When I watched The Invisible Man for the first time, I was knocked out by Elizabeth Moss’ bravura performance. I also thought it was an incredibly creative update of the story. Focusing on the victim put so much more power in the villainy of the titular character. The Invisible Man is more terrifying because we can’t see him, but like his victim, we know he’s there.
Universal chose to go with Blumhouse and Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man after the failure of their original Dark Universe plans in the wake of the remake of The Mummy.
Blumhouse has had hits in the horror field with a number of projects including; The Purge, Insidious, Paranormal Activity, and Ouija. The success of the Blumhouse produced Get Out had further enhanced the studio’s prestige with both box office success and rave reviews. Reportedly Blumhouse now has a first look 10 year contract with Universal Pictures that will lead to their involvement in future Universal Monster reboots.
Elizabeth Moss in The Invisible Man (2020)
After the success of The Invisible Man, Elizabeth Moss was approached by Universal to appear in a sequel. Moss is interested in a new version of The Invisible Woman, a lighthearted follow-up to the original Invisible Man. She did, after all, make the invisibility suit vanish.
Elizabeth Moss in The Invisible Man (2020)
In a Collider interview published 10/13/2021, Jason Blum confirmed, “Wolfman, we are also working on the script, got to get the script, right. In that case, it’s Ryan Gosling…But working on trying to get a script that he feels good about and comfortable about and excited about.” The idea was pitched by Gosling and until he is satisfied with the script, there will be no full moon.
Ryan Gosling
Leigh Whannell exited Wolfman due to scheduling issues, and Ryan Gosling brought Derek Cianfrance (Blue Valentine) onto the project. He also worked with Gosling on Place Beyond the Pines.
Also in pre-production is Bride, with Scarlett Johansson on deck as both producer and actress in the lead role, and Sebastian Lelio is slated to direct a script written by Rebecca Angelo, Lauren Schuker Blum, and himself.
Screenplay by Ted Sherdeman/Adapted by Russell Hughes based on the Story by George Worthing Yates
Cinematography by Sidney Hickox
Music by Bronislau Kaper
Warner Brothers / 1hr 34min
CAST: James Whitmore (Sgt. Ben Peterson), Edmund Gwenn (Dr. Harold Medford), Joan Weldon (Dr. Patricia Medford), James Arness (Robert Graham), Onslow Stevens (Brigadier General Robert O’Brien), Christian Drake (Trooper Ed Blackburn).
Them! opens with a shot of the desert and Bronislau Kaper’s ominous score as a plane appears in the distance and slowly pulls us into the action. We then meet police Sargent Ben Peterson (James Whitmore) as the plane’s pilot leads Peterson and his partner Ed Blackburn (Christian Drake) to a child (Sandy Descher) that is roaming through the desert as if in a trance. Parking their squad car, they call out to the child, but she does not respond. Obviously in shock, she just keeps walking.
The pilot than contacts them about an abandon car and trailer further down the road. They take the girl and head down the highway. At first it looks normal. Until they walk around to the side of the trailer that has been smashed open. It’s a mess inside, everything even money is scattered inside the vehicle. There is a bloody cloth, but no real clue as to what happened. There is a mysterious print in the sand that neither officer can identify.
When the specialist from the Department of Agriculture arrives in response to the print lifted from the sand at the trailer site, he is taken to see the girl who has not yet snapped out of her shock. He holds a vial of formic acid under her nose and she bursts out of her impingement, jumping up with a scream and shouting, “Them! Them! Them!”
Sandy Descher in Them!
The power of the film emits from director Gordon Douglas’ (They Call Me Mister Tibbs!) direction that keeps a serious demeanor never allowing camp to set in, but he doesn’t forget to include humor. Much of it is centered on Edmund Gwenn’s (The Trouble with Harry) Dr. Medford. From the moment he and his daughter Patricia get off the plane, he contributes the needed comic relief within the bounds of his hyper serious character. He comes down out of the plane’s hatch, but his daughter gets stuck and all that can be seen of her are her legs. Both Sargent Peterson and Agent Graham take note of her predicament while Dr. Medford remains oblivious.
Joan Weldon, James Arness & James Whitmore in Them!
Both Dr. Medfords suspect the truth, giant ants, but they refuse to tell even the FBI agent until they are certain. Special AgentRobert Graham is not used to waiting and quickly loses patience with the doctors.
Them!
Simply one of the best and most enduring of the creature features from the 1950’s. The ants are really frightening and the action is exuberantly real. A fine cast plays it with deadpan chagrin and terror.
