Target Earth (1954) User Reviews

"You ever try to empty a sack of sugar?"

[utgard14 · 6/10 · 4 June 2014]

A group of people wake up to find their city deserted due to an invasion of alien robots from Venus. While the military tries to figure out a way to fight back, these people hole themselves up in a hotel where they are safe. That is, until a psychopath shows up! After an impressive start, it drags some as they sit around the hotel room scared of the robots outside. The cast is decent, with stars like Richard Denning and Virginia Grey leading the way. Both were somewhat successful but should've been bigger than they were in their respective careers. Beautiful Kathleen Crowley and character actors Richard Reeves, Arthur Space, and Whit Bissell are also good. Robert Roark, however, is another story. According to the trivia section here on IMDb, he got this part because his father would only invest in the film if they cast him. I can believe that as he's the weakest part of the cast and seems to be imitating characters he saw in other movies.

The interactions between the group are pretty clichéd and cheesy but somehow I couldn't help but like them (except Roark) due to the charisma of the actors. It's kind of funny to watch Denning deduce the invaders are from Venus because of stuff he learned from reading his friend's sci-fi magazines in college. The inevitable romance between he and Crowley comes on super fast, with them falling for each other hard within hours of meeting. This is made all the more implausible when you see how much of a jerk he is to her in the first part of the film.

As others have pointed out, the special effects are limited. There's one rather silly-looking robot that they keep filming yet they tell us there's supposed to be a whole army. Look, '50s sci-fi was the best but sometimes its charm was in its goofiness. The robot here is pretty goofy. The actual invasion stuff takes place off-screen and stock footage is used a little too much. Still, despite its shortcomings, it's an entertaining movie.

A mixed bag of good and bad.

[littlenemo · 7/10 · 29 June 2000]

Acting: THE GOOD. Richard Reeves and Virginia Grey. Although they both started the movie completely intoxicated, they suddenly become sober at the sight of a dead body. But I found them to be the only two characters with any hint of personality in this movie. THE BAD: Everybody else. Kathleen Crowly runs through the vacant city with a smile on her face, isn't she supposed to be frightened? Richard Denning is just the opposite. His face is so straight throughout the whole movie, I was beginning to believe HE was a robot. And finally, Robert Roark...ugh!! What is that?? A Humphry Bogart impersonation?

SPECIAL EFFECTS: THE GOOD: You'll only have to look at the robots a few times,the rest is left to our imaginations. THE BAD: Is that robot bow-legged? Well, I have seen worse in other B-movies.

CLASSIC LINES: FRANK: "Take it easy, I'm not going to hurt you!" Just before slapping Nora in the face. And, FRANK: "It's(Venus)covered by a heavy layer of clouds,that means plenty of water, oxygen, and hydrogen in it's atmosphere." VICKI: "Say, where did you learn all this?" FRANK: "College." Overall, this is your average 50's sci-fi with more focus on character studies than on the cheap looking robot. Which saves it from the Ed Wood level of movie making.

Not As Scary As It Seemed 45 Years Ago

[ferbs54 · 5/10 · 21 December 2007]

This movie used to scare the crap out of me when I was a little kid, mainly for the reason that a dead woman that is shown at the picture's opening looks EXACTLY like a neighbor that we had back in 1964. When you're 8 years old, that's enuff to frighten the bejeebers out of you. After seeing "Target Earth" the other day, for the first time in over 40 years, I must say that I no longer find it as scary as I once did. The film's opening, in the abandoned, nameless city, is well done, but that giant lumbering robot that used to be such a thriller as a kid, these days is just a laff riot. (The shot of the dead woman is still kinda freaky, although I honestly don't recall what my old neighbor looked like now!) Anyway, the picture is competently acted, the leads are likable, and at a mere 70 minutes, the film never outwears its welcome. It's good for fans of Grade B, 1950s sci-fi. You know who you are!

Worth 1 viewing for fans of 1950s American scifi

[ebeckstr-1 · 4/10 · 10 January 2019]

This movie starts out in promising fashion. The first scene is nearly silent, with minimal use of a score, as the camera slowly pans across a woman lying in bed, a mirror, an open bottle of sleeping pills. The woman awakenings, her suicide unsuccessful. It could almost be the opening of a well-directed, stark 1950s melodrama.

Unfortunately, the best things about this movie are the first 5 minutes and the last 5 minutes (plus the fantastic poster art).

