As always there are spoilers ahead!

We've discussed Czech scifi before with Karel Zeman's gorgeous steam punk offering from 1958 Invention for Destruction (dubbed into the English language The Fabulous World of Jules Verne) and we've also covered Communists in Space with 1960s The Silent Star (AKA First Spaceship on Venus).

The Czech Ikarie XB-1 (1963) has connections to both of those films but also offers an aesthetic that seems to directly inspire Kubrick for 2001: A Space Odyssey. The year is 2163, communism has won, and a crew of 40 are sent to find life on the white planet in Alpha Centauri with a journey fraught with sociological, psychological and physical challenges.

I have two amazing academics to help give insight into the film.

Evan Torner is an Associate Professor of German Studies and Niehoff Professor of Film & Media Studies at the University of Cincinnati.

Simon Spiegel is a lecturer of Film Studies at the University of Zurich. He has written extensively about Science Fiction and Utopia and has just released the book The Fear of Knowing about spoilers in film and media.

Chapters:

00:00 Introduction

01:11 Stanislaw Lem's The Magellanic Cloud

04:28 Czechoslovakian New Wave and film industry

09:49 The striking introductory scenes and Kubrick's 2001

13:05 Cabin fever in spaaace!

15:13 Music by Zdeněk Liška

16:57 Communist utopia in spaaace!

20:57 The draw of sociological stories

26:19 A utopian party and a red alert

28:15 The capitalist ship and the 20th century

32:47 Putting science into sci-fi

39:30 Evan's Dark Matter Shenanigans

42:21 Post Stalin faith

43:41 The ending

45:39 The US edit

47:27 Legacy

52:18 Recommendations

NEXT EPISODE!

I will be taking a detour next episode to talk about Afrofuturism which I've been wanting to discuss since the very early days of research before I launched the podcast. Almost two years late but I hope you enjoy it. After that we will be discussing Dr Strangelove and I would recommend you also watch Fail Safe (also 1964) if you have time.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

You can follow the podcast on social media on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you would like to be a patron of the podcast you can join Patreon and for £3 or $3 a month you can get ad free version of the show. https://www.patreon.com/everyscififilm

Roger Corman produced hundreds of films in his lifetime and directed dozens. X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes is a colourful, psychedelic, 1960s extravaganza with aspirations of transcendence.

If you wanted to join in, you can watch the film X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes from 1963 first. DVDs of the film are available, but it is also available to rent and watch online on Apple TV and many other platforms. You can check the Just Watch website to see where it is available in your region.

Oscar winner Ray Milland (we heard a bit about him in the Panic in Year Zero! episode) stars as a mad scientist who creates a serum that will help him understand the secret of life itself. A serum that unlocks the 90% of the visible spectrum that is beyond our realm of vision. The film is fun and pacey and the tone is once again firmly in the 1960s.

I have two excellent guests to help us unravel the minds and life's mysteries around what could be Corman's magnus opus.

Barry Keith Grant is professor Emeritus of Film Studies at Brock University Canada. He has written/edited numerous books, articles and essays about science fiction cinema.

John Wills is a Professor of American Media and Culture at the University of Kent. He has written lots about popular culture including 1950s American and Nuclear film.

Chapters:

00:00 Intro

01:57 Barry's experience of watching the film on release

03:48 Eyeballs and vision

08:58 The body in sci-fi

10:57 Mad science and closing in on the Gods

12:20 Science in the 60s

15:56 LSD

17:18 A film of two halves

19:18 Diane's romantic arc

21:57 Hays Code & the Nudie Cuties

25:35 Roger Corman's 2001: A Space Odyssey comparison

31:17 Special Effects

32:41 Gurus incoming

34:48 Blunt honesty of Xavier

37:36 The music of Les Baxter

39:59 Stephen King and the ending

44:23 Legacy

51:21 Recommendations

CORRECTION: We refer to the female scientist as Diana but her name is Diane.

NEXT EPISODE!

Next episode we are heading back to the Eastern Bloc with the Czech 1963 scifi Ikarie XB-1.

