Invaders From Mars (1953)

invaders-from-mars-1Kiddie matinee thrills and chills with plenty of room in which to read all the 1950s Cold War allegory you want. A prepubescent science nerd (Jimmy Hunt) spots a flying saucer one stormy night. The next day, people in his little picket fence town are acting strangely, like they’re in some angry trance. Turns out that Martians are behind it all.

This is among the few sci-fi films of its time that was shot in color and director/production designer William Cameron Menzies uses it to create bright comic book-style visuals. The Martian saucer interior is all sumptuous emerald greens while Menzies shows mundane Earth settings through an expressionistic child’s-eye-view (see that weirdly sinister police station).

Remade by Tobe Hooper in 1986.