Robot Monster (1953)

Robot Monster (1953). Robot Monster: Directed by Phil Tucker. With George Nader, Claudia Barrett, Selena Royle, John Mylong. The monstrous Ro-Man attempts to annihilate the last family alive on Earth, but finds himself falling for their beautiful daughter.

“The first time I saw this, in the u0026#39;60s, I managed to catch clips off of a late night Creature Feature that cut the crap out of the movie to insert commercials. Thus it made little sense. However, the images that I did see never left me and I have been haunted with the desire to see it again in its entirety. Over the years I managed to catch even more clips but never the entire movie. Nevertheless I was still intrigued by a certain something. Finally I just flat out bought the DVD.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI watched it twice in a row and discovered that this is really quite a little gem. When you finally realize what is going on (which I certainly wonu0026#39;t tell you) it makes perfect sense in a 1953 flavor. The important thing to remember is that it is from a childu0026#39;s limited experience and point of view. Once that is realized it becomes great fun.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003ePerhaps the best part is Elmer Bernsteinu0026#39;s score. It kind of does for this movie what Max Stein did for u0026#39;King Kongu0026#39;. The mood is set. Things become a bit surreal and eerie. You become unbalanced. This is good because upon first viewing it throws you a curve and suddenly you arenu0026#39;t in Kansas anymore. How did this happen? It isnu0026#39;t explained until the end, but all at once we have stock footage of dinosaurs fighting(both actual lizards and stop-motion animated models) and a large armadillo walking through the scene. Why? It makes no sense….at first. It is certainly a bit upsetting to your reality though.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThen we discover that the entire wordu0026#39;s population is gone with the exception of a handful of people because of Ro-man and ensemble taking over the world. As you know Ro-man is a guy in a gorilla suit sans gorilla head which is replaced by a goofy space helmet. He has a bubble machine (for some reason) and a communication device at the entrance of this cave. His mission is to kill off the rest of the remaining humans. Piece o cake? Nope. Crafty humans have accidentally figured a way to cloak their exact location.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe acting is not good but I have the strangest feeling it was completely on purpose to unbalance the viewer. The same holds true for much of the logic. But in the end that is OK when you discover what has really happened. As soon as that is revealed you will groan and wonder what you missed that might have explained this earlier in the film. No, you didnu0026#39;t miss anything. The movie leads you where it wants you to go and reveals nothing until it wants you to know. Then, if youu0026#39;re dedicated, you will watch it again and perhaps enjoy it much more like I did. I also discovered that while it is logically lame it is never flat out stupid. There really is a method to the filmmakeru0026#39;s madness here.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThis movie is cheesy and cheap – it probably wouldnu0026#39;t have worked any other way. Because of Bernsteinu0026#39;s music and some of the work by the sound department this movie can even raise your sense of unease. This is good! It doesnu0026#39;t try to scare the Hell out of you but tries to convey a story – which is somewhat interesting from a 1953 point of view.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eBottomline: I personally like this movie and will see it again. I think David Lynch should try a remake. It has some of the same qualities as some of his films for developing a sense of the surreal.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI give it a 4.”