You know how they say that some movies are so bad that they’re good? Well, that doesn’t apply here. This movie is so bad that it’s execrable. It was made with a minuscule budget and a bunch of no-name actors during a week in rural Florida. If that doesn’t have all the ingredients for a cinematic dog, I don’t know what does. Oh, and add to that that, despite the title, Frankenstein does not actually make an appearance in this movie.
But that’s not to say the film is without its merits. For example, it has a groovy early-60s soundtrack that some might find nostalgic. Also, one of the main actors had been Playboy’s Playmate of the Year in 1959. I’m not making this up.
But let’s go through this step by step:
The Plot: The movie opens aboard a Martian spaceship, commanded by the Playmate of 1959. Through painful expository we learn that Mars had a nuclear war, and the crew of this ship are the only ones to survive. What’s more, all the females (except for Miss 1959, presumably) were killed. So they’re on their way to find female “breeding stock” to take back to their planet.
Meanwhile, at a NASA press conference we are introduced to the astronaut who is going to make a solo mission to Mars. He’s a young, likable guy, but in the middle of the press conference he suddenly freezes, not moving a muscle. (It’s a lame “special effect,” achieved by stopping the film on a single frame.)
The astronaut’s handlers suddenly end the press conference and hurriedly usher the astronaut of the room. They then remove the top of his head and we learn that he’s actually an android. It seems the folks at NASA don’t want to risk any human lives on this mission, so they secretly developed this lifelike robot. Anyway, they fix the problem that led to his “freezing,” and they send him on his mission.
It’s worth mentioning here that there are many and long stretches of film depicting NASA buildings, missiles, space capsules, etc. And these are all grainy, black & white, stock footage, borrowed from news clips or official NASA films.
Anyway, you can probably guess what happens next. The ship from Mars encounters the NASA ship, and Miss 1959 has the NASA ship destroyed. The android astronaut parachutes out just in time (you have to wonder what altitude he’d achieved before he bailed out) and lands in Puerto Rico, where the Martians land and track him down. They shoot him with a ray gun that’s very obviously a Wham-O toy that was popular at that time. Observe:
Anyway, the guns manage to fry half of the astronaut’s synthetic skin. And the result, I think, is what had the producers thinking they could pass this off as a Frankenstein film. You have a man-made creature that looks deformed.
The astronaut manages to escape, but the Martians move forward with their plan to capture earth women. Naturally, they take their hunt to the beach and to pool parties, where they can more easily judge the quality of their quarry. This is perhaps the most laughable part of the movie. The women show absolutely no inclination to fight back, and in fact don’t seem to really care what’s going on at all. And the men who are with them at the pool party similarly just stand around resignedly, like a bunch of losers.
Meanwhile, the US military finally figures out there’s been an alien invasion, and they attack the Martian ship with reels and reels of stock footage from the Korean war or whatever. (One reviewer measured the amount of stock footage in this film, and it clocked in at 65 percent of the entire movie!)
Through some plot contrivances, the injured astronaut finds himself aboard the Martian spaceship, and he frees the bikini-clad women. In response, the Martians turn loose their “Spacemonster” that they were keeping on board, presumably for this purpose. Even though the Spacemonster is laughably fake, it at least suggests the costume department put in a little effort.
And so, with only 4 minutes left to the movie, “Frankenstein” (i.e., the astronaut) finally meets the Spacemonster. There’s a brief battle, and its unclear how it ended, but somehow the astronaut gets hold of a Wham-O air blaster and destroys the ship, along with everyone on board (including himself).The world is saved.
The Monster: As noted earlier, I don’t think this qualifies as a monster at all, let alone a Frankenstein monster. He’s an android that works for NASA that just happens to have some damage to his synthetic skin. What’s more, he’s a “good guy” who ends up saving a bunch of women and, indeed, the planet.
The monster/astronaut is played by Robert Reilly, who appeared to two other minor movies in the 1960s. I can’t find any other intell on him.
The Atmosphere: This movie feels like boring, Eisenhower-era newsreel footage of American military actions and space launches. And that’s because literally two-thirds of the film is made up of boring, Eisenhower-era newsreel footage of American military actions and space launches. The one-third of the movie that actually involves new footage is largely composed of drawn-out, dialogue-free sequences of people walking.
The only truly interesting parts take place aboard the Martian spaceship. That’s mainly because an (inadvertently) campy Martian named Dr. Nadir keeps making the most absurd, melodramatic statements that make no real sense. He reminds me a lot of Uncle Fester on The Addams Family, only less dignified. You can see him in action here. (Seriously; you really have to watch this clip.)
Incidentally, Dr. Nadir is played by Lou Cutell, who would later appear as Amazing Larry on Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. He’s been in many movies (generally bit parts), and still walks the earth today at age 91.
The other thing we have to say about the atmosphere is the music. It actually seems to presage more modern movies, which use contemporary music prominently during dialogue-less scenes. It’s “hip” music from the early sixties, Daddy-O. You can listen to one of the songs from the soundtrack here.
General Comments: There’s a rumor that the writers of this movie originally conceived it as a parody of 1950s science fiction, but that the producers wanted to play it straight. Some humorous parody stuff may have originally been shot and later excised. I can’t find any such clips, though. Anyway, check out the trailer and decide for yourself whether this was intended to be viewed as a parody or as straight.
Whatever the truth, this movie fails both as a parody and as an earnest horror/science fiction movie. More to the point, this fails as a “Frankenstein” movie. (Evidently there were some alternative titles that had been considered, including “Mars Attacks Puerto Rico”. That would be less misleading, at least.)
Tomorrow: Remember Rankin-Bass, who made those unsettling stop-action animated Christmas shows like Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer and Frosty the Snowman in the 1960s? Well, they also made a full-length Frankenstein movie with that same brand of puppet animation. You have to see it to believe it. Mad Monster Party is available on YouTube.
Chasing Phantoms 