John Agar is the king of B movies, and if I counted correctly, he was in 15 Horror or Science Fiction movies from 1954 to 1967, and we've written about quite a few of them here because, well, John Agar and good music just go good together, like a martini and a good smoke. Tonight it's another John Agar classic, from 1957, "The Brain From Planet Arous." First off, you've got the theme by Walter Greene pounding you into the ground like Marvin The Martian riding a jackhammer, and then after the theme, there's the bar-b-que party background music, and it continues until Steve (now an alien from outer space) comes back with some serious lust in his head, not his heart!
Classic character actor Thomas Browne Henry enters the scene as Mr. Fallon, and if you watch the movie, you'll see that the level of liquid in his glass mysteriously goes up and down without him drinking from it, as the scene progresses. Something to do with Mystery Mountain maybe?
Even though they look nothing alike, I always get Mr. Henry and Morris Ankrum mixed up in my old memory base, mostly because they both played a lot of the same type of authority roles, Captain, Chief, Doctor, you get the picture. Meanwhile, John Agar, the
other man of a thousand faces, girds his grid for the big one!
Preceding "The Shining" by a number of years, here's the face of a Johnny that Shirley Temple woke up to for a couple of years!
I'm sure it took every ounce of John's acting ability to effectively scratch and growl in this scene like some creature from outer space who just realized how hot human females really are! I'm surprised he didn't bite her!
John's still grinning, and once again, it's through a window, that's making a sign of a cross. Very curious! Are you starting to see a pattern here?
Please do go out and get yourself a copy of
"The Brain From Planet Arous" so you can fully appreciate the difficulties of dealing with a superiour race with a hatchet! Go get 'em John!!!
John Agar is the king of B movies, and if I counted correctly, he was in 15 Horror or Science Fiction movies from 1954 to 1967, and we've written about quite a few of them here because, well, John Agar and good music just go good together, like a martini and a good smoke. Tonight it's another John Agar classic, from 1957, "The Brain From Planet Arous." First off, you've got the theme by Walter Greene pounding you into the ground like Marvin The Martian riding a jackhammer, and then after the theme, there's the bar-b-que party background music, and it continues until Steve (now an alien from outer space) comes back with some serious lust in his head, not his heart! 
Classic character actor Thomas Browne Henry enters the scene as Mr. Fallon, and if you watch the movie, you'll see that the level of liquid in his glass mysteriously goes up and down without him drinking from it, as the scene progresses. Something to do with Mystery Mountain maybe? 
Even though they look nothing alike, I always get Mr. Henry and Morris Ankrum mixed up in my old memory base, mostly because they both played a lot of the same type of authority roles, Captain, Chief, Doctor, you get the picture. Meanwhile, John Agar, the other man of a thousand faces, girds his grid for the big one! 
Preceding "The Shining" by a number of years, here's the face of a Johnny that Shirley Temple woke up to for a couple of years! 
I'm sure it took every ounce of John's acting ability to effectively scratch and growl in this scene like some creature from outer space who just realized how hot human females really are! I'm surprised he didn't bite her! 
John's still grinning, and once again, it's through a window, that's making a sign of a cross. Very curious! Are you starting to see a pattern here? 
Please do go out and get yourself a copy of "The Brain From Planet Arous" so you can fully appreciate the difficulties of dealing with a superiour race with a hatchet! Go get 'em John!!!
It was my pleasure to talk to John Agar off and on over the years before he passed away. My mother secretly idolized him, my father despised him largely for taking Shirley Temple's cherry. I got my mom an autographed photo of Agar from PLANET AROUS -- it was a portrait of him in his black eye contact lenses. My mother passed away last year, and we're going through her immense junk collection -- if I find this photo, I'm posting it online!!!!
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting to note the similarities between this movie and Hal Clemment's NEEDLE, published in Astounding Stories in 1949. Both are about alien cops and criminals who can possess the bodies and minds of human beings.
ReplyDelete