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 The 50's were a peak decade for sci-fi...good and bad. I've been on a 50's sci-fi kick latley...and I'd like to share some of my favorites! Hoo-boy,huh?

 Ok...I'll let you in on a little secret...some of these movies are considered classics...and some...well...this IS BAD movies...here  by year....
.INVADERS from MARS (1953)-One of the scariest movies I saw as a little kid. Martians are living underground in back of Jimmy's house. They've taken control of the adults,drag our pal under the dirt to they're base and are real dam ugly. The Head (literaly)
Martian is a bald head with tentacles. Too cool.
.WAR of the WORLDS (1953)-George Pal's epic invasion of Earth. I like the noise the death rays make...which sound EXACTLY like the ones from MARS ATTACKS! Really-compare for yourself someday.
.CREATURE from the BLACK LAGOON (1954)-Ok...this is more of a 'monster' movie...but it could happen...right?
.GODZILLA (1954)-the Japanese version! No explanation why I love this movie,I don't think.
.KILLERS from SPACE-(1954) -Now I guess I have some explaining to do. Ok...here goes...ummm...I can't explain why. I guess the same reason I like Ju-Ju Fruits: They have no nutrietional value...they rot your teeth...but I can eat a whole big box of 'em.
  (http://i93.photobucket.com/albums/l79/RCMerchant/untitled-103.jpg)
.THEM (1954)-My second favorite Giant bug movie...next to...
.TARANTULA (1955)....which wins out because it features deformed,melty looking mutants!
.THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955) -Why MST2K made fun of this movie...I dunno. Stupid robots.
.THE DAY the WORLD ENDED (1956)- It's the DAY AFTER-AIP style!!! And whatta bleak mess! Lori Nelson mike (MANNIX) Conners and freinds battle each other and radioactive mutants...the scariest being a 3-eyed,four armed,multi-horned critter! YIKES!
.BRIDE of the MONSTER-(1956) Lugosi,Tor Johnson,Ed Wood,giant rubber octopus,atomic bomb....nuff sed!
.the INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN-(1957) A masterpiece of 50's sci-fi. Grant William's boat passes through some weird chemical fog...which causes him to shrink. A parrabel of man's impotence in an ever expanding techno....ah...he fights a giant spider-and a giant cat!!! WOW!!!
 
 I could go on...but this is gettin'kinda long-winded,eh? BUT...I NEED to add...
The MONILITH MONSTERS (1957),WAR of the COLASSAL BEAST(1958),HORRORS of SPIDER ISLAND (1958),and...one of my all time favorites of ANY era...the BRAIN THAT WOULD'NT DIE (1959) !!!!

 (http://i93.photobucket.com/albums/l79/RCMerchant/1543340255_2ed174be3b_o.jpg)

 Sooooooo...what are YOUR favorite sci-fi films of the 50's?

All of them. :teddyr:

Seriously. The 50's represents my absolute favorite decade for horror and scifi. I love those flicks. If I had to pick some top faves, they would be:

The Thing
The Blob
Fiend Without a Face
Forbidden Planet
Them
Godzilla
The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms.

Yours truly also wrote some "Monster survival guides" on how to live through an encounter with various 50's beasties. You can access them via THIS (http://www.bmoviegraveyard.com/pages/roguecinema.html) page.

Some dork over at Rogue Cinema wrote a series of articles on 50's flicks, but he hasn't gotten off his lazy ass to finish it yet.

Part 1 (http://www.roguecinema.com/article883.html)
Part 2 (http://www.roguecinema.com/article949.html)
Part 3 (http://www.roguecinema.com/article-981--0-0.html)
Part 4 (http://www.roguecinema.com/article1008.html)
Part 5 (http://www.roguecinema.com/article1031.html)
Part 6 (http://www.roguecinema.com/article1057.html)

Gads, The Horrors of Spider Island is such a terrible film; unless there are robots in the corner it's tough to stomach :teddyr:

When I hear "B-movie", I also tend to think more of the b&w than the newer variety, though those are nonetheless also B-movies.