In between is a mishmash of C-grade romantic melodrama, crime melodrama, and military stock footage, blended with a few unimaginative scenes of a couple of government scientists working in a little low-budget brick room in a basement to find a way to defeat the enemy.

And of course the requisite sexism of the era. Our two main protagonists meet each other and bond over a man-on-woman slap, because, naturally, he perceives her as being hysterical. Fortunately, she apologizes, and they move on.

Regarding the latter, I don't blame this movie for being "a product of its time," but I nonetheless cannot understand why it has managed to stay in the consciousness of fans of 1950s American science fiction and Cold War pop culture. It is somewhat interesting as a post-apocalyptic Cold War melodrama, of which the movie Five is another example, and has obvious cultural relevance in that context. But there are so many other better, more interesting and entertaining examples. It might be worth one viewing for die-hard fans, but having seen it more than once now I can say it is certainly not worth repeated viewings.

WHERE IS EVERYBODY?

[danr51 · 24 February 2000]

This low-budget 'B' fifties film benefits from a highly compelling opening. A young, single woman awakens in her room in the early afternoon (after a failed suicide attempt), notices that the power is out and that no one else is in the building. Upon going outside, she sees that the entire city of Chicago (which looks suspiciously like L.A.) is deserted. She discovers the dead body of a woman with a look of sheer horror on her face and a man who tells her that he had been knocked unconscious all night after being robbed. The pair desperately search the empty streets (the B&W photography evokes an appropriate bleak mood), trying to figure out what happened. (I always wondered exactly when this was filmed for portions of the town are truly deserted).

Obviously, the city was evacuated for some crucial reason, but they haven't got a clue. Many of the fifties cold war paranoias come to mind; the atomic age and the UFO scare. Our hapless duo discover another couple, a pair of rowdy partiers who decided to stay behind and go bar crashing as well as a frightened, pathetic man who tells them that he's seen more dead bodies with the same horrified expressions on their faces. Then they see a huge shadow on a building of something, not apparently human, from the nearby roof. An ominous moment, reminiscent of the lurking shadow of IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE.

The hapless group takes cover in a close-by hotel lobby where they find a newspaper stating that a UFO landed outside the city last night. It looks like they really have something to worry about now. The frightened man (the only one without a date) has a simple solution: GET THE HECK OUT OF THE CITY! Before the others can dissuade him, fearing that the outskirts of the city are already surrounded, he dashes back out into the street, only to be greeted by a cyclopean robot who fires a death ray from its orb, prompting him to join the ranks of the rest of the corpses. Realizing that the city is now doomed and that any escape attempt would end up causing them to become additional reluctant members of the corpse club, the two couples decide to hold up in one of the suites upstairs. At least they can hide out first-class.

This film's set up is great, presented in a mysterious Twilight Zone manner. O.K., the robot looks a bit silly, but its bland, expressionless appearence is aloof and somewhat chilling. The fact that its lethal ray will knock you dead without a mark is quite chilling. Throughout the rest of the picture, our heros are helplessly trapped upstairs in the hotel room as the invading robots lay siege on the deserted city (we see only one; remember this is fifties low-budget, an experimental era when the studios snubbed the Science-Fiction and Horror genres and wouldn't invest much money in them).

TARGET EARTH was an old favorite that had great potential. It's unfortunate that about midway it becomes a standard alien invasion tale, lacking the mystery and suspense of the first half hour. However, the performances are good enough that I actually felt dismayed to see a few of the characters fall victims to the death rays. There is a very fifties science-fiction pulp feel to it which generates a sense of paranoia that grabs your interest. Also, this was one of the first of the "characters trapped in a confined, claustrophobic setting as an unknown menace besieges them" genre films; a theme that is reiterated in IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD and ALIEN. This idea is an effective means of creating tense suspense, especially if the filmmaker is restricted by a limited budget. The enclosed tension can produce a certain intimate quality, heightening the characters' interactions, sometimes taking on aspects of a dysfunctional family. Corman applied these methods in many of his early low-budget efforts, often to great effect.

Some of the script flaws are here: Denning (the ideal fifties science-fiction everyman) immediately arrives at the conclusion that the robots are from Venus simply because it has cloud cover, is nearest to us and "could support human life." But these are robots! We never learn why the invasion is being engineered, but maybe that's better for some unresolved mystery always adds a disturbing quality that tears down complacency.

Though I dread to say it, this could be remade, but I doubt that the script would be improved. Knowing today's formulaic approach far too well, we'd end up with a zillion more robots (at least the six year olds will be thrilled), an overblown budget and, except for schmaltzy moments, no intimacy. As an added bonus, we'd be also stuck with an idiotic, inappropriate MTV soundtrack.

