THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL: Blu-ray rei-ssue (2oth Century-Fox, 1951) Fox Home Video
As a forewarning
of man’s meddlesome interventions in the cosmic contingent of the universe,
Robert Wise’s The Day the Earth Stood Still (a.k.a. Farewell to the
Master and Journey to the World, 1951) remains a sobering parable
for our naïve understanding of alien civilizations and the repercussions that
may evolve should we proceed upon our present course to probe the farthest
reaches of a cosmos we have yet to fully comprehend. The fact that little has
changed in the collective cultural mindset of our human world since its debut
has helped to keep The Day the Earth Stood Still frighteningly relevant
in the intervening decades. We are still at the cusp of an upsetting epoch,
destined to defame the delicate balance of outer space without, as yet, fully
to grasp the ramifications of our colonizing curiosities. Edmund H. North’s
screenplay is, of course, based on Harry Bates’ short fiction story, Farewell
to the Master, expanding upon Bates’ brief critique of what our first human/alien
contact might look like; the sight of a large metal disc, descending from the
skies into the heart of Washington D.C., from which a strange new life brings
forth its message of hope, only to be subdued by our own shortsightedness for
extending the proverbial olive branch in peace, is – I think – so uncannily on
point, that it continues to haunt the memory with a modicum of our collective
shame. Why do we always meet a newfound contact as an enemy with an act of
unwarranted aggression? Will mankind’s cynicism ever abate? These and other
questions worth answering are asked in North’s screenplay as our other-worldly
visitor, Klaatu (brought forth by the towering and lanky, yet otherwise
unassuming Michael Rennie); initially wounded on his peaceable arrival, before
being taken into the comfort and care of a nearby U.S. military hospital.
Visited by the President's secretary, Mr. Harley (Frank Conroy), Klaatu explains how
his people have learned through the centuries to live together in harmony. With
begrudging humility, Harley admits, “My people have not.”
In its infancy, The
Day the Earth Stood Still was the brain child of producer, Julian Blaustein,
who originally set out to create a sci-fi epic that would epitomize the looming
paranoia characterized by the early Cold War and Atomic Age. In perusing more
than 200 short stories and novels, Blaustein came upon Bates’ work and was
given permission by 2oth Century-Fox’s mogul, Darryl F. Zanuck to proceed with
caution. Indeed, Hollywood’s self-governing censorship, headlined by Joseph
Breen, strenuously objected to the inference Klaatu’s accompanying robot, Gort
(played by the imposing 7’ 7” Lock Martin) possessed unlimited powers over life
and death – the scene where Gort revives his mortally wounded master, ever so
slightly rewritten with a few lines between Helen Benson (Patricia Neal) and
Klaatu, who explains that only the ‘Almighty Spirit’ has absolute dominion.
Gort’s powers are thus limited to a temporary resurrection. North was not
pleased with this alteration, intending deliberately to draw a parallel between
Klaatu and Christ, even down to the clothes Klaatu steals to escape from Walter
Reed Hospital – the suit belonging to a Maj. Carpenter (carpentry, of course,
being Jesus’ early study and profession in the Bible). Klaatu also borrows the
name, John (one of Christ’s disciples).
To add a layer
of authenticity, several key sequences, particularly the opener depicting the
saucer’s arrival in D.C. were actually photographed on location in the nation’s
capital – Fox, very progressive, as one of the first to leave their studio
facilities and depict stories in the locations where they supposedly took
place. To keep the picture’s budget in check, only a second unit was dispatched
to Washington and Maryland to photograph process plates, later integrated with live-action
footage of the principles, shot under more controlled lighting conditions back
at Fox’s Century City back lot. The design of Klaatu’s space ship relied on the
traditional ‘saucer’ shape generally depicted in everything from scientific
literature of its day to comic books. But the interior, designed by Thomas
Little and Claude Carpenter, based its designs on architect, Frank Lloyd
Wright, drawing inspiration from Wright's Johnson Wax Headquarters, built in
1936. Perhaps concerned over some such hysteria, or being depicted in an
unflattering light, the United States Department of Defense absolutely refused
to participate in the film-making process with a loan out of its equipment.
Thus, the tanks, guns, uniforms and soldier extras shown in the movie were derived
from a stockpile borrowed from the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment at Ft.
Meade.
