By Hank Reineke
In his collection of 1997, Who the Devil Made It?: Conversations with Legendary Film Directors,
Peter Bogdanovich, trumpeted that no one in the film industry, “had ever made
good pictures faster or for less money than Edgar Ulmer. What he could do with nothing (occasionally
in the script department as well) remains an object lesson for those directors,
myself included, who complain about tight budgets and schedules.” Bogdanovich, who befriended Ulmer when the
latter was in his seventies, reminded readers the director of such gems as Detour (1945) and The Black Cat (1934) was rarely given more than six-days to shoot
any of his features.
Ulmer was an interesting character, an oft-cited ego-centric
with high aspirations and boundless energy. Indie Hollywood producers found Ulmer a dependable craftsman who made
the most of what he was given – which too often was a pittance. He occasionally made great films. To his credit, he never delivered anything
less than an efficient film. In a 2014 study,
Edgar G. Ulmer: A Filmmaker at the
Margins, biographer Noah Isenberg, conceded his on-set mission of seeking
“clear-cut answers” was futile: Ulmer’s personal and professional life was nothing
if not a bewildering “straddle [of] truth and fiction.”
Though Isenberg exhumed every interview with the director
he could find, he acknowledged one couldn’t “accept without qualification what
Ulmer himself presented as the truth when he was still alive.” According to
film historian Gary D. Rhodes, Robert Clarke, the actor/producer of Beyond the Time Barrier – one of a trio
films included here on Kino’s new Blu ray issue of the Edgar G. Ulmer Sci-Fi Collection - considered the writer-director
“something of a genius, but also a troubled, difficult person.”
Ulmer was, inarguably, partly responsible for some of his
travails. Working at Universal as an art
director and set designer in the early ‘30s, Ulmer was given the opportunity to
direct the studio’s art-deco atmospheric horror The Black Cat with Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. But opportunities to helm future pictures for
up-market Hollywood studios were derailed. Though married, Ulmer entered into a scandalous affair with a studio script
supervisor – one already married to the nephew of Universal’s c0-founder, Carl
Laemmle. The retribution for Ulmer’s
affair-of-the-heart was his blacklisting from working at any Hollywood major. But as a filmmaker Ulmer was nothing if not
resilient. He worked for the next
thirty-odd years as a director-for-hire by independent producers and
poverty-row studios.
As Bogdanovich noted, Ulmer was an able craftsman. He was a utilitarian director, successfully
cranking out films in nearly every popular-market genre: westerns, gangster
films, mysteries, adventure yarns - even the occasional comedy. Though the film noir classic Detour might be his greatest achievement,
he is also beloved by fans of classic horror and sci-fi for a string of
engaging pictures. He never approached
films in the horror genre as toss-a-ways, stories unworthy of his talent. Though none of his subsequent horror pictures
would ever match the iconic status anointed to The Black Cat, his occasional dabbles in “fantastic films” were solid
efforts.
Some films were better than others. One especially well done was Bluebeard (1944, featuring John
Carradine). Sometimes the films were
simply off-the-charts exploitation fare as was Daughter of Dr. Jekyll (1957 with John Agar). His films tended to be, whatever their budgetary
shortcomings, memorable. This new set
from Kino offers fans a trio of his best sci-fi efforts: a well-regarded effort
and two of the last films directed before his departure from the film business.
The “pick” of the set is, arguably, Ulmer’s The Man from Planet X (1951), a very
early entry into the Silver-Age sci-fi film sweepstakes. It’s September 1950 and astronomers are
puzzled by the sudden surfacing of “a strange astronomical phenomenon” which
they describe as “Planet X.” The problem
with Planet X is that its trajectory suggests it might be on a collision course
with earth. The space craft lands
somewhere in the gloomy, foggy moors of Scotland, not too far from the ancient,
spooky watchtower where scientists Dr. Elliot and Dr. Mears (Raymond Bond and
William Schallert, respectively) and journalist Jack Lawrence (Robert Clarke) just
happen to be tracking Planet X’s path. Dr. Elliot’s daughter Enid (Margaret Field) is the unlucky first one to
come face-to-face with the Man from Planet X, describing the alien as having a
“ghastly caricature” of a human face. But now that he’s arrived on earth the
question is why he’s here – and whether he’s friend or foe.
