Several years ago, my brother Nathan had the lead in a play called The Foreigner. Among his lines was the curious phrase “Klaatu barada nikto,” a series of alien words spoken to avert a disaster in The Day the Earth Stood Still.
The phrase didn’t mean anything to me when I heard it, though, nor did I
have any frame of reference when, the following year, I watched the
gloriously geeky young Sam Weir dress up as Gort, the robot from the
same 1951 film, on the Halloween episode of Freaks and Geeks.
By the time last year’s remake rolled around, I had a fairly good idea
what the movie was all about, but I still hadn’t seen it. Now I can put
another knotch in my sci-fi nerd belt because I’ve finally experienced The Day the Earth Stood Still.
I’ve got aliens on the brain lately thanks to ABC’s V,
and it’s a little odd to watch this incredibly low-tech movie after the
stunning visuals offered by the shiny new series. The alien vessel is
literally a flying saucer, and during the scenes in which it’s airborne,
it merely looks like a luminescent Frisbee. On the ground, it’s a
little more impressive, but not much; it’s the drabbest spaceship
imaginable, especially from the outside.
Additionally, it’s
odd to see the difference in how spectators react to the ship’s two
inhabitants. When Klaatu (Michael Rennie), steps off the ship, looking
thoroughly human, everybody gets an itchy trigger finger. When Gort,
who, to quote a sour neighbor in Freaks and Geeks, “looks like
the freakin’ Tin Man,” steps out of the entrance, there’s a mass exodus
at absurd speed. And that’s before the taciturn robot vaporizes several
weapons.
Rennie’s warm but condescending turn as the alien
visitor is the best aspect of this movie. His kindness and perplexity at
some of the customs of humans endears him to the audience quickly; it’s
obvious - to us, at least - that this is a benevolent entity. And yet,
as my friend Dan pointed out as we finished watching, there’s a definite
irony to the idea that Klaatu is heavily promoting peace while his
metallic companion threatens to pulverize people with his eyes.
Acting-wise, Rennie is the only one who really kept my attention,
though he shares some nice scenes with Billy Gray as Bobby Benson, the
boy who quickly declares Klaatu his “best friend,” and Sam Jaffe as
Professor Barnhardt, a scientist in whom he confides. Patricia Neal has
some tender moments as Bobby’s mother Helen, but she also does a fair
amount of annoying screaming, which particularly grates during a scene
in which she has been given an important job to do. I guess that’s down
to the writers more than the actress, but shrieking women have always
gotten on my nerves.
This is an extremely slow movie. It’s got
to be about the most uneventful sci-fi classic ever made. The big event
that occurs is Klaatu causing human technology to stop for half an hour
(though making helpful exceptions for such things as airplanes and
other objects whose cessation would cause a disaster). It’s like the
beginning of Flashforward, except nobody gets hurt. Klaatu spends
the entire movie looking for a sufficiently wide audience for his Very
Important Message: Don’t use atomic weapons on each other, or I’m afraid we’ll have to take you out for the good of the universe.
By the time he makes the official announcement, we’ve heard it so many
times that it sounds anti-climactic, not to mention like a double
standard. He delivers it like an ultimatum, but then he just vanishes.
When will he come back to make sure humanity has followed through? The
movie really leaves things dangling.
I like the basic premise of The Day the Earth Stood Still,
and I’m sure it made a much bigger impression 60 years ago. But for
contemporary audiences, this movie is more historical curiosity than
edge-of-your-seat drama.
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