Casting the
picture proved a minor challenge as Wise did not want any previous associations
between the audience and the actor playing Klaatu. And although 6' 4" Michael
Rennie had tooled around Britain’s Gaumont Studios since the mid-1930’s, and
had appeared in such high-profile pictures there as Hitchcock’s Secret Agent,
and, The Man Who Could Work Miracles (both in 1936), Conquest of the
Air (1937), The Squeaker (1937), Gangway (1937), The
Divorce of Lady X (1938), Bank Holiday (1938), This Man in Paris
(1939) and The Briggs Family (1940), he remained relatively unknown to
North American audiences, even as he affected a mid-Atlantic accent to ease him
into his American debut. Towering over the other cast members, Wise deduced
that the actor to play Gort – Klaatu’s robot companion – needed to be even taller
and more menacing. He found such a man in 7’ 7” Lock Martin, an usher at
Grauman’s Chinese Theater. Unaccustomed to being encased in an uncomfortable
and heat-inducing foamed neoprene costume, and sporting a pair of over-sized weighted
boots, Martin’s discomfort was somewhat abated by Wise’s compassion; the
director, restricting Martin’s work schedule to half-hour intervals with plenty
of respites in-between. For scenes in which Gort remained stationary in the
background, Wise had a life-size dummy cast, so Martin would not have to appear
in costume.
In the cannon of
science-fiction movies, The Day the Earth Stood Still remains quite
unique – removed from its own epoch of B-budgeted radioactive giant bugs and
hammy C-grade actioners with laser guns in which hapless humans are endlessly threatened
by ruthless alien attackers. Determined
to make a ‘serious’ picture that also happened to be sci-fi, Wise’s central
focus on a morality play, whose stabilizing force for good also happens to be
from ‘another world’, took the onus off the picture to be ‘exciting’ in the
campy tradition of what was then considered passable for science-fiction movies.
Given Wise’s determination to make a movie about so much more than a close
encounter, The Day the Earth Stood Still nevertheless proved to be an
unsettling experience, refreshingly digestible – its message never impeding its
entertainment value. While Wise
continued to expertly craft his narrative, composer, Bernard Herrmann envisioned
the picture’s score as a complete departure from the Hollywood tradition. In
this, his first assignment since relocating from New York to Hollywood,
Herrmann ventured into relatively uncharted territory, employing electric
violins, cellos and a bass, two Hammond organs, a Wurlitzer organ, three
vibraphones, two glockenspiels, a marimba and tam-tam, two bass drums, three
sets of timpani, two pianos, celesta, two harps, one horn, three trumpets,
three trombones, and four tubas. But perhaps his most defining ‘discovery’ was the
Theremin - an electronic instrument, first created by Soviet
government-sponsored research, and later patented by RCA in 1929. While the Theremin
would distinguish itself as the set piece in Herrmann’s orchestral cacophony,
its eerie strains had already marked their debut in the movies in Miklos Rosza’s
main titles for Hitchcock’s Spellbound (1945). For The Day the Earth
Stood Still, Herrmann employed two Theremins, played by Dr. Samuel Hoffman
and Paul Shure, using dissonant chords between D and E-flat with overdubbing
and tape-reversal techniques later applied.
The Day the
Earth Stood Still opens with Herrmann’s moody score and a display of
various telescopes and other sky-searching human apparatuses picking up on a
distant signal from outer space. The mood quickly escalates from casual
curiosity to ferocious concern with the sudden arrival of a large metal disc
hurtling over Washington, D.C. The saucer lands without incident in a park near
the Capital Building and is quickly surrounded by the Army, weapons drawn and
prepared to do battle. Alas, the emerging humanoid, Klaatu (Michael Rennie) is
wounded by trigger-happy gunfire, even after he declares to have come with a
peace-offering. In the aftermath, Klaatu’s travelling companion, the robot –
Gort – quickly dispatches with man’s implements of war until Klaatu withdraws
his participation. Realizing Klaatu’s arrival does not mean imminent danger for
the inhabitants of earth, he is quickly taken to Walter Reed Hospital for
treatment, attended by the President’s Secretary, Mr. Harley. Klaatu informs
Harley he has come to deliver a message of peace to the nations of the world.
The gift he initially presented, that was destroyed, was meant for the
President to study life on other planets. Having miraculously healed his wound, Klaatu
is informed by Harley it will take some time to assemble the leaders of the
nations for his public address – a stalling tactic Klaatu accepts, but then,
escapes from hospital, having stolen clothes and the identity of a Maj.