Though TARGET EARTH is no classic, see it nevertheless, even for the top film it could have been.

TARGET EARTH (Sherman A. Rose, 1954) **1/2

[Bunuel1976 · 6/10 · 26 October 2008]

Since it was co-written by the man behind ROBOT MONSTER (1953), I really wasn't expecting anything from this one (whose SE DVD I bought dirt-cheap from VCI outright). However, the film proved worthy of some attention – though failing to keep up the initial momentum, despite a brief 75-minute duration.

The plot starts off with a typical 'Last Man On Earth' scenario (albeit restricted in this case to just one big American city, and the reason it's deserted is due to evacuation rather than decimation). Eventually, a handful of people (including a constantly squabbling couple) band together in a hotel; we gradually learn their individual reasons for being left behind – which would actually be replicated in the much later THE QUIET EARTH (1985) – and, amidst fighting one another (especially the bossiness of an armed criminal on the run), they heroically withstand the alien invasion (consisting of a single solitary robot!) which is threatening the planet. Ultimately, the military springs into action – scientist Whit Bissell having finally hit upon a particular sound wave which can 'kill' the clunky automaton(s), also able to shoot a deadly ray a' la Klaatu from THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (1951) – and rescues those still standing (obviously the hero and heroine).

The male lead is once again played by Richard Denning, whom I had just watched in THE BLACK SCORPION (1957): amusingly, as in that film, for all his ruggedness he's made up to be something of a dope as well, since Denning cluelessly purports to defend himself with a mere firearm (at the end, when he's told the alien was actually a robot, his character displays genuine amazement – duh!). In the end, though no classic, the film is extremely typical of its time and reasonably entertaining while it's on (with, as I said, the best moments coming at the very beginning via the eerie depiction of deserted city streets).

The extras are perhaps over-generous for such minor genre fare: that said, I haven't listened to its late producer Herman Cohen's Audio Commentary – while I was already familiar with the tribute featurette to him from its inclusion on VCI's own edition of HORRORS OF THE BLACK MUSEUM (1959).

Seen on Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater in 1964

[kevinolzak · 3/10 · 2 April 2019]

1954's "Target Earth" was an alien invasion ripoff of "The War of the Worlds," too impoverished to afford more than a single robot built, a screenplay credited to James H. Nicholson, who would soon parlay his experience with Realart Pictures to form a new company with attorney Samuel Z. Arkoff, American International Pictures, catering to the double feature crowd (also credited is "Robot Monster" author Wyott Ordung, director of Roger Corman's "Monster from the Ocean Floor"). Allied Artists definitely looked more like Monogram on this seven day wonder, despite a suitably eerie opening with Kathleen Crowley's unsuccessful suicide awakening to find the metropolis deserted, and no electrical power or utilities. She meets up with Richard Denning, then Virginia Grey and Richard Reeves (as a couple celebrating free drinks in a bar), the quartet unable to escape the city so they hold up in a nearby hotel. We see only a shadow of the robot (effectively making us believe it to be much larger than it is), the only suggestion that the invaders come from Venus due to its cloud cover and moisture in the air. The second half splits time between endless discussions between the four principals, and the military trying to discover how a disabled robot's cathode ray tube was shattered, since bullets have no effect. The picture starts off fairly strong but peters out all too quickly, only a few corpses shown lying in the streets, and the late arrival of a wanted killer hardly enough to break up the tedium (director Terence Fisher tried essentially the same story a decade later in "The Earth Dies Screaming," with similarly underwhelming results).

While you can do better than this, you could also certainly do worse.

[Hey_Sweden · 6/10 · 10 January 2021]

Robots from outer space are now invading an unnamed American city, and most of the citizens have been evacuated. Some people were overlooked, such as an out of towner named Frank Brooks (handsome Richard Denning, who was a regular in B flicks like this one) and an unhappy young woman named Nora King (Kathleen Crowley). Frank & Nora meet up with a couple named Jim & Vicki (Richard Reeves & Virginia Grey), and together they try to figure out their plan of action. Meanwhile, the film eventually starts cutting back and forth between our main characters and a group of military men and scientists who attempt to find a weakness in the robots.

