSI (Office of Scientific Investigation) agents from Washington, DC, are called in to investigate mysterious and deadly malfunctions at the facility.

We witness one such occurrence at the start of the film, GOG where a lab monkey is undergoing an experiment in freezing and thawing. After the experiment successfully concludes Dr. Hubertus, the department head, is trapped in the cold chamber when the door to the chamber mysteriously closes and the automated equipment begins its deep cold cycle. Hubertus is frozen solid. Dr. Kirby returns to the cryo lab and discovers the dead and shattered remains of Dr. Hubertus when suddenly the door closes once again and the cryo cycle repeats, killing her as well.

Agent Dr. David Sheppard has been called in by Laboratory supervisor Dr. Van Ness to find the cause of such mysterious deaths among the 150 top scientists at the facility. Together with Joanna Merritt, an OSI agent already stationed at the facility and who is secretly in a romantic relationship with Dr Sheppard, Sheppard determines that the deaths are due to deliberate sabotage of NOVAC (Nuclear Operative Variable Automatic Computer), a central computer which controls all equipment in the underground facility. NOVAC was built in Switzerland and took five years to complete, and Zeitman was the designer.

The important question is, how is the sabotage is being performed? How will they later be able explain the deaths of six scientists, as well as the complex's Chief of Security, Major Howard?

The answer to the mystery is found by Sheppard. It turns out that a powerful radio transmitter and receiver were incorporated into NOVAC during its construction. The unnamed “enemy” have constructed a stealth jet plane that can fly faster than the speed of sound and is made of fiberglass which makes it difficult to be located by radar. As it flies above the facility, ultra-high frequency radio signals are beamed from it, allowing the “enemy” to control NOVAC. The plane can apparently fly over 100.000 feet high and it is observed that “no plane has ever gone that high,” to which Joanna replies, “At least not from this planet.” By controlling NOVAC, the “enemy” also gains control of the two powerful robots at the facility, Gog and Magog, who Dr Zeitman believe will one day “guide rockets into space.”

Who is causing the deaths of crucial personnel at the underground facility? 

Where did such an advanced aircraft come from? 

What nefarious purposes will NOVAC and the robots, Gog & Magog be put to? 

By whom?

 

To what end? 

Points Of Interest

The film, GOG was shot on two sets at Hal Roach Studios, with exteriors done at George AFB, a former Air Force base near Victorville, California. It took just 15 days to shoot all of the footage for the film.

The film at some points does become a bit plodding and tedious such as when security officer Sheppard and his undercover security agent girlfriend Merritt take us on a guided tour of the base. This, together with the long-winded lectures concerning scientific experiments, may have been intended to highlight the positive features of future technologies, but for today’s audiences it seems a bit dated and unimpressive.

What is more interesting are the dangers, fears and insecurities associated with the “new” technological developments depicted in the film; concerns that are relevant even for 21st. Century audiences who are becoming more aware of the almost anonymous destructive potential of military applications of “smart” technologies. There is also the issue of who is really in control when it comes to information and personal privacy in a digital age, particularly when such notions as, “the security of the nation is at stake” are used as justification for employing technology as a means of control and intrusive monitoring of people.

The double-edged sword nature of human technology is apparent when early in the film we see a helicopter cross the desert sky. On board is the pilot, Al and his passenger, Dr. David Sheppard. They are headed for the top secret underground facility. Suddenly the helicopter is buffeted by some force. The pilot explains that the "brain" has taken over the controls and will do the flying, thereby keeping the exact location of the facility secret. They are both being monitored by central control. Instead of being reassuring. it’s all a bit unnerving! NOVAC’s code transmitters will also be in control of the solar mirror which will provide the space station with all its power and its destructive potential as demonstrated by the Elzevirs’. NOVAC will be able to control the space station’s mirrors via code transmitters and as is noted by one of the characters in the film, “It would be a powerful weapon of war.”