Forbidden Planet(1956)
Directed by Fred McLeod Wilcox
Screenplay by Cyril Hume based on a Story by Irving Block & Allen Adlerloosely based on William Shakespeare’s The Tempest (Uncredited)
Cinematography by George J. Folsey
Music Department: Bebe Barron & Louis Barron composers of electronic tonalities
CAST: Walter Pidgeon (Dr. Morbius), Anne Francis (Altaira Morbius), Leslie Nielson (Commander Adams), Warren Stevens (Lt. ‘Doc’ Ostrow), Jack Kelly (Lt. Farman), Richard Anderson ( Chief Quinn), Earl Holliman (Cook).
MGM / 1hr 38min
Forbidden Planet was not the first film to have its screenplay based on a Shakespeare play, but it certainly was the most unusual. The film that was influenced by the world of Prospero and Miranda became an influence in the world of science fiction. The excellent script’s original story foreshadowed many science fiction tales to come. Many of the TV shows and films that came later borrowed freely from Forbidden Planet, from the story telling to the uniforms to the use of robots and even the names of weapons.
LEFT:Leslie Nielson, Warren Stevens, Jack Kelley, Anne Francis &Walter Pidgeon inForbidden Planet (1956) RIGHT: William Shatner, DeForest Kelley & Walter Konig in Star Trek: The Original Series (1966)
In addition, the cast was exceptional including: Walter Pidgeon, Leslie Nielson, and Anne Francis. The film looks like the blue print for the soon to be popular, Star Trek: The Original Series (1966) right down to the landing party of three (in Star Trek usually the Captain, Spock & Bones), and the Captain getting the girl. More blatantly, Forbidden Planet’s, United Planets Starship C-57D is reflected in Star Trek’s Federation of Planets Starship USS Enterprise.
LEFT: Anne Francis & Leslie Nielson in Forbidden Planet (1956) RIGHT: Nancy Kovack & William Shatner in Star Trek (1966) Season 2 Episode 19
The decompression chambers on the United Planets Starship C-57D look like a prototype for the USS Enterprise’s transporter.
LEFT: Decompression Chambers in Forbidden Planet RIGHT: Transporter in Star Trek: the Original Series
Set design in subsequent science fiction films echo the long before its time set design displayed when Morbius takes Adams on a tour of the Krell’s astonishing complex. Star Wars (1977), Blade Runner (1982), and Total Recall (1990) come to mind. In Total Recall it was a machine that was built by ancient Martians to create air on the planet.
Forbidden Planet (1956)Total Recall (1990)
Robby the Robot not only influenced both television shows and films, but the robot in the 1966 television series, Lost in Space was designed by Robert Kinoshita who had also designed Robby for Forbidden Planet.
LEFT: Anne Francis & Robby the Robotin Forbidden Planet (1956)RIGHT: Robot (B-9 class) & Jonathan Harris in Lost in Space (1965)Publicity photo
LEFT: R2D2 in Star Wars (1977)RIGHT:The Robot & Maxwell Jenkins in Lost in Space (2018-2021)
Forbidden Planet is a classic of the genre and remains a must see film for both science fiction fans as well as the casual film viewer.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
Directed by Don Siegel
Screenplay by Daniel Mainwaring & (Richard Collins/Uncredited due to being blacklisted) based on story by Jack Finneyserialized in Collier’s Magazine
Cinematography by Ellsworth Fredericks
Music by Carmen Dragon
Allied Artists Pictures / 1hr 20min
CAST: Kevin McCarthy (Dr. Miles J. Bennell), Dana Wynter (Becky Driscoll), Larry Gates (Dr. Dan Kauffman),King Donovan (Jack Belicec), Carolyn Jones (Theodora Bellicec), Jean Willes (Nurse Sally Withers), Ralph Dumke (Police Chief Nick Grivett).
The undeniable high point in 50’s Science Fiction, Invasion of the Body Snatchers has so much going for it that it will never go out of date. The opening is unforgettable as Kevin McCarthy tries to convince disbelieving doctors and authorities that the world is in danger of being invaded by interstellar plant life! Just the extreme yet subtle manner in which the aliens supplant the humans in their own bodies defies rational thought.
Larry Gates, King Donovan, andKevin McCarthy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Once the doctor calms Dr. Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) down getting him to calmly tell his tale, the action begins. As the good doctor returns home from a trip, we are introduced to the characters as he finds that something odd has been going on during his absence. Many of the townspeople have tried to make appointments while he was away, but on his return, most of those that seemed panicked to see him, cancel without explanation! At the same time, there are a number of people that are under the delusion that someone they are close to is not really that person anymore.