"Target Earth" has an interesting pedigree. Directed by Sherman A. Rose, it was based on a story by Paul W. Fairman called "Deadly City". A.I.P. head honcho James H. Nicholson and Wyott Ordung of "Robot Monster" infamy get credit for "original screenplay", while a man named William Raynor gets final screenplay credit. It shows its low budget at every turn, although the filmmakers do well at establishing the initial mystery, when none of us know what the situation is. The picture was shot on Sunday mornings in L.A. when the streets were more likely to be deserted. Actually, considering the budgetary limitations, this is fairly compelling in its depiction of various characters under crisis situations. It only gets cheesy when we see a robot invader clunking around. (Only one costume was made, so you only ever see one robot invader at a time.). Then it becomes quite funny.

The acting is capable from our four main cast members. Robert Roark, however, is merely adequate as a mad-dog killer who is needlessly inserted into the story to add some drama. Roark only got the role because his father was a doctor / investor who insisted that his son be cast as a major character, yet he was able to parlay this opportunity into a fairly decent career. Denning is a welcome presence as always, Crowley has some appeal, and Reeves & Grey are amusing as a couple who playfully snipe at each other all the time, no matter their circumstances. The supporting cast consists of other familiar faces like Arthur Space as a general and Whit Bissell (nice to see this guy in anything) as a scientist.

It would have been nice if the filmmakers could have opened up the scope of their action a bit. As it is, though, this is a decent, fairly intimate story, albeit one with a rather low-key finish. Fortunately, everybody involved plays it straight, with none of the winking at the audience that we began to see more and more of as the decades wore on.

Six out of 10.

Low rent? You could say that...

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 7 May 2016]

TARGET EARTH sounds like an epic sci-fi movie on paper: see! Earth attacked by an army of killer robots with death rays! Sadly, as is usually the case with these things, the real story is far more prosaic, and a dearth of money means that this is a typically cheap and plodding sci-fi pic with more in common with ROBOT MONSTER than WAR OF THE WORLDS.

Cult producer Herman Cohen delivers us a tale of a quartet of survivors trapped in a deserted city and at the mercy of a robot seemingly made out of cardboard boxes. A few scenes of military speak are interspersed with the main narrative, no doubt to pad out the running time a little. Whit Bissell plays in support.

Nothing much happens here. There are a few cheesy death scenes and attempts at suspense that will disappoint all but the smallest child. Needless to say there are few effects. I like 1950s B-movies but this really doesn't have much going for it, although Robert Roark is fun as the human villain of the piece, Richard Denning is the likable everyman hero, and Kathleen Crowley certainly fills out a form-fitting sweater. What more could you want?

Cheaply made sci-fi alien invasion doomsday drama

[Billiam-4 · 6/10 · 14 August 2022]

Cheaply made sci-fi alien invasion doomsday drama uses its low-budget well and is more interested in its characters than other movies of this genre; however, the alien robots are extremely ridiculous.

Target missed on account of budget

[movieman_kev · 4/10 · 18 December 2004]

In this low-budget '50's sci-fi movie, a young woman (Kathleen Crowley) awakens only to find herself being an apparently lone survivor of some event and everyone has disappeared, eventually she runs into a few more people. They find out that the place has been evacuated on account of an invasion of robots from another planet. The movie is fairly decent, until said robots (or in this case, robot, as thats all the budget allowed for) shows up, then it loses all sense of forward momentum that the film had going for it.

DVD Extras: Commentary by Producer Herman Cohen; 20-minute video tribute to Mr. Cohen; Biographies; Theatrical Trailer; and Trailers for "Horrors of the Black Museum" and "The Headless Ghost"

My Grade: C-

The Robots are Coming!!

[oigres · 9/10 · 10 January 2000]

When I first viewed this movie,I was 11 years of age. Needless to say I couldn't sleep for a couple of nights. The movie is vintage post-World War II paranoia that has reached cult classic status (see The Astounding B-Monster web site).

All right!! So it isn't hi-tech or academy award winning material, however, the premise is a good story.

So what! The robot looks like a Maytag washer-dryer combo gone mad. Give us a break!! Stop comparing yesterday's movies by today's computer F/X standards. Think (if you can) what it was like in the fifties with no internet, no laptops and no cell phones! And you couldn't trust those Russians! The fifties reached their peak with UFO's sightings and stories and that's what this movie is all about.

Enough said!. Turn the lights down low, make some popcorn and enjoy this movie with a friend, because that robot might just be looking over your shoulder.

8 out of 10.

War of the Robot!

