Review of The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) by Byron B — 14 Mar 2012

This won the Golden Globe's short lived award Best Picture Promoting International Understanding. The award existed for less than 20 years of the Golden Globe's existence, but represents an important ideal that I wish was given more focus.

The opening sequence with the flying saucer contains surprisingly good effects. The filmmakers attempt to show an international response to the UFO with a prototype of a 24/7 news cycle, in those days primarily with radio, but with television just beginning. I didn't understand why the local news anchor kept his fedora on in studio while reporting warnings to Washington D.C. residents. Was that common? Klaatu's costume looks really dated when he finally emerges from his craft, but the robot, Gort's, sleek and simple look and ability to eliminate military weaponry makes up for it. It is odd that Klaatu looks exactly like a human, but Michael Rennie who plays the role, gives him an intelligent, otherworldly quality. Patricia Neal plays single mother Helen Benson and Billy Gray plays her son Bobby. Klaatu, or Mr. Carpenter, gets to know humanity more personally through these two. Bobby is a kid right in line with the Leave It to Beaver types of that period, but he helps Klaatu find the "smartest man in the country," the scientist, Dr. Barnhardt. Unlike many paranoid sci-fi films of the 50's, this scientist, played by Sam Jaffe, is not mad, but filled with curiosity and is reasonably willing to help Klaatu get his warning to all the nations of Earth, since the government leaders are supposedly unwilling to sit down together. The scene that gives the film its title is pretty cool, but it is the secret views into the spacecraft that impressed me most with its futuristic technology. The way Klaatu plants seeds about the potentials of science in Bobby, representing the next generation, was unique. Patricia Neal's Helen Benson is an interesting character, not your traditional 50's housewife. There is a good amount of suspense, but even after Klaatu's big speech, I wonder if humanity really heard what he had to say.

Klaatu- "I am fearful when I see people substituting fear for reason.".