The Man
from Planet X received a modicum of press interest in the
last months of 1950. There were reports writer-producers
Aubrey Wisberg and Jack Pollexfen’s modest Mid-Century production company was
taking on a David vs. Goliath challenge. They were, after all, competing against a Hollywood big dog studio with
their modest upstart picture. One month
prior to the start of the filming of Planet
X at Culver City’s Hal Roach Studio, Howard Hawk’s production of the iconic
‘50s sci-fi thriller The Thing was
already in mid-production at RKO. Though
tackling the same sort of space-invader subject matter, Planet X was scheduled to be shot – Ulmer-style – in six scant days
with a budget of less than $50,000. As
one Los Angeles daily noted the threadbare budget allotted “wouldn’t rate you a
thing at RKO or any other film factory.” Perhaps not, but the hasty shooting schedule ensured The Man from Planet X would hit cinema
screens long before than The Thing.
The producers of Planet
X didn’t deny they had proceeded with budgetary economic caution since -
they were two of the film’s principal investors and had a lot to lose. “As writers,” Wisberg defended to the L.A.’s Daily News, “we recognized and
anticipated the time and budget limitations in our script in advance and are
now able to cut corners on the set.” One
such frugal measure was their re-using the “standing scenery” left erected of
Ingrid Bergman’s Joan of Arc (1948)
featuring Ingrid Bergman. (Much of the background scenery and effects in the
film are comprised of impressionistic matte paintings and miniatures).
Following the film’s release, Pollexfen conceded while
the film’s script was laden with a lot of scientific jargon, there was probably
more fiction than science embroidered within. For starters, there was never a mention of exactly how far the visitor from Planet X had traveled to get his spaceship
to earth. “We did it on purpose, he
admitted. “If we had mentioned the
distance some 12-year old with a slide rule would prove we were bums.” With its tight, seventy-one minute running
time, The Man from Planet X proves to
be a very serviceable thriller.
The scenario of the second film of this collection, Beyond the Time Barrier (1960) exploitatively
springboards off the popularity of George Pal’s version of H.G. Well’s The Time Machine. The film was scripted by Arthur C. Pierce who
brought us such other 50s and 60s low-budget sci-fi fare as The Cosmic Man (1959), Invasion of the Animal People (1959) and
The Navy vs. the Night Monsters
(1966). I really wasn’t expecting much
from this film, but was surprised that, all things considered, it was actually
a pretty decent futuristic adventure.
On March 5, 1960 Major William Allison (Robert Clarke), a
research test pilot for the USAF, sets off on a jet that will straddle the
border of earth’s atmosphere and outer space. The craft accidentally strafes the speed of light, catapulting Allison
through the time barrier to the Citadel, a fortress protecting the inhabitants
from a mutant population. The non-mutant
population of the Citadel are all deaf and dumb – with the exception of the
grandfatherly supreme leader (Vladimir Sokoloff) and his belligerent Captain (Boyd
Morgan). Most of communication of the residents
of the Citadel is done telepathically – a bit of bad luck for the bewildered
test pilot trying to plot an escape.
Allison learns the year is now (gasp!) 2024. The residents are survivors of a plague
brought on by cosmic radiation from too many nuclear explosions on earth. They are also part of a dying race. There have been no newborns in the Citadel in
twenty-years since the plague left all of the men sterile. Among the last born were the supreme leader’s
granddaughter Trirene (Darlene Tompkins), a nicely-formed ingénue. There’s a sort of cockeyed plan for Trirene
to mate with Allison to promulgate the species. But that idea goes bust when double-crosses and carnage follow in the wake
of the scheming scientists and rampaging mutants. There’s also a bit of a Twilight Zone twist to keep things interesting in the end. Despite the film’s low budget, Ulmer’s
talents in art direction allows the film’s futuristic sets – all triangles,
diamond-shapes and inverted pyramids – to give the film a glossy, moneyed
appearance.