Dana Wynter in Invasion of the BodySnatchers
Once Bennell realizes what is actually going on, the clock begins to tick as he and Becky Driscoll are aided by Belicec’s in plotting to escape and expose the alien plot.
Dana Wynter & Kevin McCarthy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers
A well honed script based on a serialization that ran in Collier’s magazine is transformed into a masterpiece of science fiction, horror, and suspense. Don Siegel’s direction employs economy and pacing to keep the beat as it gradually quickens with every scene. The cast is as memorable as the story itself, and each character is fully realized as the horror slowly engulfs them. The exceptionally shot black and white adds to the feeling of isolation and fear.
The film has been re-made three times: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), Body Snatchers (1993), The Invasion (2007) with varying degrees of success; although none have surpassed the original, they stand as a testament to it’s influence.
Facts, Rumors, and Hearsay
Them!
“Sharp, slightly vinegary formic acid is the one-carbon volatile acid, a chemical weapon found in ants and other insects but turned against them by the anteater, which relies on it to help digest them.” Harold Mcgee WSJ – 10/24/2020, What Does Outer Space Smell Like?
Forbidden Planet
The Robinson’s (Lost in Space – 1966) robot was created by Robert Kinoshita, who also designed Robby the Robot for Forbidden Planet (1956).
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Don Siegel directed two episodes of the original Twilight Zone. One of the episodes featured Robby the Robot from Forbidden Planet. The episode aired November 15th, 1963 and was titled, Uncle Simon.
The last sequence was not filmed on the Hollywood Freeway, but on an out of the way cross-bridge. The cars were actually manned by stunt drivers. Don Siegel admitted that Kevin McCarthy was in real danger of getting hit, because the sequence was shot at dawn and the actor was nearing complete exhaustion.
Years after the film, Dana Wynter received a message on her answering machine from Kevin McCarthy and he said: “Hi Becky, this is Miles. Stay awake won’t you!”
Ken Russell’s pyrotechnic and more than a little hallucinatory biopic focuses on a night spent at Lord Byron’s Villa Diodati in Switzerland, and the antics of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary Godwin, Claire Clairmont, Dr. John Polidori , and their host, the enigmatic, Lord Byron. This was the night that a horror story contest was suggested which in time led to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) and Polidori’s Vampyre (1819). It is interesting to note that both the Frankenstein monster and the fictional vampire were born of the same night. Out of one night of revel, two horror tales were brought to life.
Natasha Richardson & Julian Sands in Gothic (1986)
It is a fictionalized telling, but much of it is based on the known facts and speculation about what went on at Villa Diodati on that singular night. The cast is well up to the task of portraying Byron and his guests. Byrne is both ingratiating and sinister; Shelley is nearly mad, and drinking laudanum during the proceedings with spectacular results; Mary is the rational yet jealous wife; Claire is entirely the mad mistress and spurned woman. Dr. Polodori is the very wild card. Certainly, much of it had to be imagined and that is where screenwriter Volk’s and director Russell’s own creative madness takes hold and spins a tale of lust, jealousy, guilt, and regret.
Polidori’s story was the first fictional vampire story; although vampires were mentioned in non-fiction writing as far back as 1718 in the Treaty of Passarowitz, where the local practice in Serbia and Ottenia of exhuming bodies and “killing vampires,” was mentioned. The first appearance of the word vampyre in English would be in 1732 in news reports about epidemics of vampirism in eastern Europe.
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT:Julian Sands & Natasha Richardson / Myriam Cyr / Myriam Cyr & Natasha Richardson in in Gothic (1986)
The next vampire tale to be published would be Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s 1872 novella, Carmilla. It would be part of the influence for the German film, Vampyre (1932) which came out a year after Tod Browning’s, Dracula (1931). Bram Stoker’s novel, Dracula was published in 1897 twenty-five years after Carmilla. It is certain that the creator of Dracula was influenced by his predecessors in terror.
Illustration from Carmilla by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (1872)
Frankenstein is the more famous of the two tales that gestated on that strange evening where a contest for the best horror story powered a kind of chilling paranoia that brought out the worst and the best from all in attendance. All of it is gleefully imagined and brought to life in Gothic.
This is an excellent film for anyone interested in the legend of George Gordon, Lord Byron as well as those curious about the influences that spurned such a young woman to create so imaginatively terrifying a novel in that particular time and place.
Facts, Rumors & Hearsay
Director Cameo: Ken Russell and his family are on the tour boat at the end of the film.