In terms of watching it, the American version is titled Voyage to the End of the Universe and is a different edit.

Although Just Watch advertises the English language title it seems to not differentiate which edit is available. The original is available on The Criterion channel and also cultpix.com.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

You can follow the podcast on social media on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you would like to be a patron of the podcast you can join Patreon and for £3 or $3 a month you can get ad free version of the show. https://www.patreon.com/everyscififilm

In 1959 at the cusp of a new and exciting decade Richard Condon wrote a book that is largely described as a political thriller. And it is a political thriller. But it also fits neatly into my concept of science fiction. To learn more about what is and isn't science fiction you can head to the heady days of the first episode where the topic is discussed with science fiction scholars Lisa Yaszek and Glyn Morgan. (Please do excuse the fear in my eyes.)

Just a few years later a film was made by John Frankenheimer, starring Frank Sinatra, Janet Leigh and a brilliant and manipulative Angela Lansbury.

The 1960s USA is in peak cold war fears, and the CIA is undertaking covert operations of their own, with the MKUltra programme, testing on humans to discover whether they can be manipulated and brainwashed.

Although this film continues many themes from the 1950s it is definitely a product of the new age as culture shifts and a new batch of Hollywood directors take cinema in a different direction.

I am lucky to have two brilliant guests to talk us through the themes and context of this film.

Ian Scott is a Professor of American Film and History at The University of Manchester. He has written extensively about politics and film in Hollywood including the book American Politics in Hollywood Film.

Sherryl Vint is Professor of Science Fiction Media Studies at the University of California, Riverside. She has written/edited many books about science fiction.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

02:23 New Hollywood Directors

04:57 Richard Condon's novel

07:00 Mind control in science fiction

09:40 Cold War in the Far East

16:57 The brilliant brainwashing scene

25:28 Raymond Shaw the unlikely hero

29:17 Frank Sinatra as Marco

33:17 Angela Lansbury as Eleanor

37:54 Janet Leigh

44:04Eisenhower and the legacy of conspiracy films

48:31 The remake

52:29 Recommendations

The recommendations this week are the films Suddenly (1954) and Seconds (1966). I will be covering Seconds in the near future so you can get ahead by watching it if you like!

NEXT EPISODE!

Next episode we will be discussing the Roger Corman film X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes from 1963 starring Ray Milland. DVDs of the film are available but it is also available to rent and watch online on Apple TV and many other platforms. You can check the Just Watch website to see where it is available in your region.

There are spoilers ahead for all versions of The Day of the Triffids and also for the film Signs.

You can follow the podcast on social media on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you would like to be a patron of the podcast you can join Patreon and for £3 or $3 a month you can get ad free version of the show. https://www.patreon.com/everyscififilm

This episode had been edited down to a more digestible length of under an hour but a longer (audio only) version is available for Patreon subscribers (alongside the shorter option).

We are doing things a little differently and discussing the 1963 film along with the source material which is John Wyndham's 1951 book The Day of the Triffids.

The Day of the Triffids film was released in 1963 after reshoots were required to add a whole new arc in the story and bring the time to a more suitable length for a feature.

The film has many of the hallmarks of a 1950s science fiction film but seems to be reflective of the Golden Era of science fiction very much coming to its end.

The film is (very loosely) based on John Wyndham's first successful novel but seems more dedicated to the tropes of a 1950s sci-fi marketed for a mass, US leaning audience. The book is chockful of themes that are touched upon throughout the story which have very little (if any) presence in the film.

I have added a list of the characters we discuss below as well as a quick overview of their roles in the book and the film.

As usual I have two insightful guests to help us understand all of this.

Matthew Rule-Jones is a senior lecturer in film studies at the University of Exeter and author of the book Science Fiction Cinema and 1950s Britain: Recontextualising Cultural Anxiety.

Adam Stock is a senior lecturer in English Literature at York St John University and author of the book Dystopian Fiction and Political Thought: Narratives of World Politics.