Clocking in a little more than 58 minutes, the final film
of the set, The Amazing Transparent Man
(1960), ties things up in perfunctory fashion – the running time adequate, I
suppose, to tell its slim story. In 1959
the film’s screenwriter, Jack Lewis – whose previous scripting work was mostly
of adventures and westerns – decided to try his hand at writing a
science-fiction tale. His script,
originally titled Search for a Shadow, was
initially picked–up by indie Pacific International Pictures. Ulmer was tapped to direct the film – this
time involving a master safe-cracker who is “sprung from prison by a ring of
international spies.”
The spies are seeking copious amounts of atomic material X-13
so they can develop a ray that will transform an army invisible for the purpose
of military supremacy. To that end Major
Paul Krenner (James Griffith) and Laura Matson (Marguerite Chapman) orchestrate
the escape of safe-cracker Joey Faust (Douglas Kennedy) to – under the cloak of
invisibility - break into the government’s highly protected stores of
fissionable material. Krenner is an
unlikeable sort, manipulative and cold. It’s not clear whether he’s acting on behalf of a secretive U.S. agency
or as a double-agent for a foreign power.
He’s assisted, under duress, by Dr. Peter Ulof (Ivan
Triesault), an “eminent nuclear scientist” and developer of the special X-ray
machine that turns both guinea pigs and escaped convicts invisible. Ulof is acutely aware of Krenner’s dark intentions,
but is unable to do anything about it: his reasons for dutifully assisting in the
Major’s schemes becomes evident as the film unspools. In the meantime, Faust incurs Krenner’s
ill-will by enjoying an unsanctioned - but predictable – return to bank robbery
– a side-benefit of his now being invisible. There are a few hand-to-hand combat tussles but little suspense as the
tale unfolds. The story hastily wraps
with Ulof’s breaking of the “third wall” with an earnest morality plea/request.
Lewis’s conjured invisible man/spy-ring scenario was
intriguing but not without precedent. Curt
Siodmak had already written a more successful variant of the idea for Universal
during WWII. That film, Edwin L. Marin’s
Invisible Agent (1942), didn’t cheat
on the special effects as would The
Amazing Transparent Man. Universal’s
especial effects team (including the illustrious John P. Fulton) earned an
Academy Award nomination for their work on this earlier project. The invisibility tricks as provided by
special effects supervisor Roger George in Transparent
Man are passable but not breathtaking.
To be fair, the script would undergo numerous
tweaks. Ulmer and producers John Miller
and Robert L. Madden liked the premise, but were not enamored with the script’s
original title. Lewis reportedly offered
them no fewer than twenty-three alternate titles, the filmmakers initially settling
on The Invisible Invader. But this title too was tossed when Edward L.
Cahn’s Invisible Invaders (1959, with
John Agar and John Carradine) beat them to market. Other titles were bandied about (“The
Invisible Thief,” “The Invisible Gangster”) until the whole “invisible”
campaign was dropped in favor of The
Amazing Transparent Man. Lewis’s
script called for Faust’s character to - intriguingly - cast no shadow even
when not in his invisible state. The
screenwriter contended this element was quickly – and sadly - dropped when the
filmmakers ordered him to “Take out the shadow part. The budget won’t stand all that special
effects work.”
This new Kino Lorber Blu-ray set will obviously be of
great interest to fans of Ulmer and 1950s/early 1960s vintage sci-fi. If you are a fan or collector of commentaries
in particular then this release provides you with a bonanza of them. There are no hoary hack commentators present,
these are folks who know what they’re talking about. The Man
from Planet X features no fewer than three separate commentaries featuring
the likes of Tom Weaver, David Schecter, Dr. Robert J. Kiss, Joe Dante, Gary D.
Rhodes, Richard Harland Smith and Ulmer’s Daughter Arianne Ulmer Cipes. Weaver, Schecter and Rhodes do double-duty on
Beyond the Time Barrier, with David
Del Valle going it alone on The Amazing
Transparent Man.
All three films are presented in their original
black-and-white in 1920 x 1080p with DTS audio, Planet X in 1.37:1 and Time
Barrier and Transparent Man in
1.85:1. The set also features the theatrical
trailers for all three of the films and an option for removable English
sub-titles. The films generally all look great, The Amazing Transparent Man looking a bit soft-focused in parts,
but still better than anything we’ve seen so far of this title. Totally recommended.
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