Bill Wrobel's DVD - Film Score Rundowns

immensely. For instance, the alien helmet is actually made of “solidified electricity”
(according to the Bureau of Standards). Actually, according to the commentary,
Harryhausen himself came up with that term! Earlier at dvd 00:48:37 we learn that
instead of trying to duplicate the visitors’ weapons that we interrupt their magnetic field
by projecting a highly intermittent induced electrical field. Of course! That way we cut
the ultrasonic wavelength into the circuit, and knock them down like clay pigeons! I
would’ve recommend that they reverse the electromagnetic field back to the spaceship so
that they would actually burn up instead of wobble around and drop. This way the flying
saucers would become frying saucers! Unfortunately I was only about 5 or 6 years old, so
I could not contribute that line in the screenplay! The action at Washington D.C starts
around 1 hour 12 minutes into the movie. Too bad Klattu’s spaceship wasn’t still there at
D.C. because Gort would’ve dispatched those other flying saucers in a hurry. It appears
there were smudges on the plate at 1:15:03 as the three saucers pass by that someone
forgot to clear away. I guess by then it was too late (no budget for re-shoots!). I think the
saucer blowing up real good at dvd 1:15:19 was probably a huge paint storage facility.
The aliens’ first priority was to destroy any and all paint companies in the area (just as
they did in the Belmont Lab facility in the middle of a forest, next to the secret Pacific
Marine Paint Company). Also they had to destroy the famous Los Angeles building
where Superman usually hangs out (see 1:17:31 if you freeze it there for that instant).
That space ray travels a huge distance! I believe I heard what sounded like Rozsa around
1:21:44 at the all-clear section, but I’m probably mistaken.
David Schecter in his Film Music’s Unsung Hero documentary had discussed
how the “Trial and Escape” cue from the 1942 film, Talk of the Town (Hollander) was
used in two of the early Harryhausen movies. He used 15 seconds of it for the Main Title
of Earth vs. the Flying Saucers. Mischa right away uses the ominous two-note motif for
the menacing flying saucers. The first one is almost immediately at the start of the movie
as the Air Force pilot sees a flying saucer (dvd 00:00:28) then fifteen seconds later we
hear it again as a farmer on a tractor in Kansas sees one too. These aliens will try to
contact anybody! Then around the five-minute point a saucer tries to contact Dr. Russell
Marvin (Hugh Marlowe) and his wife, Carol (Joan Taylor) traveling in a car on the
highway. These aliens are pretty smart to be able to locate these specific two in a
highway full of cars! It is interesting that Hugh Marlowe was cast here. I wonder if it had
anything to do with the fact he was in the earlier movie, The Day the Earth Stood Still!
Both of course had to do with flying saucers. Donald Curtis is back after It Came From
Beneath the Sea. I liked him better in this role as the Major. Marlowe and Joan Taylor
have a good chemistry between them (although I still would’ve preferred Paula
Raymond!). Joan will later be in the next Harryhausen movie, 20 Million Miles To Earth.
The commentary on disc One with Harryhausen and visual effects people was fun
to listen to. After listening to Harryhausen how he created effects with simple materials
and methods, he is virtually the MacGyver of special effects! [end session 9 pm]
-Star Trek (2009) *** 1/2 [music ***]
http://www.amazon.com/Star-Trek-Single-Disc-Chris-
Pine/dp/B002HWRYJE/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1292988038&sr=1-1
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