Those in the facility have arrived at point where, as Joanna observed, since “the machines took over….we live here like ground hogs.” In addition to an “enemy” possessing intrusive, dangerous and destructive technologies that have led to a fearful, siege-like, underground fortress existence, we learn later that Van Ness has "positive proof of a saboteur” on his staff. Code transmitter devices have been located around the facility. We also learn that unknown even to her boss, Van Ness, Joanna Merritt, as part of a secret mission, has been assigned to the project by the security services that employ Sheppard. At one point, even the illustrious Dr. Zeitman is reprimanded by Sheppard about failing to abide by security regulations (“You’re not above the security of the nation.”)

Fear, suspicion, security concerns: all very apparent even years after the Cold War era with the revelations from Edward Snowden concerning NSA surveillance activities, the US monitoring of the German chancellor Merkel’s phone, as well as Australia’s Signals Directorate secret monitoring of Indonesian Prime Minister, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s and his wife’s phone communications. Unlike the Cold War era animosity between the US and Soviet Union, these modern instances of international mistrust, fuelled by intrusive technological surveillance, are occurring between allies! We won’t even get started on allegations concerning certain Chinese mobile phone and electronic instrument manufacturing companies installing surveillance devices in their products in order to access information from the users of their products. Fancy being able to hack into someone else’s electronic device (computer, Novac, mobile phone, Gog, data base, Magog) and exercise control over it? Who would have thought such a thing could possibly happen back in 1954!

The film, GOG employed an interesting choice of names for the two robots; “Gog” and “Magog.” Initially, this one word title, together with its appearance on the screen at the start, conjures up feelings of timeless and implacable power. The biblical reference to “Gog” and “Magog” (Rev.20:8) involves the names of two nations to be led by Satan in the final battle at Armageddon against the kingdom of God;

“When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth - Gog and Magog - to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore.”

And in Ezekiel 38;

“Son of man, set your face against Gog, of the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshek and Tubal; prophesy against him and say: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am against you, Gog, chief prince of Meshek and Tubal.” 

Perhaps for the purposes of film the “enemy,” the former Soviet Union, was being cast as Satan in the international battle between the forces of “good” and “evil” over the fate of the world.

Other issues raised by the film also have relevance to our era and they include;

Advanced weaponry and security devices: In the film during the segment featuring the electronically controlled sound detector with its tuning forks, we are introduced to the notion of sound waves whose “intensity can kill!" It has been demonstrated in recent times that sound waves of certain frequencies can have quite severe effects on human physiology. Proposals have been made to use sound waves as a form of crowd control during riots and demonstrations and even as a weapon of warfare.

Surveillance & Privacy: The personnel in the underground facility are subject to constant monitoring from various devices such as microphones. In our modern era, we are surrounded by devices that can monitor our actions and movements. Among such ways and means of monitoring individuals include, computer & mobile phone tracking & usage; ATM & credit card transactions; speed cameras: cctv proliferation in major cities; public transport, taxi and department store camera surveillance and more. It is amazing how we have willingly submitted to this intrusion into our personal privacy and right to anonymity. It has become a normal state of affairs for us all and we justify it (rightly or wrongly) in terms of it being necessary to guarantee our overall safety and security.

Perhaps we may reach the stage one day soon when we vow that in another sense, "We'll never be taken by surprise again!" and where we will all resolve to set our faces against the Gogs of our own making and declare, “no more, we are against you, Gog!”

©Chris Christopoulos 2013

The Magnetic Monster (1953)

Intelligent & well-paced

Plausible-sounding science

Builds up to an excellent climax

Director: Curt Siodmak, Herbert L. Strock

Producer: Ivan Tors, George Van Marter

Writer: Curt Siodmak, Ivan Tors

Narrator: Richard Carlson

Music: Blaine Sanford

Cinematography: Charles Van Enger

Editing: Herbert L. Strock

Distributor: United Artists

Running time: 76 minutes

Budget: $105,000 approx.

