Jim Knipfel Mar 15, 2019

Forbidden Planet is still dazzling and subversive, and an influence on most major space opera science fiction.

Despite the sudden and unexpected explosion in the popularity of science fiction films in the early 1950s, a number of major studios were resistant to the trend, considering the genre to be B-film fodder at best, and at worst childish gutter trash that was beneath them. When it became apparent just how much money could be made with sci-fi, however, most eventually relented. One neat trick that was used to justify taking the dive while preserving a bit of pride and self-respect was to produce lavish, big budget Technicolor adaptations of established sci-fi literary classics. As a result we ended up with George Pal’s versions of War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, and Philip Wylie’s When Worlds Collide. Let Pal toss in his trademark heavy-handed Christian subtext,...