Red Planet Mars (1952) Never Lifts Off
God, as in Him, sends messages from Mars, or isit Mars? At least I think that's how Red Planet Mars goes. Channel 8 ran it once on their weekday movie and the host promised at the end that they'd never show such a lousy picture again. Severe a posture, but not by much. You'd be remiss even calling Marssci-fi, though technically it is that. Forget rockets or spacemen, there are none. Anyone who grew up in the monster-mad 60's got burnt by Red Planet Mars at least once. No wonder Channel 8 took it out of rotation. Much of the yarn, based on an early 30's play, was amended to Cold War setting, but we'd lots rather focus on Martian concerns than Soviet ones. You could credit Red Planet Mars for serious intent; this is no bug-eye creature feature, but wouldn't we like it more, then or now, if it were? There is endless babble over morality of communicating with Mars, quite overlooking our having paid admission for precisely that. If you're going to watch a movie called Red Planet Mars, it had damn well better be about going there or having them come here. To get neither is a plain cheat, and by the by, 1952 audiences must have concurred --- the pic got but $183K in domestic rentals.