Cast

Richard Carlson: Dr. Jeffrey Stewart

King Donovan: Dr. Dan Forbes

Jean Byron: Connie Stewart

Harry Ellerbe:  Dr. Allard

Leo Britt: Dr. Benton

Leonard Mudie: Howard Denker

Byron Foulger: Mr. Simon

Michael Fox: Dr. Serny

John Zaremba: Chief Watson

Lee Phelps: City Engineer

Watson Downs: Mayor

Roy Engel: Gen. Behan

Frank Gerstle: Colonel Willis

John Vosper: Captain Dyer

John Dodsworth: Dr. Carthwright

Robert Carson: the Pilot

Donald Kerr:  Nova Scotia Lab Worker 

Trailer

Spoilers follow below......

Office of Scientific Investigation

Official Summary Report

Operation: “Magnetic Monster”

TOP SECRET

EYES ONLY

Background To Investigation

• On the morning of July 18, 1953, ‘A-Man’ agents, Jeffrey Stewart and Dan Forbes received a report from the power company representative, Chief Watson as part of a DIRECTIVE 149 response, concerning a local hardware store where all of the clocks had stopped at the same time.
• Investigation revealed that a strong magnetic field had magnetized every metal item in the store and that the source of this was traced to an office above the store.
• An examination of the room revealed the presence of scientific equipment, as well as a dead body.
• Detection of radioactivity was confirmed, the cause of which was not immediately apparent.
• Initial fears centred on the possibility of someone trying to build a small atomic bomb.
• Further investigation based on information received from a taxi driver and an examination of airport facilities led investigators to an airline flight carrying a research physicist, Dr. Howard Denker and more importantly, to the contents of his suitcase.
• Dr. Denker had developed signs of radiation sickness due to an artificial radioactive isotope, serranium, which in an experiment he had bombarded with alpha particles for 200 hours. This deadly microscopic product of his experiment was contained in the suitcase in his possession.
• Dr. Denker died from radiation sickness on board the plane while passing on information to the agents about his creation.

Nature of Emergency

• Based on the findings fed into the MANIAC system, it was able to deduce that the element would double in size and mass every 11 hours by absorbing energy from its surroundings.
• The process of transformation released deadly radiation and extremely intense magnetic energy.

Danger Posed: Extreme

• OSI determined that, if left unchecked, the element would have eventually become large enough to affect the Earth's rotation and cause the planet to spin out of its orbit.

Course Of Action

• The isotope could not be destroyed or rendered inert by any known means.
• It was decided there was no option but to use a Canadian experimental power generator then being constructed in a cavern under the ocean. It was intended to use this to bombard the element with as much energy as possible in one surge in the hope that this would neutralize it.  
• With US and Canadian government cooperation, the isotope was transferred to the new (“Deltatron”) project facility.
• Dr. Benton, in charge of the project, when shown how much energy would be needed, raised objections and voiced concerns about the safety of the personnel involved.
• Due to the urgency of the situation, Agent Stewart took it upon his own authority to assume control of the experiment himself despite the risks to his personal safety.
• Despite Dr. Benton’s efforst to thwart him, Agent Stewart was able to activate the machine and seal the device off from the rest of the underground operation and the project workers. 

Outcome

• The isotope was successfully stopped.
• Deltatron was destroyed as a result of the operation.

End Notes:

• A full report of the above operation will follow at the conclusion of OSI internal investigation of operation, Magnetic Monster.  

• As part of the report, the following items will be included;

1. Recommendations of ways & means to meet such future challenges to our existence.
2. Elimination of opportunities for “lone wolves” to conduct nuclear research.
3. Managing the dissemination of information to the public via media outlets.
4. Commendations for those who took part in the success of operation, Magnetic Monster.

End Summary Report

Points of Interest

The main character, Jeffery Stewart narrates the story in a manner similar to a detective-crime genre film complete with lines like, “July 18: The morning quiet,…peaceful…The world seemed safe and good.” We also learn with due seriousness that in order to combat threats that pose a “challenge to our existence,” a new agency has been created, The Office of Scientific Investigation (OSI). As if taken from the pages of the creation of the FBI, the men who work for this agency are known as A men, who perform as “detectives of science,” something akin to J. Edgar Hoover’s G-Men.