[Red-Barracuda · 6/10 · 30 November 2021]

This one begins in a fashion which no doubt influenced Day of the Triffids and the subsequent 28 Days Later, with a character waking up to find the city deserted except for dead bodies and finally a small group of survivors. What could be responsible? Alien robots from Venus, that's what! This one has a quite decent group of characters to propel the drama but its best asset in my opinion were the robots (or more precisely the ONE robot). It is a truly hilarious dime store wonder, like Maximillian from The Black Hole made by kids for a school project. And I, for one, loved it! But if you would prefer a second opinion then you could refer to the American magazine 'TV Guide' who proclaimed that "the robots are just plain disappointing."

Pretty good low budget science fiction based on a bad novelette.

[youroldpaljim · 5/10 · 8 December 2001]

The main thing I liked about this film is the basic premise. An assorted group of people find themselves in an abandoned city with an alien menace lurking about. The first half of this film is quite creepy and is very effective. However, once the alien robots show up, the film becomes just another ordinary 1950's alien invasion flick.

Like many of these 1950's science fiction and horror flicks, I first saw TARGET EARTH on T.V. in the sixties. Then the film vanished from television and I did not get a chance to see it again till I purchased a video copy about ten years ago. In the interim (when I was a teenager) I read the short novel "The Deadly City" by Paul Fairman which TARGET EARTH was adapted from. Having seen the film several times since, I can tell you the film is actually better. In the novel the invaders were not robots, but flesh and blood aliens (if aliens have flesh and blood!). They are never described, but someone utters something like (I'm not kidding): "They don't look like us!" While the films characters are the standard type found in films of this nature, those in the novel are all unpleasant types. No reader would care if they survive or not. Like the film, the characters are menaced by an escaped killer, but at least in the film he has a motive to menace the characters. In the novel the killers motives are unclear. Also, the novel ends by having the aliens suddenly drop dead with no explanation offered other than someone alluding that the aliens might not have been able to adapt to conditions on Earth.

Overall, TARGET EARTH is not a bad film. It's to bad it's makers let the film drift into a routine alien invader film after the very effective first half. The second half is okay, but it just doesn't deliver anything special. At least the writers didn't use the same unpleasant characters found in the novel. Like many cheap films made in the early fifties, TARGET EARTH is much better and enjoyable than many low budget films made in the later fifties.

A good scary movie

[julianbristow · 19 June 2002]

Although dated, this science fiction thriller asks the question, "Is it possible for outer space aliens to invade our earth?" The script was well written and the acting was just as good. Richard Denning and Kathleen Crowley have been seen in other top notch "B" 50'S sci-fi and horror films. But this is one of the best.

What could Ray Harryhausen have done with this?

[toddholmes-88883 · 2/10 · 24 September 2022]

Having too much time on my hands, I often reimagine old science fiction movies from the 1950s that could have been done far more effectively given a larger budget. The premise of Target Earth is interesting and does play on the emotions of isolation and paranoia. The thought of killer robots from another planet is pretty cool and at least if you are kid watching, it's the stuff of modern nightmares. Of course, this "army" of robots is never seen. They could only afford one robot. Not a bad design as 1950s robots goes (It was no Robby the Robot for sure). This brings me to my main thesis. What if Ray Harryhausen could have designed and animated an army of alien killer robots? Given the special photographic techniques used in the The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, and Earth vs. The Flying saucers, I believe Target Earth could have been a classic sci-fi movie of its kind, and not this tedious version of "Waiting for Godot".

Low budget sci-fi affair, better hire Agar, Ankrum or Denning!

[joegarbled-79482 · 7/10 · 20 October 2023]

I'm a fan of certain cheap sci-fi films of the 1950s and "Target Earth" is one of those movies, thanks to Richard Denning who was right up there with John Agar or Morris Ankrum for the ability to add some sincerity to a usually hokey story. As a big fan of Hawaii 5-0 where Richard played the Governor, Denning comes top. His somewhat craggy looks and voice were an advantage for a guy who was only going to lead in 'B' movies otherwise, a dependable second male lead.

We get a deserted Chicago and here is something that is truly effective, city streets that are completely still, totally deserted, just adds a kind of menace that flashing lights or gore can't match. Being in the era of the cold war, it just ramps up the tension even further, so here, it appears that Chicago has been officially evacuated but for our little group of stragglers led by Denning, there's no knowing why as none of them were conscious at the time of the exodus. They can't find a radio that works, the phones are out and that icon of 1950s America: the car, they can't find one that'll even turn over on the battery let alone start.