Carpenter. While the military guards the saucer, with Gort silently overseeing
them, Klaatu arrives at a nearby boarding house, momentarily startling its
residents, including a young widow, Helen Benson and her prepubescent son,
Bobby (Billy Gray).
Taking the new
arrival at face value, Klaatu is shown a room opposite Helen’s and quickly
befriends Bobby, who adopts him as a sort of father-figure, much to the chagrin
of Helen’s boyfriend, Tom Stevens (Hugh Marlowe). Bobby takes Klaatu on a tour
of the city, pausing momentarily to visit his father’s grave at Arlington
National Cemetery. Afterwards, Bobby and Klaatu visit the Lincoln Memorial, and
then the spaceship, cornered by the military, but having since become something
of a tourist attraction, drawing quite a large crowd. Klaatu inquires who Bobby believes to be the
greatest living person. Rather conveniently, Bobby suggests Professor Barnhardt
(Sam Jaffe) who just happens to live only a few blocks away. Taken to
Barnhardt's home, only to discover he is not at home, Klaatu enters the
professor’s locked study from the outside, effortlessly adding to a
mathematical equation to have left even Barnhardt’s genius utterly baffled. Later,
Klaatu returns to Barnhardt’s home and explains that ‘his’ people are gravely
concerned since humanity has developed its rudimentary form of atomic energy.
Klaatu insists if man continues to use this awesome power for destructive
purposes, earth will be eliminated from its solar system. Barnhardt concurs and
corrals the leading scientists for Klaatu’s sermon at the saucer. But Barnhardt
also suggests Klaatu offer a harmless demonstration of his power. Meanwhile,
the ever-inquisitive Bobby, unseen by Klaatu, follows him back to the
spaceship, observing as Gort renders the soldiers standing guard unconscious so
Klaatu can reenter his ship undetected.
Bobby informs Helen
and Tom of his discovery. Alas, they are more amused than frightened. Wounded
by their lack of faith in him, Bobby tells his mother, “I would never call
you a liar.” Now, Tom decides to investigate further, discovering what
appears to be a diamond in Klaatu’s room. However, when inspected by a local
jeweler, Tom is informed the gemstone is unlike anything of this earth. Even as
Tom is now convinced Bobby may be telling the truth, he is too late to inform
Helen, who is cornered by Klaatu inside a service elevator in her place of employ
moments before the power goes out. Indeed, the outage has affected not only
this one building but the entire earth – Klaatu’s demonstration of his ‘other
worldly’ power causing the earth to stand still for nearly thirty minutes – all
except the essential services of hospitals and airplanes in flight. Klaatu
reveals his true identity to Helen as asks for her help. Meanwhile, Tom informs
the authorities of his suspicions. Disgusted by his behavior, Helen breaks up
with him and hurries away to escort Klaatu to Barnhardt’s home. On the way,
Klaatu insists that if anything should happen to him, Helen must reprogram Gort
to prevent his assault in retaliation with the words, ‘Klaatu barada nikto.’
Cornered in
their taxi, Klaatu attempts to flee on foot, but is shot dead by the military.
Helen dutifully makes her way to the saucer where Gort – intuitively knowing
his master is dead – has already killed the two soldiers standing watch.
Terrified, Helen nevertheless manages to relay Klaatu’s cryptic message. Gort
carries Helen into the spaceship, then retrieves Klaatu’s body from the morgue,
bringing it back to life. Amazed, Helen is informed by Klaatu that Gort’s
powers of resurrection – although complete – are merely temporary. With limited
time to bestow his message of peace on the nations of the world, Klaatu is cautiously
welcomed by Barnhardt’s scientists and delivers his forewarning – that an
interplanetary organization is standing guard with a police force of invincible
robots like Gort. “In matters of aggression, we have given them absolute
power over us,” Klaatu concludes, “Your choice is simple: join us and
live in peace, or pursue your present course and face obliteration. We will be
waiting for your answer.” Without further delay, Klaatu and Gort board their
saucer and depart into the farthest reaches of outer space.