In the case of the FBI’s formation, science in the form of forensics became the key weapon in the fight against crime. Science is also the weapon of choice for the OSI in the film, Magnetic Monster. For instance, we see many examples of gadgetry being employed such as an electronic counter to determine that there were “2200 disintegrations per minute” occurring as well as traces of radioactive dust. There were gadgets to monitor the speed and distance of particles and to examine dust particles and fingernail scrapings. An electronic microscope was used to examine the element whereby the investigators could see that it was “adding new structure to the old,” that “mass is forming into supposedly empty space” and that with this tool of science they were “witnessing the secret of creation.”

The silence that followed the last statement above was laden with profound implications. At what point does science cross over into areas where some people believe it should not and cannot cross. The name given to this new breed of investigators is A-Men which as we are told by the narrator, “sounds like the final word of a prayer.” Perhaps it is no wonder that people sometimes worry that materialistic science seems to assume the mantle of a new kind of religion. After all, the world and what seems to be inexplicable appears to be able to be explained by the new religion of science and its own version of the priesthood. In the face of the hysterical and panicked reactions of those in the hardware store, we have the calm and methodical resort to paper, tacks, fishing poles and Geiger counters to locate the epicentre of magnetic force in the store. In days gone by people would have been reassured by the priesthood that certain inexplicable occurrences were part of God’s will or the result of the Devil’s work, often resulting in the immolation of innocent people to rectify the perceived problems.

In the area of science, there is a certain unease of the times being reflected in the film, Magnetic Monster. After all, it was scientific research that produced an element that even in the initial stages resulted in the production of radiation that was “strong enough to kill us or wipe out a few city blocks.” Whether done independently or not, science had created something new that “turned out to be unstable,” that was “monstrous” and capable of “reaching out with invisible fingers” to kill! If only such research was removed from the hands of “lone wolves” and placed in the all-knowing secure embrace of government scientific centralised control!-at least as implied in the film. Similarly, once upon a time all knowledge about the world remained securely within the province of the church and its priesthood. “Lone wolves” and the threat posed by the spreading fingers of their devil’s work were dealt with using the tried and tested tools of the time.

The unease of the times is further highlighted by the fact that the element created by Dr. Denker appears to be as Forbes exclaims, “a live thing!” If it is not “fed” it draws on available energy and causes an implosion. Even the plan to destroy the element involves an attempt to “overfeed it until it bursts.” Instead of the usual monsters from space, the ocean depths or from under the ice, we have an impersonal, apparently indestructible and unseen monster. For many, the products of science and technology seem to take on a life of their own, growing more powerful, demanding more and more from us, reaching out and infiltrating all aspects of our lives and even threatening our own existence.

In Magnetic Monster and many other similar films of the time, it seems as if it is felt that people’s fears and concerns can be assuaged by controlling how much and what type of information they are to be exposed to. In the film, the city is put on alert but people are informed via radio broadcasts only that the authorities are “conducting a test.” Even today we find ourselves grappling with issues of freedom of information and are left wondering how much information is being withheld from the public about matters that effect all of us; how truthful the information is that we are being presented with and whether or not matters of “national security” should override our need or right to know the truth. Such matters are curently being put to the test in relation to the controversial treatment of organisations like Wikileaks and individuals such as Julian Assange, Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning. For some people and governments, they are seen as traitors, while for others they are simply upholding the principles of free speech and the right to know, as well as performing the kind of role that the world’s media ought to be performing. One can only hope that we don’t have recourse to the kind of witch hunts that were prevalent at the time of the making of Magnetic Monster.

Magnetic Monster was shot in eleven days. Footage from a clip of an atom smasher from the 1934 German film, Gold was used in the scene of the Nova Scotia Deltatron. It seems to have been quite a seamless fusion of the footage in the film. The "M.A.N.I.A.C." computer with the “cathode ray memory unit” consisted of footage featuring a computer being developed at the University of California in Los Angeles. Glad to see scientists and technicians (film makers?) have a sense of humour and irony!

©Chris Christopoulos 2013