The tension is wonderfully ramped up with unexplained dead bodies (no visible signs of injury) an escape that is seemingly going to have to be done on foot and that's with the city being encircled....cue a giant shadow on a tall building! Denning leads his party into the relative safety of a hotel where they find a newspaper saying that the city was being invaded by forces of an unknown origin. One of Denning's group attempts to make a run for it, and sadly, the wonderful tension that'd been built up was lost as the invader turns out to be a (bit) daft looking robot that kills with a light ray.

It was more often than not that low budget sci-fi films kept the tension going with the "monster" remaining unseen for as long as possible. It would've helped if the robot wasn't so obviously designed by an earthman (two arms, two legs, a head with a vague face). Revealing the villain less than thirty minutes in, means that it's a toss up whether you'll sit through the rest, it's really going to be down to the characters: Denning's finely chiselled leader, the girl who becomes his love interest, and the couple they discovered in a bar, celebrating the end of the world by drinking expensive champagne "on the house". I was always going to watch the rest, thanks more to Denning than wanting to find out if/how the US Military were going to topple these invaders.

7/10.

Target: Earth. Mission: bore humanity to death.

[Coventry · 4/10 · 23 September 2014]

I'm probably one of the biggest admirers of 1950's Sci-Fi cinema that is still walking around today, and I've loved practically every single movie that fits into this category from the moment I laid eyes on it. There's just something unique about the mixture of the genre and the decade that has never again been equaled before or after the fifties. The almost standard atmosphere of paranoia and mass hysteria is mesmerizing, the long and intellectual scientific speeches/dialogs are dazzling and the black and white photography creates an unbearable tension. I'm personally convinced that milestones such as "The Day the Earth Stood Still", "War of the Worlds" and "This Island Earth" define and emphasize the essence of science fiction cinema. With "Target Earth" I was hoping to have come across another obscure gem to add to my long list of favorites, but unfortunately it became a bit of a disappointment. The opening sequences are still pure Sci-Fi gold, however. Heroine Nora King awakes in her disorderly apartment and, having narrowly survived an act of desperation, slowly realizes that she's left all alone in the giant metropolis of Chicago. The sight of the empty city streets and the disturbing sounds of silence raise the impression that "Target Earth" is a predecessor of apocalyptic masterpieces like "Last Man on Earth", "Night of the Living Dead" or "The Omega Man", and therefore the first twenty minutes of the film are sublime and absorbing. Nora then bumps into Frank Brooks, an equally confused lone ranger, and together they find out that the entire city has been evacuated while they were sleeping, apparently because they're under the attack of large robotic creatures from outer space. What follows – sadly enough – isn't an intense fight for survival against the alien opponents, but a tedious and dull portrait of a handful of people hiding in an abandoned hotel room and waiting, occasionally interfered with scenes of military men discussing their defense strategies. There are only two (!) notable robot moments throughout the entire film and the biggest menace actually comes from a human villain during the climax. That's just a wasted opportunity, regardless of how little budgetary means the cast and crew had available. Needless to say that "Target Earth" is overly talkative and overlong in spite of its barely 75 minutes running time. The robots look cheap and boorish, but still typically fifties and charming and I would have loved seeing them in action a bit more. They parade around the streets like they're on a sightseeing trip

Brilliant premise, dodgy acting

[stevelomas-69401 · 6/10 · 1 March 2020]

All in all it's a fairly original idea that remains quite tense for about 30 minutes. Sadly wardrobe, monster design and bad acting let the last half down.

Forgettable 50's Sci-Fi

[JoeB131 · 3/10 · 9 February 2008]

The plot line is so simply you'll swear you've seen it before...

People wake up to find that their city has been evacuated and is under siege by alien robot thingees (of which we never actually see more than one on screen at any given time.) While survivors try to keep one step ahead of the monsters, the Army is bravely trying to figure out how to defeat them.

Can't say the movie was all that great. It was clearly done on a budget, with characters talking about what was going on rather than showing us things going on. (Something a modern film would never do.)

The acting was fairly decent, but the threat just wasn't all that impressive.