Nearly 70 years
on, mankind has yet to heed the timely advice in Wise’s sci-fi masterpiece. The
Day the Earth Stood Still thus resonates as a sobering reminder, that in all
likelihood we are not alone in this expansive and endless panacea of suspended
planetary matter, whirling in space. Wise’s movie uses sci-fi’s milieu to tell its
Biblical story with troubling earnestness. The analogies between Klaatu – nee,
Carpenter – and Christ are unmistakable; Wise, tapping into the public’s
fascination with science-fiction to make a movie whose message continues to resonate
as a timeless and perennial warning against man’s unwitting perversion, leaning
towards his own self-destruction. Michael Rennie, who would go on to have limited
appeal in other Fox movies from this period, would never again mark his career
with such an indelible characterization. Patricia Neal and Billy Gray are
marvelous too. Alas Neal, who had entered Hollywood with such promise in 1949,
and would go on to have a lucrative career after The Day the Earth Stood
Still, suffered a catastrophic stroke from three burst cerebral aneurysms
while pregnant in 1965, slipping into a coma from which she was never expected
to recover. But recover – at least, partially – she did. Though her acting career
was at an end, Neal went on to live a relatively normal life, succumbing to
lung cancer, age 84 in 2010. And Sam Jaffe – suspected in 1952 of communist
sympathies, and blacklisted, outlasted this fallow period in his career,
out-lived two wives, and, his own cancer scare, to die at the ripe old age of
93 in 1984. The world would bid farewell to Robert Wise in 2005, after a
prolific career that included such memorable outings as The Body Snatcher
(1945), Born to Kill (1947), The Set-Up (1949), Run Silent,
Run Deep (1958), I Want to Live! (1958), West Side Story (1961),
The Haunting (1963), The Sound of Music (1965), The Sand
Pebbles (1966), The Andromeda Strain (1971), The Hindenburg
(1975) and Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979).
Viewed today, The
Day the Earth Stood Still ranks among the finest features ever to come out
of Hollywood, which is saying a great deal, considering the industry’s immense
treasure trove of classics, and, Wise’s own back catalog of accomplishments. The Blu-ray from Fox, released ten years ago,
continues to represent a masterful restoration effort in which the 1.37:1
B&W image still holds up remarkably well. Fox’s past archival efforts have
not always been stellar. But The Day the Earth Stood Still sports a
magnificent and authentically rendered 1080p transfer that reveals good solid
clarity, a modicum of fine details – especially in close-up – and an exquisite
texturing of film grain, appearing very indigenous to its source. There are no
complaints here. The movie looks great and true to its film-based origins; an
outstanding effort with narrowly an age-related blemish seen anywhere. The 5.1 DTS
audio is, of course, a re-purposing of the original mono mix that accompanied
the movie theatrically. Without hesitation, it sounds robust and hearty –
particularly Bernard Herrmann’s score and main titles, even more ominous than
before. Despite obvious limitations due to sound recording techniques of their
time, this re-imagined audio delivers uncommon clarity, depth and spatial
separation, surely never to disappoint.
Fox has
jam-packed this disc with goodies: 2 audio commentaries, the first, recorded in
1997 for the DVD debut and featuring Robert Wise and Nicolas Meyer, the other, co-authored
by film and music historians, John Morgan, Steven Smith, William Stromberg and
the late Nick Redman. Each has their individual merits and is worthy of a
listen. We also get an isolated score in 5.1 stereo, plus the half-hour ‘making
of’ that was created for the Laserdisc release in 1992. New featurettes on the Theremin,
a live performance of the main title by Peter Pringle, ‘Farewell to the
Master’ as read by Jameson K. Price, and an archival Fox Movietone newsreel,
are augmented by 3 more featurettes, decoding ‘Klaatu, Barada Nikto’,
exploring the history of flying saucers, and shorts on Harry Bates’ and Edmund
North’s contributions. Finally, there is the documentary short, Race to
Oblivion, produced by North. Add to this, 7 galleries of stills and
promotional material and an interactive Theremin feature, and, well – this is
precisely the sort of Blu-ray release that Blu-ray in totem was supposed to
deliver. It is really rather sad to see what has become of the Blu-ray format
these days; special features cut or kept to a bare minimum, and, disc authoring
that cannot even be bothered to insert ‘chapter’ breaks accessible by
interactive menus. But I digress. The Day the Earth Stood Still has been
endlessly repackage by Fox on Blu-ray. Cover art may vary but the quality of
the presentation and extras do not. This disc belongs on everyone’s top shelf.
That it has taken me this long to review it is my cross to bear. Bottom line:
very – very – highly recommended!
FILM RATING (out
of 5 – 5 being the best)
5+
VIDEO/AUDIO
5+
EXTRAS
5+
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