Chapters:

00:00 Intro

01:30 John Wyndham's first hit

05:23 The concept of the cosy catastrophe

08:43 Wyndham's Britain: post-colonial triffids coming home to roost

14:48 The 1963 film: Wells, end of the golden age and marketing

20:04 The lighthouse sequences: Karen vs Josella

23:06 Weed killers in The Silent Spring era and WW2 imagery

25:17 The role of the Triffids

30:37 Bill Masen the hero

34:37 Coker's missing role

37:11 Women!

40:27 The ending

46:51 Legacy

53:57 Recommendations

Bill Masen:

Hero in both the book and the film. In the book Bill is English and works for the triffid farm where he has been almost blinded by a triffid sting. His colleague begins to suspect the triffids are indeed sentient and able to communicate. This brings up questions around exploitation and enslavement. In the film Bill is American and works for the US Navy who help save the hero and other survivors at the end of the film.

Josella Playton:

The heroine from the novel is not present in the 1963 film. Josella comes from a wealthy family (one with servants) and has written a notorious book titled Sex is my Adventure.

Coker:

Coker has a large role in the book and we meet him as an advocate for the newly blinded masses when many of the few sighted people left are attempting to save themselves from the threat of a disintegrating society. He is a strong public speaker from a working-class background who had learned to speak in a way that is more amenable to the intelligentsia and upper classes. His strongly held beliefs (of forcing the sighted to serve the blind) change through the book to become less idealistic and more practical.

Coker in the film is an old man with a very minimal role who dies early in the story form a triffid attack.

Susan:

Is a young girl who is rescued by Bill in the film after a train crash and ensuing chaos. In the book Bill takes in Susan whose family have died. She is a capable young child who develops an understanding of triffid behaviour from observing them as she guards the home that Josella and Bill stay in for many years.

Miss Durrant:

In the film Miss Durrant is the beautiful heroine that Bill meets in a large house in France that is caring from blind survivors of the meteor shower. In the book, Miss Durrant is a religious minded woman who is appalled at a man named Beadley's attempts to rebuild society through polygamy. She seems to purposefully mislead Bill who is trying to track down Beadley because he thinks Josella will be with him.

NEXT EPISODE!

Next episode we will be speaking about The Manchurian Candidate from 1962 by John Frankenheimer. A film that may not fit the definition of science fiction for many people but by now I think we know how ambiguous those definitions can be!

You can find the film on streaming platforms including Apple TV. The Just Watch website is a good resource to find where the film is available online in your region.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

You can follow the podcast on social media on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you would like to be a patron of the podcast you can join Patreon and for £3 or $3 a month you can get ad free version of the show. https://www.patreon.com/everyscififilm

There is a trigger warning for discussion of rape in this episode. I have marked the beginning of that part of the discussion with a beep and the discussion lasts for four minutes and four seconds after the beep if you wanted to skip past it.

Last week we told you "Don't Panic!" but this week we focus in on the panic.

Panic in Year Zero was directed by and stars Ray Milland and is about a father taking his family on the road to do some camping. One the way there a nuclear bomb is dropped on Los Angeles and the world starts to fall into disarray. Not because of the bomb causing devastation or radiation but because of how human s are absolute nutters given the slightest chance.

This film has a very 1950s sensibility but with a Jazz laden soundtrack that hints at the unruly decade ahead.

The Federal Civil Defense Administration in the US in the early 50s was set up by President Truman to educate and prepare the public in case of an attack on US soil. The short film mentioned in the discussion The House in the Middle can be viewed on YouTube here.

This episode we talk not just about the film but the human fascination with apocalypse. I have the perfect guests for the task.

Steven Schlozman is a psychiatrist and a writer of books including the novel The Zombie Autopsies which was being adapted to film by George Romero before his death in 2017.

John Wills is a Professor of American Media and Culture at the University of Kent. He has written lots about popular culture including 1950s American and Nuclear film.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

01:52 The non-nuclear nuclear film

07:10 Nuclear drills in schools

10:07 USA nuclear prep: Civilian education and CONELRAD

16:33 Jazz music and sociopaths

20:05 Daddy's gaze

26:39 The fun of Armageddon

32:02 The developmental stage of apocalypse fantasy

37:35 Ann is always wrong

39:21 Sexual violence

43:27 A pre-cursor to zombie apocalypse

48:25 Legacy

52:45 Recommendations for the listener

Recommendations

Steven: The Day After (1983) is a made for TV film.

