Day the Earth Stood Still

Pros: story, direction

Cons: costumes, script, score

Review: One of the most beloved of 1950s science fiction films, "The Day the Earth Stood Still" has become a cult classic. Much discussed and praised, its reputation often prevents legitimate examination of its many flaws.

It was directed by Robert...

Pros: script, directing, acting, timelessness of the "message"

Cons: nothing

Review: These words are legend in the annals of science fiction film. The classic 1951 film, the Day The Earth Stood Still that they come from remains as relevant today as the time it was released. An alien lands on Earth in a saucer shaped spaceship...

Pros: Timely political message. Great performances.

Cons: Pacing problems in the 2nd act.

The Bottom Line: This Sci-Fi classic should not be missed by anyone aware of our current political climate.

Review: Now here's a movie that jumps right out of the time period in which it was made. The Day the Earth Stood Still is structured like a classic 50s paranoia sci-fi thriller, but it has a much deeper meaning than that. Director Robert Wise has...

Pros: Brilliant, timely landmark of a science fiction film.

Cons: Peace...or else.

The Bottom Line: A movie that reflects to a remarkable degree the divisiveness and hostility of the world not only half a century ago but also today.

Review: Although the bulk of alien-invaders-from-space movies had yet to come in the Fifties, a decade for which the science fiction sub-genre reached unparalleled heights, The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) stands as a brave and high-minded...

Pros: The story, the message, the performances, the score-all of it

Cons: Where is Gort when you need him?

The Bottom Line: This is one of those movies that stands as foundation work for much of the Science Fiction what would follow in the sixties. Still fascinating.

Review: Looking for Gort in all the wrong places?

Where do you start with a movie as old and as germinal to all science fiction movies following it as The Day the Earth Stood Still? The thing that surprises me is that I don t think I...

Pros: Well produced and directed... a thoughtful script

Cons: None

Review: "The Day the Earth Stood Still" gives rise to the question: how do we judge who is civilized? The humanoid alien Klaatu lands on the US front lawn in Washington, D. C. and promptly gets shot before he can say a what he came here to say. Only by...

Pros: Great drama, good DVD extras

Cons: Plot not necessarily the most logical at times.

The Bottom Line: Even half a century on, The Day the Earth Stood Still is one of the all time classics of fifties science fiction films.

Review: In the Beginning, all was darkness. And god said let there be lips, and there were and they were red and they said. . . .

Michael Rennie was ill
The Day the Earth Stood Still,
but he told us where we stand.

...

Pros: Sci-fi, aliens, funny one-liners, kept me intrigued

Cons: Dated, black & white, mixed messages

The Bottom Line: All in all, I enjoyed it enough to watch all the way to the end...after almost turning it off when I saw it was a black and white dated film

Review: Yea the message here was lost on me. I see many people talking about the 'peaceful' message while I heard only 'the Earth will be destroyed'. How is that peaceful? The Day the Earth Stood Still is a science fiction movie set in the late '50s...

Pros: After all of these years, it is still provocative and scary.

Cons: What cons?

The Bottom Line: Sadly, "The Earth Stood Still" is still a relevant, scary, and provocative film, that clearly, not many people of the world have seen.

Review: It is a shame, that people can return to Robert Wise's The Day the Earth Stood Still, and still find it as scary and provocative as it was when it first opened. For all of the wrong reasons.

The movie is about an extra-terrestrial, named...

Pros: Well-done sci-fi anti-war/persecution allegory, essential viewing for propellerheads and the like

Cons: Sometimes draggy and a little obvious

The Bottom Line: An essential science fiction film and talky warning against the stupidity of man, nonetheless entertaining

Review: Actually, Robert Wise's "Day the Earth Stood Still" is a pretty entertaining sci-fi/Cold War artifact that still stands up to viewing today. My first acquaintance with the movie was as a five-year old watching this on The Late Show on Channel Two...