When Shelly comes down from the roof and expresses his obsession with lightning, Byron calls him “Shelly, The Modern Prometheus,” which would become part of the original title for Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.
“Mad, bad, and dangerous to know,” Lady Caroline Lamb on Lord Byron.
Adrienne Barbeau began her career on the Broadway stage in Fiddler on the Roof (1968); prior to that, she had been working in a nightclub as a go-go dancer while auditioning for acting jobs. In 1972, Barbeau was nominated for a Tony award for her performance (Musical) as Rizzo for best supporting actress in the original Broadway production of Grease. By the mid-seventies she was doing mainly TV work in both series and movies. From 1972 to 1978, she was a series regular on Maude. In 1978 she met John Carpenter on the set of Someone’s Watching Me! a made for TV movie with Laura Hutton in the lead role that showcased Carpenter’s talent as a director.
Adrienne Barbeau in The Fog (1980)
Barbeau and Carpenter were married in 1979, and she made her feature film debut in John Carpenter’s, The Fog (1980); Carpenter wrote the part with his wife in mind.Her next film with her husband directing was the classic, Escape From New York (1981). Less a horror film than action adventure, Barbeau fit right into the exceptional cast that includes Kurt Russell, Lee Van Cleef, Donald Pleasence, Earnest Borgnine, Tom Atkins, and Isaac Hayes. The film was highly rated by both critics and audiences and Russell’s character, Snake Pissken remains his best known role.
LEFT: Earnest Borgnine, Henry Dean Stanton, Adrienne Barbeau & Kurt Russell in Escape From New York (1981) LEFT: Kurt Russell & Adrienne Barbeau in Escape From New York(1981)
John Carpenter directing Adrienne Barbeau in Escape From New York (1981)
In 1982 Wes Craven’s Swamp Thing was released, and was seen mainly as a campy version of the DC comic book, but Barbeau & Jourdan manage to lift the film above its director’s somewhat low aspirations. It is a better film than many may recall, and is a good film to revisit.
Adrienne Barbeau in Swamp Thing (1982)
In 1981’s Creepshow, George A. Romero presents five tales in a screenplay written by Steven King. How could you go wrong, five stories inspired by E.C. Horror comics of the 1950’s penned by the undisputed master of horror that are both creepy and wickedly funny?
Adrienne Barbeau in Creepshow (1982)
Barbeau has had a long and colorful career and currently has two films in pre & post production: Hellblazers a new horror film with Billy Zane, Bruce Dern, and Tony Todd (Candyman 1982) in post production, and Pitchfork with Tony Todd and Dee Wallace (Cujo 1981) in pre production.
Carnivale cast photo
Adrienne Barbeau
Carnivale (2005)
She has also starred in TV shows with guest spots on Dexter (2009), Gray’s Anatomy (2009), Creepshow (TV series 2019), American Horror Stories (2021), and as a regular in 24 episodes of the astonishingly well written and produced but sadly, short lived, Carnivale (2003-2005). She has had a total of 153 screen credits to date and counting.
Lori Hallier & Cynthia Dale
Lorie Hallier & Cynthia Dale
My Bloody Valentine (1981)
Lorie Hallier
Prior to My Bloody Valentine, Hallier appeared on the TV series, Bizarre in 1979. My Bloody Valentine was her first film appearance, and she went on to do guest appearances on many popular TV shows, including:
Trapper John, M.D., The Dukes of Hazzard, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and The Twilight Zone to name just a few. Hallier also appeared in a number of TV movies. She has clocked 94 screen credits to date.
Cynthia Dale
Lori Hallier & Cynthia Dale in My Bloody Valentine
Cynthia Dale has had a long career in both film and television as both an actress and producer. After a TV movie appearance at the age of 10 in The Wonder of It All (1971), her next was in My Bloody Valentine in 1981. She also had a part in The Boy in Blue (1986) with Nicolas Cage, Christoper Plummer, and David Naughton (An American Werewolf in London), and Moonstruck (1987), and the successful TV series, Street Legal (1988-94).
Adrienne King
Adrienne King in Friday the 13th
Friday the 13th2
Adrienne King is best known for Friday the 13th and Friday the 13th 2. Although she has continued working intermittently, she currently has only twenty on screen credits including three that are in pre-or-post production.
Adrienne Kingearning her Scream Queen title in Friday the 13th
Jeannine Taylor
Jeannine Taylor
Kevin Bacon & Jeannine Taylor
Friday the 13th (1981)
Jeannine Taylor has only two screen credits, and only one appearance in a horror film: Friday the 13th. The Royal Romance of Charles and Diana (1982), a TV movie,was her other screen credit. Taylor will be forever remembered by fans as the axe victim in the former. She commented on her brief screen career, “But as far as acting in major motion pictures… I didn’t think I was pretty enough. I wasn’t tall and blonde – I didn’t ever think of myself in that way.”