John: The book Every Home a Fortress: Cold War Fatherhood and the Family Fallout Shelter by Thomas Bishop

NEXT EPISODE!

Next episode we will be discussing The Day of the Triffids! Although we will be using the 1963 film as a starting point there will be a lot of discussion about the original novel and the differences between the theme heavy book and the fun 50s style scifi of the film.

The film can be found on Fubo, Roku, Pluto and Plex and a few other online streaming platforms in the US and UK. The Just Watch website is a good resource to find where the film may be available in your region.

As always there are spoilers ahead. You can buy the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy book in most bookshops and you can listen to the radio play on YouTube and also on the Internet Archive.

You can follow the podcast on social media on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you would like to be a patron of the podcast you can join Patreon and for £3 or $3 a month you can get ad free version of the show and be revered amongst both the G'Gugvuntts and the Vl'Hurgs: https://www.patreon.com/everyscififilm

As mentioned elsewhere this is not an analysis of the film or any kind of review of the book but more like a chat amongst fans of what the story means to us and why.

My amazing guests are very qualified to wax lyrical about the topic at hand.

Michael Newton is a University Lecturer at the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society. He is a cultural historian who has written about film amongst many other topics including being the Editor of the book The Origins of Science Fiction.

Mark Steadman creative digital producer, long time podcaster and host of the Beware of the Leopard podcast which explored the A to Z of the Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy. (He also has what I consider the best productivity podcast in the world as it takes into consideration that we are humans with feelings and lives. Undo – How history's outliers got stuff done can be found here.)

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

01:52 When we were first exposed to H2G2

05:01The Late 70s and scifi

06:54 Mental health and the art of Zen

10: 40 Zaphod: Douglas Adams and the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster

15:31 Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect

19:53 Suburban life and bathos

21:46 Douglas Adams' "first album"

24:41 The broad appeal

28:03 Douglas' delightful detours

32:25 We love Douglas and his thin plot

32:58 No happy ending

36:18 Absurdism

37:31 Sirius Cybernetics Corporation and Silicon Valley

41:29 Gadgetry in H2G2

47:11 Shoutout to the super intelligent colour blue

50:25 Legacy: Tech, atheism, and imagination

54:02 Recommendations for the listener

NEXT EPISODE! In two week's time (if all goes well!) we shall be discussing Panic in the Year Zero (1962) and the appeal of Armageddon. The film is available to buy or rent online in many places in the USA and UK but may be tricky in certain regions.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

A quick note that I shall be at the London Film Festival on October the 16th giving a whistlestop tour of sci-fi cinema. It is a free event but you have to reserve tickets so if you happen to be in London and wanted to attend here is the information.

Translation for the beginning of the podcast:

"Later, he knew he had seen a man die.

And sometime after came the destruction of Paris."

You can follow the podcast on social media on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you would like to be a patron of the podcast you can join Patreon and for £3 or $3 a month you can get ad free version of the show. https://www.patreon.com/everyscififilm

La Jetée is very different from the science fiction films I have covered so far. A 28-minute art film mostly made of still images that went on to inspire many films as well as the 1995 12 Monkeys. The filmmaker, Chris Marker was an elusive French multimedia journalist, artist, writer, filmmaker, photographer who very rarely did interviews. He was part of the Left Bank group in Paris which was part of the larger French New Wave movement.

My amazing science fiction authorities today are Lisa Yaszek who is Regents' Professor of Science Fiction Studies at Georgia Tech and has written/edited multiple books on science fiction and Mark Bould who is a professor of Film and Literature at the University of West England, Bristol. He has also written/edited numerous books on science fiction.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

02:15 The French New Wave

08:50 The New Wave of science fiction literature

13:00 The New Wave science fiction films

17:53 Vertigo's influence

21:10 Eros and Thanatos: Love and death (and time loops)

23:55 A very different science fiction film: Un photo-roman, sound and reliable narrators

32:00 The darker future: gritty retrofuturism and echoes of WWII

36:59 What is real? (And why is it so beautiful?)