An army of one (robot)

[copper1963 · 7/10 · 8 August 2007]

Crackerjack opening: awakening from a deep, self-induced slumber, Nora King discovers a strange new world. Imagine, for a moment, you wake-up, after an evening of popping pills, to find that everyone has vanished. You are left alone in a quiet, empty metropolis. You search the city streets and edifices for signs of life. You find nothing. And fear begins to creep into your thoughts. Target Earth, a b-movie pioneer from the 50's, begins in such a manner. It's a powerful beginning. After about ten minutes of screen time, Miss King meets a business man, Frank, from Detroit. A few stops later they hear music and stumble across a married couple, bickering and boozing it up at a high class joint. A nervous fellow soon joins the quartet--but is dispatched quickly by one of the army (never seen) of robots from Venus. Of course this makes very little scientific sense on any reasonable level. But we are along for the ride, anyway. I enjoyed the performances by the four main characters. I also felt Robert Roark's "killer" was quite good and smart. Towards the end we get a burst of ice cold violence. Not unexpected. The one mechanical man we do see is properly menacing despite the crack in his view plate. I wish the final had been filmed on the roof of a real building, instead of an indoor set. And a few more shots of the robot vaporizing some soldiers would have been appreciated.

Magnificently lousy.

[rmax304823 · 2/10 · 23 December 2007]

Four people (Denning, Crowley, Grey, and Reeves) meet by accident on the streets of a city that has been emptied overnight of people, except for a few dead bodies. They learn from a newspaper that the city has been invaded and evacuated by everyone else. The cars have been disabled, so the four refugees hole up in the suite of a hotel, making do with candles, beer, and canned food. There WAS a fifth member of the group, a witless little character, but he ran out into the street and was rayed to death by a wandering robot. The invading army, as it turns out, consists entirely of these robots with their death rays. They're impervious to bullets and can destroy airplanes, presumably with the same rays. A gun-toting evil murderer invades the hotel sanctuary of the survivors and puts moves on Crowley (who has fallen in love with Denning after knowing him for only a few hours). The resulting fight sees Grey killed and Denning wounded before the burly Reeves manages to strangle the killer.

The scenes of the survivors are inter cut with scenes of the requisite military and scientists trying just as hard as they can to devise a means of disabling these robots. They finally succeed -- surprise! When the robot army is exposed to sound waves of a certain frequency, it "cracks their cathode ray tubes." (Your television set is a cathode ray tube.) The army comes to the rescue at the last moment, too late, alas, to save Reeves but soon enough to whisk off Denning and Crowley.

A cheap and boring movie, I found it almost impossible to watch. Well, sometimes the cheapness can't be helped. A budget will stretch only so far, as we all must know. But this thing could have been written and acted by members of the robot army, who look like they're made of Lego's or like unusually angular Gorts, although we only see one of them at a time.

The dialog sucks. The plot is unoriginal. The special effects might better have been suggested than put on display. The logic of the plot is terribly flawed and the direction careless. (Carefully pruned, it might have been a decent episode of The Outer Limits.) I'll give just one example of a jarring lapse of common sense. The vicious murderer is holding the others at gunpoint and Grey suddenly remembers where she saw him before. He's the guy that murdered that hooker on Skid Row! That's right, admits the evildoer. His picture was all over the papers. They'll be looking for him on every street corner, Denning observes. Not if I slip out through the sewers and get out behind the enemy lines, the murderer sneers. The entire city has been evacuated and is now occupied by indestructible robots who kill people and repulse the military with unknown rays -- yet they'll be watching every street corner for some nobody who killed a hooker! Santa Clause could waltz past the army without interference under these conditions! Well, another example. At the very beginning, Crowley wakes up to find the city empty and she wanders the streets. She stumbles across a dead body and Richard Denning at roughly the same time. They introduce themselves and explain where they spent the previous night. Minutes of frippery go by while neither asks the question: WHAT HAPPENED? It could have been good, even with the inexpensive sets and the second-tier (but seasoned) actors. As it is, it's rather a painful experience except for those who really enjoy cheesy SF movies, and there seem to be legions of those.

The producer, the late Herbert Cohen, provides an audio commentary on the DVD and he seems like a good-natured guy. He's generous with his credits and he didn't mind if people laughed at the crummy effects when the picture was released and he still doesn't mind.

Scary concept, typical dialogue.

[John35mm · 9/10 · 16 March 1999]

The beginning of this movie could have been a Twilight Zone episode. The dialogue is similar to what you hear in War of the Worlds; you might say it's a typical post-WW2 outer-space movie. There's not much violence, but the suspense from "What's going on here?" to "Run for your life!" as the robot gains on the hapless couple makes good early-50's sci-fi the way it should be.

