Monster of the Day #25

Updated on May 11, 2010 By Ken Begg 13 Comments

“Great scientific advances are oftentimes sudden accomplished facts before most of us are even dimly aware of them. Breathtakingly unexpected, for example, was the searing flash that announced the atomic age. Equally unexpected was the next gigantic stride when Man moved out of his very orbit to a point more than 20 million miles to Earth.”

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  • Reed

    I’m pretty sure that, at a minimum, the scientists on the Manhattan Project expected the searing flash that announced the atomic age. 1 or 2 other people might have expected it as well. I guess to some it would have been breathtaking unexpected though.

    There is a small part of me that regrets that I never learned to write in the style of 1950’s science fiction hyperbole. It would certainly make my office memos more exciting!

  • TongoRad

    Oh, those street urchins named Pepe, they never know all of the trouble that they can cause! (Actually, my 7 year old son kinda reminds me of him- and we keep our eye on him all of the time.)

    I love everything about this movie, even when the monster is just a wee thing and only we viewers know how big he is destined to become.

  • It’s a Pokemon movie! Just like Gamera the Brave and Gamera 3: Awakening of Iris

  • BeckoningChasm

    Believe it or not, the colorization on this film isn’t half bad.

  • The Rev. D.D.

    Truly one of Harryhausen’s finest creations.

  • The colorization *was* overseen by Harryhausen, so says he would have shot them in color if he could have. I still don’t think it’s necessary, but it wouldn’t ruin the films, like adding color did to Night of the Living Dead, or would do to Them!

    On the other hand, I wouldn’t want them to computer add three more tentacles there just because Harryhausen couldn’t afford them at the time.

  • BeckoningChasm

    The nice thing about the Harryhausen colorizations (which he did oversee) is that they don’t exclude the black and white versions: both are available in a very nice Blue Ray box set that also has C/B&W versions of Earth VS The Flying Saucers and It Came from Beneath the Sea. Also the 7th Voyage of Sinbad, but that’s in color only (as it was originally).

  • Rock Baker

    Once again I can thank TNT’s Monstervision for finally introducing me to this movie (I had seen clips in Invasion Earth! The Aliens are Here! and I was hooked) during a Harryhausen marathon. It was also my first viewing of Earth vs The Flying Saucers. I was so jazzed to see these movies that I lied to my parents! At the time, we had a deal that if I failed a test at school, I’d be cut off from television over the weekend. That weekend, on Friday, just before leaving for home, the teacher handed out some tests we’d taken earlier and mine was covered in red ink. Normally, I’d have taken my medicine and been forced to play outside that weekend, but I didn’t want to miss 20 Million Miles To Earth! I’d been waiting all week! So I tossed the test into the trash on my way out and lied about the results when I got home. I finally got to see the film and loved every minute of it. Unfortunatley, the teacher found the test paper and rescued it from the trash and called my folks on Monday. After it was all over, Pop told me that we might’ve been able to work something out for the Monstervision show. He knew how important it was to me that I get to see it. We did tape it the night it was on, and I later ran the tape at school for the other kids. I got to show the tape for my birthday.

    I had never noticed before that my first viewing of 20 Million Miles to Earth sounded so much like an episode of Leave it to Beaver.

  • GalaxyJane

    I was fortunate enough to get both the Harryhousen DVD box sets for Christmas just past (Santa had apparently been looking the other way and thought I’d been a VERY good girl). I have been sharing them with my sons and both, the youngest in particular, love this flick. In fact when they visited me for Mother’s Day the first thing the 4 yo asked to watch was 20 Million Miles to Earth.

  • GalaxyJane

    That’s Harryhausen. I have got to start proofreading before I hit submit.

  • “In fact when they visited me for Mother’s Day the first thing the 4 yo asked to watch was 20 Million Miles to Earth.”

    Truly, that was the greatest Mother’s Day gift of all!

  • The Rev. D.D.

    Wow, that’s a beautiful story, GJ.

    I wish I was closer to the homeland, so I could do the same for my nephew and soon-to-be-born niece more than once a year. *sigh*

    Not that that’ll stop me…

  • sandra

    I believe that if you look carefully at the Mad Scientist’s lab in PIRHANA you can see a tiny Ymir lurking among the equipment. Personally, I find the Ymir a very sympathetic character: kidnapped from his home, taken to a planet whose environment must have been very uncomfortable and then killed. Poor thing.