1950s Sci-fi Movies Full Length Free

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Lorin Cupples

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Aug 3, 2024, 11:14:56 AM8/3/24

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I was reminded why DC comics were the first comics I read and the ones that dominated my comic reading for the first six years of my public schooling, before I discovered Marvel Comics in the Sixth Grade. The art strikes me as much more cinematic than the EC comics, with movement and action driving the storytelling, rather than the text and dialogue coming first and the artwork having to get squeezed in.

There were a number of color science fiction films in the 1950s that dealt with space travel and alien invasion. With the ability to create matte paintings and painted backdrops and design large studio sets and expertly crafted miniatures, Hollywood filmmakers could bring to the big screen the kinds of images comic book artists had to fit into panels on a page.

THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955) was the first color Hollywood film to visit a planet outside the solar system when Earth scientists are abducted by scientists from Metaluna seeking help in saving their planet from destruction. It had some of the most memorable and dramatic images from 1950s color sci-fi as the Earth scientists are thrust into a sprawling underground city under alien attack.

A list of science fiction films released in the 1950s. These films include core elements of science fiction, but can cross into other genres. They have been released to a cinema audience by the commercial film industry and are widely distributed with reviews by reputable critics.

This period is sometimes described as the 'classic' or 'golden' era of science fiction theate. With at least 204 sci-fi films produced, it holds the record for the largest number of science fiction produced per decade. Much of the production was in a low-budget form, targeted at a teenage audience. Many were formulaic, gimmicky, comic-book-style films. They drew upon political themes or public concerns of the day, including depersonalization, infiltration, or fear of nuclear weapons. Invasion was a common theme, as were various threats to humanity.[1]

So many of the great science fiction stories of the 1950s were about the end of the world, or the collapse of civilization. Some of my all-time favorite novels are about the end of the world as we know it, like Earth Abides (1949) by George R. Stewart, On the Beach (1957) by Nevil Shute, or Alas, Babylon (1959) by Pat Frank.

However, and however: as the SF of the 1930s seems so dated now, so too will the fiction of the 1950s come to be something that only older people like. What us older people need to do is to temper that nostalgia with the new, powerful, very well-crafted fiction and TV that is increasingly coming our way.

That true Ed.I try and split my science fiction reading time between old and new. Also, more women, people of color, and writers from distant countries are writing today, and that adds tremendously to the scope of science fiction.

Plus it is amazing to see their future come true. Look at New Horizons. Look at Juno. Kepler. We are on the verge of exploring space. Truly exploring it. I know I will never go in space, but watching some of the building blocks come together so that one day people will be able to is exciting.

As for all the complex thoughts and discussion of the meaning of all of this, well it sounds fine to me and important to an understanding of why those works of fiction caught our attention. But what I remember most is the ignition of my imagination, the 3D Cosmotronic visuals that occurred in my brain while I was reading all of that stuff.

50s science fiction was imbued with hope and the sense that colonised planets, trade with Mars, interstellar travel and contact with aliens could actually happen. Today, none of these things are in sight, so I miss that wide-eyed era where we could dream about fantastic things.

You pretty much covered what I wanted to say. One thing I learned by studying history was not to judge the people of one Era by the current standards. I believe every child should be required to read Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in school. Not because I think people of those times were right, but rather to help understand what those times were like.

I strongly recommend a Yahoo group who are dedicated to preserving our pulp heritage. Pulp...@yahoo.groups offers thousands of high quality scans of periodicals from the mid 19th century to within 10 to 15 years ago. Obviously nothing that is available commercially is allowed and if an author or their heirs request something be removed it is. Many of the scans at Archive.org, project Guttenberg, and other repositories on the Web came from these amazing people. Can not recommend them highly enough.

I do! I love the books you listed, and just recently re-read most of them. When thinking about why I enjoy it and still find it attractive to read even now? The first thing that popped into my head was the sense of adventure, wonder, and excitement that comes though. Modern SciFi seems to be a bit more serious and sprawling, with a lot less left to the imagination.

I was 12 in 1957 so I was reading much the same a you. Remember the Ace doubles?
Some stores age better than others. City and the Stars is still good. I was just rereading some H. Beam Piper from the 50s and the smoking was jarring along with on the buttons and dials on the machines. Poul Anderson provides a sense of wonder and grandeur that I can think any one matching.

I was a teenager during the turn of the century and 12 or so sounds about right for when I started reading science fiction. However, it was one genre among others. The only newish books I was reading were action adventures by Clive Cussler, Tom Clancy and Wilbur Smith. Aside from those there was every single Hardy Boy novel in the public library system, along with a sizable collection of Nancy Drew books when the Hardy Boy ones were on order. Every Phantom comic available in the secondhand bookstores cycled its way through my hands and was redeemed for credit. Every single one of those flimsy stapled westerns in the public library. Enid Blyton and Arthur Ransome, Biggles and Tarzan. Lots of other things.

I never went really hungry as a child, but books were a luxury for the home (Phantoms were shared, and could be redeemed for half credit), so they all came from the public library and the public library had thousands of books from what I thought of as the olden times before my father was even born. It is these books that took over from everything else and when I finally had money, it was science fiction that I brought. The first collection I created was every single novel and short story collection by Heinlein made up of $3 and $4 ratty paperbacks generally published between the 60s and 70s, aside from obviously, the later novels.

But there were old science fiction and fantasy encycopedias, illustrated encyclopedias, reading guides and books of science fiction art in the library. There were also anthologies and omnibuses. Most of them were from the 70s. From these I learnt about the Grand Masters, The Deans, The Hugo Winners and the Fan Favourites.
Heinlein, Clarke and Asimov. Bradbury and Bester. Pohl and Norton. van Vogt and Wyndham. Blish and Aldiss. Clement and Stapledon.

Some of us are relatively young, but through some chance or necessity our reading started not in modern times, but in far distant times. Since then, instead of reading forward and back from the contemporary era where we started reading, we are reading forward and back from an era of the past, much as if we lived in that era. Even to us, the fiction of the early 20th Century sets the grade that newer works must meet and they are often found wanting.

Ultimately, the increasing popularity of SF (mostly via movies and TV) will increase the readership of the classics and will continue to increase as SF becomes more and more culturally and historically relevant. For one last example, this has become especially evident to me in the last few weeks as a fellow educator and I are proposing a course on Mars SF and Science to a major university and, so far, have had strong positive feedback from students and administrators who have initially vetted our idea. Though the course may not be through all the official hoops for months yet, we are trying hard to bolster to prove the relevance of all SF. Speaking of which, if you (or anyone) have any good suggestions for Mars based short stories we would appreciate the help (any period of SF, but especially from the 50s until now, except Martian Chronicles which is already being considered).
Anyway, thanks for the interesting articles.

A few years ago, I made it a project to read or reread every novel and short story that Heinlein ever wrote. This got me to read his later work which I had never got around to reading and I enjoyed most of those books, though still much prefer his 1950s/1960s works. Asimov is another that has long been a favorite.

The film has the stark look of the German films of the Expressionist era, and indeed Ulmer claimed that he worked on movies like Der Golem and Metropolis before coming to Hollywood. That influence would most notably be felt a decade later in the groundbreaking TV anthology series, The Outer Limits, which also probed the horror/sci-fi sweet spot. The rich atmosphere, empathetic portrayal of the alien, and overall intelligent approach to the material help this picture stand out more than 70 years later.