NFR Project: “Invaders from Mars”
Dir: William Cameron Menzies
Scr: Richard Blake
Pho: John F. Seitz
Ed: Arthur Roberts
Premiere: April 9, 1953
80 min.
This film represents the work of one of the original geniuses of American cinema, William Cameron Menzies.
Menzies invented the role of production designer on films. No one person had been assigned to creating the look of a film before he began to do it, in a career that stretched from 1917 to 1956. In that time, he won two Oscars – one a special award for his work on Gone With the Wind. He primarily occupied himself with production design, although he did direct occasionally as well, most notably the 1935 sci-fi epic Things to Come.
Invaders from Mars was an opportunity for Menzies to create a unifying mise-en-scene. First, he used SuperCinecolor for this film, which resulted in deep, vibrant, saturated color that gave the film a distinctive look. Then he designed all his sets with a spare, clean minimalism that gives the movie a dreamlike, hallucinatory feel. In Menzies’ film world, only significant elements are included in the frame and everything extraneous is taken out.
The story begins with a boy, David, seeing a flying saucer land near his home in the middle of the night. He tries to alert his parents, who disbelieve him. His father goes to investigate – and comes back from the site a different person, cold, suspicious, and hostile. David notices he has a peculiar puncture on the back of his neck. Two police officers and a neighbor girl are also affected. The puncture is the only sign of a mind-control device implanted in the heads of the aliens’ victims.
David goes to the police, but they only lock him up (the police chief has been taken over as well). A health department doctor interviews him, and he convinces her that his story is true. The two of them consult local astronomer Dr. Kelston, who theorizes that everything that has happened presages an invasion of the Earth from Mars. He contacts the Army, who surround the landing site.
What follows is a standard back-and-forth battle between the Army and the Martians, which culminates in the explosive destruction of the saucer. David then wakes up – it was all a dream! He reports it to his parents, who send him back to bed. He looks out of his window . . . and sees the saucer landing again . . .The End.
The movie plays well as an allegory of people’s fear of being conquered by an enemy force (remember, the Soviet Russians were our enemies at the time), and the film makes the viewer suitably paranoid. Additionally, there is the idea of one’s parents turning into cold, hostile creatures that do not have one’s best interests at heart. David loses his parents to the Martians, but he gains an idealized pair of parents in the form of the doctor and the astronomer, who are the only ones to believe him at first. This kind of wish fulfillment works well in the context of this fantasy.
Invaders from Mars would prove to be a template for the alien-invasion films to come.
The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Pickup on South Street.