40:52 Distressing distortions and more death

46:03 The one moving image

48:33 12 Monkeys

51:47 Legacy of the film

55:30 Recommendations for the listener

NEXT EPISODE!

Next episode is episode 42 and it seems patrons on Patreon would like a detour to cover the meaning of life the universe and everything. So we shall be talking about The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. You do not need to watch the film but if you felt like reading the book , listening to the original radio play, watching the TV series or indeed watching the film either as a new experience or to refresh your memory you absolutely can!

As always there are spoilers ahead!

If you'd like to join in on more conversations and keep up to date on what I'm working on you can follow me on social media: Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

After last episode's UK village setting we stay in the country but head to London for a newsroom apocalyptic drama. We have more hints that we are heading into the 60s with a surly hero and a sultry ex-Disney heroine.

The Day the Earth Caught Fire was finally released in 1961 after eight years of director Val Guest trying to get the film made. Perhaps the mid-50s Britian wasn't ready for this story although it would be interesting to see what kind of differences there would have been. (Val Guest was busy making The Quatermass Xperiment during that time!)

I welcome back two excellent guests to teach us more about this film.

Jay Telotte is Professor Emeritus of film and media studies at Georgia Tech. He has written/edited numerous books and articles about science fiction film including the 2023 book Selling Science Fiction Cinema.

Glyn Morgan is Head of Collections and Principal Curator at the Science Museum in London and a science fiction scholar.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

02:17 1961: Anxiety, British Free Cinema & Angry Young Men

07:28 The CND and memories of the war

08:05 The highs and lows of Cli-Fi

13:16 The beginning of the end

15:47 Val Guest

18:43 Snappy dialogue or too much talk?

22:25 The newsroom

27:40 Arthur Christiansen

30:06 The surlier hero

34:47 Janet Munroe

37:05 Disney & breaking out of type

41:06 One foot firmly in the 60s

42:09 Ambiguous and alternate endings

46:39 Legacy

51:57 Recommendations

NEXT EPISODE!

Next week we will be talking about the beautiful, half hour long, science fiction art film La Jetée (1962) that 12 Monkeys was based on. You can find the film on Apple, Amazon and also on YouTube but the version with English subtitles is not great quality.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

You can follow the podcast on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

If you want to support the podcast you can get ad free versions at Patreon.

In 1956 the film The Bad Seed was a big hit for Warner Bros featuring a blond-haired evil child.

One blond scary child sometimes isn't enough! Writer John Wyndham published The Midwich Cuckoos in 1957 which had already sold to MGM before he'd completed it. The film tells the story of a different kind of alien invasion. Midwich village is infested with pregnancies affecting the female population who all give birth to blonde haired and light eyed, rapidly growing, telepathic children (did I mention they were creepy?). Outsiders who will go to any length to keep their kind alive.

I have two absolutely amazing guests who can tease apart some of the history and themes of this wonderful sci-fi horror.

Mark Bould is a professor of Film and Literature at the University of West England, Bristol. He has written/edited extensively about science fiction cinema.

Roger Luckhurst is a Professor at Birkbeck, University of London. He has written/edited numerous articles and books on cultural history and film.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

01:38 John Wyndham, The Midwich Cuckoos and MGM's British studios

04:22 Post War anxieties

07:10 Wyndham and pacifism

08:29 Feminism, forced birth and Wyndham's women

11:16 The life of George Sanders: a fabulous cad

18:50 The Cosy Catastrophe

21:38 The premise: terrifying telepathic toddlers

27:20 The evil child and the concept of innocence

31:42 The legacy of the evil child in cinema

35:59 Telepathy

41:47 Class and post war social mobility

47:25 Legacy and the John Carpenter remake

51:29 Recommendations for the listener

The telepathic couple Mark mentions are most likely the Piddingtons.

When Mark says "Astounding" he is referring to the magazine Astounding Science Fiction where the editor was John W Campbell Jr.