Robbie Morgan
Morgan’s career on the screen was also a short but memorable one that began in 1969 with Me, Natalie with her playing the titular character along side: Patty Duke, Elsa Lanchester, Martin Balsam, Al Pacino, and James Farentino.
Robbie Morgan in Me, Natalie (1969) Lobby Card
Her very next role was in a horror film in which she played a student at a dance studio run by, shall we say, a lunatic? In 1971’s answer to 1961’s Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? Debbie Reynolds and Shelley Winters appear in the formulaic horror story What’s the Matter with Helen? A young Morgan does a diminutive version of Mae West in a musical interlude.
What’s the Matter with Helen? Poster (1971) / Robbie Morgan in What’s the Matter with Helen? (1971)
Nine years later she played Annie in Friday the 13th and would only appear in three more projects in the 80’s, two of which were TV movies: Forbidden Love (1982) and I Married a Centerfold (1984). She also appeared in an episode of The Fall Guy “Eight Ball” (1983). Her next appearance was not until 2015 in Dutch Hollow. Most recently, her character in Friday the 13th was the focus of Episode 10 of the TV series, Coroner’s Report “Annie Phillips” (2021)
Robbie Morgan inFriday the 13th (1981)
Lauri Bartram
Laurie Bartram inFriday the 13th (1981)
Mark Nelson & Laurie Bartram in Friday the 13th
Friday the 13th was Laurie Bartram’s last screen credit in another short lived career. She began with two appearances on the TV series, Emergency! in 1973.
Next, she made an uncredited appearance in The House of Seven Corpses (1974), and from 1978 through 1979 was a regular on 85 episodes of the TV soap opera, Another World.
Felissa Rose
Felissa Rose in SleepawayCamp (1983)
Sleepaway Camp is a deadpan parody of Friday the 13th as well as an original in its own right with an infamous twist ending. Unlike most of the Friday the 13th Scream Queens, Rose has had a long and eventful film career with too many projects in pre & filming & post production to name, and a total of 148 screen credits as well as 32 producer & 1 writing credit.
Barbara Crampton
Bruce Abbott &Barbara Crampton
Bruce Abbott & Barbara Crampton
Re-Animator (1985)
Re-Animator remains the most entertaining as well as successful film version of an H.P. Lovecraft story. Barbara Crampton’s performance gives her a special place in the Scream Queen hall of fame. She also has enjoyed a long career on screen which began with 83 episodes on the daytime soap opera, Days of Our Lives (1983-84). She then did a TV movie and a guest shot on the TV series, Santa Barbara (season 1 episode 16-1984). Before being cast in Re-Animator, Crampton appeared in Brian De Palma’s Body Double (1984) in a supporting role. Re-Animator (1985) was the film that would land her in the horror hall of fame for all eternity!
LEFT: Bruce Abbott & Barbara Crampton in Re-Animator (1985) RIGHT: Barbara Crampton & Gary Daniels in Cold Harvest(1999)
Crampton has continued working in both TV & Films and to date has 69 screen credits including Snow Valley (2021) which is in post production.
LEFT: Barbara Crampton in From Beyond (1986) Barbara Crampton LEFT: Barbara Crampton in Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich (2018)
Facts, Rumors & Hearsay
Friday the 13th
Adrienne King was stalked by a fan with an obsession for her, terrified, she requested a much smaller role in Friday the 13th 2. She also refused to do horror conventions for 20 years.
Adrienne King’s scream was so good it clinched her getting the part.
My Bloody Valentine
Lori Hallier on Bloody Valentine: “I was watching it for the first time in 15 years. When I saw myself it was like watching a stranger, but I could finally watch it as a movie and see what made it cult-like.”
Creepshow
In the segment The Crate, the characters Wilma “Billy” Northrup (Adrienne Barbeau) and Professor Dexter Stanley (Fritz Weaver) are a tongue in cheek parody of the alcoholic and psychotically dysfunctional Martha and George in the film Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) Starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.
Sleepaway Camp
Being only 13 at the time, Felissa Rose was unable to see her own movie in theaters.
Re-Animator
Barbara Crampton does all of her own screaming in the film.
Originally, the film was going to be a faithful adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft novella, Herbert West – Re-Animator, but morphed into a parody of Frankenstein.