The First Third Hits The Target But Then Misfires

[Theo Robertson · 6/10 · 12 April 2014]

Nora King , a young woman in Chicago has survived a suicide bid via a barbiturate overdose . Stirring from what would have been her death bed she knocks on her neighbours door and no one replies . She finds no one seems to be in her apartment block . Wandering the eerie deserted streets of the city she is startled to find another survivor called Frank Brooks

Okay you've seen this type of set up before . Protagonist wakes up , thinks " Oh hold on something isn't quite right here " and finds that the entire population has been rendered blind / turned in to zombies / Daleks have invaded the world / insert your own scenario here etc etc . . It's not an original idea but it's a brilliantly effective hook that draws the audience in to the story which is why it's a common occurrence in horror and science fiction . Off the top of our heads we can name a very long list of books , films and TV shows throwing up this scenario

Where this very low budget film works best is during the deserted city scenes . I know everyone quite rightly raves about Boyle's dead London scenes in 28 DAYS LATER but stop to consider how the problems and pressure were eased by the director shooting that film on digital video . With TE let me just repeat this is a very low budget movie and camera technology in 1954 would have been very primitive in comparison to now . Even more astonishingly the trivia section of this site states the production team didn't have permits so did what we would now describe as " guerrilla film making " and shot on location in Los Angeles very early on Sunday mornings . There's not too much in the way of panning long shots but at the same time these location shots are far more convincing than in bigger budget movies such as THE OMEGA MAN where you're constantly aware of cars driving by in the distance . As Nora meets with Frank they wander around Chicago bumping in to other occasional stragglers my attention was held one hundred per cent

As you might guess for a low budget SF B movie the film can't really sustain this . Chicago has been evacuated because an alien invasion has taken place the night before . Even if you ignore the implausible idea that a large city of this kind can be evacuated in such a short period you can't ignore the fact that the film doesn't have the budget to make this invasion from Venus credible in any way and is confined to one robot . Worse than that this robot just happens to look like it was constructed out of cardboard by a group of primary school children and does tend to drag the film down after its effective first third . Likewise from a narrative point of view we have distracting cutaways to a military base where the military reference to the recent invasion and you're painfully aware that these scenes exist only to give away exposition . Might it not have been more efficient having the survivors run in to a military patrol who say something along the lines " Oh you're a handful of survivors we haven't evacuated and therefore you don't know what's going so here's the plot that needs to be explained to the audience etc etc ?

This is a film that this pulp science fiction in its most low brow form and yet some of it works brilliantly , so much so that for the early period you think you're going to be watching some sort of lost classic . Such a pity TE can't sustain its early promise . One can't help thinking that maybe the production team might have gone back to the drawing board and deleted all the rubbish about cardboard robots from Venus and come up with a premise of survivors battling to stay alive in a world where civilisation and the rule of law have been consigned to history , but I guess audiences always flock to stories that have a nice happy ending ? Even if the events leading up to the end are very silly

NORA, please wake up!!!!

[thejcowboy22 · 2/10 · 14 September 2016]

Another classic from the vault of the Million Dollar Movie in New York. Watched it over and over again. Nora King (Kathleen Crowley) wakes up to an empty boarding house. Walks outside and realizes there's no people around. Sees a dead woman with her eyes wide open screams and a chain smoking Richard Denning catches up with her. Next they meet up with two alcoholics Virginia Grey and Richard Reeves who are celebrating like it's 1999. Anyway next they find this paranoid yammer Charles Otis (Mort Marshall) who was scouring the city and also came to the same conclusion that their city is invaded by Robots hence lack of people around. Otis has no patience and runs out only to get the death ray sprayed on him. The others look in horror and make their way to a high rise apartment away from the deadly cathode ray tubed robots. After being settled in their high perch above the city another straggler finds his way upstairs and breaks in on our foursome survivors.Enter actor Robert Roark portrayed as Davis a two bit crook with a pistil who quite frankly is annoying and plays his role as a scoundrel to the max. Now there's trouble upstairs and trouble below for our vicarious foursome. Meanwhile the movie cuts away to a lab miles from the city. Chief scientist Whit Bissel and his staff work diligently for a way to destroy the mechanical menaces buy using ultra sound to destroy their face tubes. Can the army get to our feared foursome in time? Will Davis use his gun on the four at bay? I had some issues. You never see more than one robot at a time. Secondly how did our alcoholic friend sober up so expeditiously? Thirdly I would have loved to see a mass evacuation at the beginning of the movie . That would have been something to behold but the budget was low AND WE'LL HAVE TO LEAVE IT TO THE IMAGINATION!! The Diary Of Ann Frank would be much more suitable viewing hiding for Nazi turmoil than these four hiding from clumsy robots which at the right angle you could probably tip over. Hard to watch this sci-fi schlock movie more than once.