NEXT EPISODE!

Next episode we will be talking about The Day the Earth Caught Fire from 1961.

You can rent the film on Apple or Amazon in the US or on Amazon or BFI Player in the UK. The Just Watch website is a good option to find where films are available in your region.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

In 1951 Poland, during its Stalinist era, acclaimed science fiction writer Stanislaw Lem released his first book: The Astronauts. (He had already written the novel The Man from Mars which was serialised).

In 1960 The Astronuats would go on to become the basis of East Germany's ambitious communist sci-fi film Der schweigende Stern or The Silent Star. The script would go through 12 drafts before filming by which time Lem had removed his name from the project.

Although the script lacks focus it is full of historical and cultural significance and is a strong an indictment of why ideological control should not be asserted on the arts.

The film is idealistic, looks great with some beautiful design and does not feature Christopher Nolan (link to Instagram post).

I have two top notch academics to discuss the film.

Sonja Fritzsche is a professor of German Studies and Senior Associate Dean at Michigan State University. She has also written/edited many books about science fiction.

Evan Torner is an Associate Professor of German Studies and Niehoff Professor of Film & Media Studies at the University of Cincinnati.

Chapters

00:00 Intro

01:53 Post Metropolis German Sci-Fi

09:50 East German filmmaking in 1960: DEFA, Kurt Maetzig & Utopian futures

16:34 The Bitterfelder Weg programme: the working class in the arts

18:50 The Polish influence: Stanislaw Lem, ideological space & the Polish October

24:31 12 drafts of the scripts: Too many cooks

29:24 Influences: Forbidden Planet, Woman in the Moon and If All the Guys in the World

32:03 The communist ideal in spaaaace!

38:32 Visual delights: Box office draw and Nazi Agfacolor

45:11 The stolen US edit: First Spaceship on Venus

47:15 Legacy, language and recommendations

NEXT EPISODE!

Back to Blighty for some good old fashioned evil children in Village of the Damned (1960). The film is easy to rent or buy on an array of streaming platforms including YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cujvDkHxFcg

You can check the Just Watch website for details of where to find it in your region.

As always there are spoilers ahead!

You can follow the podcast on Threads, Instagram and Bluesky.

HG Wells shadow is a long one and his seminal work on time travel was published in 1895. But well over a half a century later Hollywood was still hooked on Herbert (George Wells). The Time Machine was directed by George Pal and released 1960. From the turn of the century to the beginning of a new decade my amazing guests break down the themes and influences on this mid-century steampunk precursor.

Keith Williams is a Reader in English Literature at the University of Dundee where he runs the science fiction programme. He has a special interest in the pre 1945 period and is the author of the book H.G. Wells, Modernity and the Movies.

Ian Scott is a Professor of American Film and History at The University of Manchester. He has written extensively about politics and film in Hollywood.

Chapters

00:00 Intro

02:39 HG Wells in 1985: the book and the birth of cinema

05:37 1960s USA: the cusp of a new age

10:02 The influences on Wells: Thomas Henry Huxley and William Morris

17:21 James Bond: Rod Taylor's missed opportunity

19:08 Time travel: the time machine, mannequins and the BBC

27:57 The far-flung future: evolution, class and nuclear war

35:32 Fritz Lang, Metropolis, and the death of flower power

39:24 The Legacy

47:09 Recommendations for the listener

NEXT EPISODE!

Next week I will be discussing the Eastern Block with brainy experts and discussing one of the first sci-fi films from the region Der schweigende Stern, AKA The Silent Star from 1960.

It was also re-edited and released as The First Spaceship on Venus. You may like to watch the MST3K version on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVmgb3jEimQ

If you are in the USA and have a public library card you should be able to find the film on Kanopy: https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/116646

The film is available to rent online depending on your region. Just Watch should be able to help.

If you felt very committed you could also buy this DVD collection of DEFA sci-fi which includes writing and interviews with the amazing Sonja Fritzsche, Evan Torner and Mark Bould: https://eurekavideo.co.uk/movie/strange-new-worlds-science-fiction-at-defa/