#82: THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (1951)

THRILL SCALE 1-10

1.5

HAVE I SEEN IT BEFORE?

Never

BEST SEQUENCE

The worldwide electrical outage orchestrated by Klaatu to demonstrate his power to all of humanity

BEST LINE

"I'm impatient with stupidity. My people have learned to live without it."

ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE

95%

ROTTEN TOMATOES CRITICS CONSENSUS

"Socially minded yet entertaining, The Day the Earth Stood Still imparts its moral of peace and understanding without didacticism."

IMDB SYNOPSIS

"An alien lands in Washington, D.C. and tells the people of Earth that they must live peacefully or be destroyed as a danger to other planets."

THOUGHTS

• More like The 90 Minutes My Life Stood Still
• Catty remarks aside, let's talk Thrill Scale. It's an entirely unscientific process. I don't have a rubric, there's no specific criteria. Really, whatever number I assign is just a way for me to quantify my gut reaction to these movies. Going into this I was uncertain how low these scores would go; this is a list of the most thrilling movies of all time, so surely there's a good chance I'd be fairly entertained by all of them. But I can definitely state that while watching The Day the Earth Stood Still I was the least entertained, the least thrilled, out of any of these movies so far
•  And I know that this is considered a stone cold classic of early sci-fi. While watching, I was trying to find some sort of justification for this and I just couldn't. It's boring and it's corny and it did nothing for me. I will acknowledge that some of these early, influential movies may have lost some of their impact because aspects have been imitated in so many movies in the years since that the original iteration may have lost some of its novelty, but even with this in my mind, I just couldn't find anything in this movie that would stick with me
• Some of the special effects, especially when it comes to Klaatu's spaceship, were fine. But Gort, the main threat to humanity in this movie, just looks like a tall guy lumbering around in grey pyjamas. I didn't find him intimidating, and I mostly just kept thinking of Sam's Halloween costume from Freaks and Geeks
• Also, all the characters kept referring to Gort as a "robut" in that old-timey way
• And Klaatu's story, of learning about this funny little species called humans, was incredibly slow going. Even the scene in which he stopped all the power across the Earth, which I thought was the most effective scene, was kind of silly. How can we show the massive impact that this would have on people around the globe? I know, how about someone who's trying to make a milkshake, but the milkshake blender won't work! Goosebumps!
• I will admit that some of the Washington DC landmarks were used effectively
• I get that this is a parable about the Cold War and nuclear weapons, and I get that Klaatu is a pretty heavy-handed Christ figure. I'm sure this was a very effective concept during the actual Cold War. These days, the movie just doesn't hold up
• We also had to deal with an annoying child actor, who got to deliver such wonderful lines as, "I like you, Mr. Carpenter! You're a real screwball!" Credit to the rest of the actors, though, at least they engaged with the film
• And so, this is officially the lowest score I've given a movie so far, and it's going to be hard to go much lower. More than even The Poseidon Adventure, another "classic" which did nothing for me at all, I wouldn't be surprised if The Day the Earth Stood Still has its defenders. And who knows, maybe I'll watch it again some day and it'll click for me. But as it stands, I doubt it, and I probably won't have the urge to watch this one ever again. But hey, check another "classic" movie off the old list

Up next: The Omen from 1976

#83: THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925)

 

THRILL SCALE 1-10

5.5

HAVE I SEEN IT BEFORE?

Never. In fact, this is the first filmed version of The Phantom of the Opera that I've seen (but I did see the musical on Broadway)

BEST SEQUENCE

It would have to be the famous unmasking scene, but when the chandelier falls it's also pretty cool.

BEST LINE

"..." - Everyone

ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE

90%

ROTTEN TOMATOES CRITICS CONSENSUS

"Decades later, it still retains its ability to scare -- and Lon Chaney's performance remains one of the benchmarks of the horror genre."

IMDB SYNOPSIS

"A mad, disfigured composer seeks love with a lovely young opera singer."

THOUGHTS

• This movie is best remembered for the physical appearance of Lon Chaney's face as the Phantom, which the actor designed himself with makeup effects. As most people probably know about The Phantom of the Opera, the titular character wears a mask for a large part of the story and we don't see the Phantom's face until exactly halfway through the movie at minute 45. Now, apparently in 1925 when moviegoers first saw the Phantom's face, there was much screaming and fainting. But come on, that was 1925, and we've seen some pretty intense movies since then. I knew about this scene, and I was prepared to be underwhelmed and scoff at the weak stomachs of those people from 1925. But you know what, in the context of the movie it worked pretty well. I didn't scream or faint, of course, but it was quite effective, especially with Lon Chaney staring directly into the camera. If you want to see just this clip, you can find it very easily on Youtube. Just look for the unmasking scene
• Speaking of which, as has happened with a few of these movies so far, at some point The Phantom of the Opera's copyright lapsed, so it's now in the public domain and you can find several versions of the whole movie on Youtube
• And in addition to his physical appearance, I thought Lon Chaney was great as the Phantom. Considering he spent half the movie behind a (still quite creepy) mask and the other half behind a full face of makeup, and the fact that this is a silent movie, his physical acting was really quite expressive and engrossing. He especially stood out compared to some of the other actors who were more hammy and exaggerated (we're talking giant stage winks and nudges to show us when someone's being sneaky)
• There have been a few different releases of this movie, including various versions of colouring effects and different musical scores. The version I saw used tinting on the black and white, and some scenes even appeared to be in full colour, which was quite striking visually. This version also used a score which was composed by Gabriel Thibaudeau in 1990, which I thought was absolutely fantastic
• The sets and scenery were also magnificent
• I'm pretty sure this is the last silent movie on the list, so I made my dumb "..." silent movie joke again, but if I did pick a favourite line it would actually be the Phantom saying, "Feast your eyes - glut your soul on my accursed ugliness!" Big mood

Up next: The Day the Earth Stood Still from 1951