Just a few, probably, since my interests span too many years for me to just list movies as they come to me :tongueout:

The Good
(1951)The Day the Earth Stood Still
(1953)The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms
(1956)Earth vs. the Flying Saucers
(1957)20 Million Miles to Earth

Yes, I'm a Harryhausen nut :wink:

The "Bad"
(1954)The Snow Creature
(1955)The Phantom from 10,000 Leagues or The Bobbing Head of Doom

Unfortunately, many of my favorites are in the 60's era, or this would be easier. Can I just say The Killer Shrews?

I love the old B&W b-movies and science fiction films.  "Fiend Without a Face" is great, ditto for the original "Gojira" and "Forbidden Planet."  Actually, making a list of the old movies that I love would take quite a bit of typing.  Overall, trying them all is not a bad idea.  The entertaining ones outweigh the bad.

"Horrors of Spider Island" is a pretty boring film.  The girls are nice to look at and the spider monsters (both the arachnid and the man/spider) help you to wake up, but overall it's a nudie cutie film without any of the nudie cutie.  Which means that it really isn't trying to do anything and the characters could be swapped out for cardboard cutouts without losing anything.

I'm sure I'm in a VERY small minority,when I say that I LOVE the HORRORSof SPIDER ISLAND. I know it's boring....but those Spider Island girls got some kinda supernatrual hold on me! I feel the same way about the ASTOUNDING SHE MONSTER and KILLERS from SPACE....I really can't explain the love I hold for some of these truly worthless films.
 I dunno...I may need professional counsoling...! :bouncegiggle:

Well "The Astounding She Monster" is mostly a movie about a girl wearing a sparkling leotard running around a cabin in the middle of the night.  It still ends up being a little entertaining - probably a 2 slimer for me.  "Killers from Space" I enjoy, because it is really bad.  The big, googly eyes always crack me up and I also love how they defeat the aliens in the end.

Don't forget INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (1956).

Godzilla
This Island Earth
The Blob
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Attack of the Crab Monsters

On a side note, there's a song called The Cockroach that Ate Cincinnatti, which is a novelty song often played on Dr. Demento.  It's got a sci-fi feel, funny, and I wish a movie was made of it.

Hands down/no contest for me:
"The Thing" (1951)--
Howard Hawks writing and directing.  Ben Hecht also contributing to the script.  The great overlapping dialogue.  The scene where everyone stands at a different point of the spacecraft visible beneath the ice, and we see by where they stand that . . .  It's a Flying Saucer!!
The scientist guy almost gets everyone killed because of his attempts to befriend James Arness, but when he gets killed, nobody casts aspersions on his dead memory, saying only instead that "he died in the battle".  Honor, ladies and gentlemen, honor!!
The "Dr. Girl" in this one really actually being part of the team, rather than camera candy that screams and fetches coffee.
The feeling/the atmosphere that even though it's just James Arness in a carrot costume, there really IS something alien/unknown trying to eat us & drink our blood.
Just an all-over winner . . .
peter johnson/denny don't open that door!!

I didn't forget....much like Shadow said...I really do love them all! I only touched on a fewfavorites...there are so many more! BODY SNATCHERS,as you mentioned, ROCKETSHIP X-M (with it's crazy mutants ), Edgar Ulmer's MAN from PLANET X, the classic the DAY the EARTH STOOD STILL, allthe AIP monsters...I could go on forever!

 One that really seems to be maligned is the MONILITH MONSTERS. IIt has an almost surreal feel to it...
http://youtube.com/watch?v=9Rfp56py4GE



The THING is undoubtly a classic!!! The fact he is rarly seen makes it more so! I would be MUCH more afraid of an unknown,half hidden enemy,than a rubber suit waddling around Bronsan Canyon!

i love spider island,and i'm a girl!yeah,it's boring,but we do our own commentary during marathons,and it's different every time,much fun!big faves are-
devil girl from mars
terror from the year 5000
attack of the eye creatures
angry red planet
i may be wrong on the decade for some of these,if so,my apologies...

I adore 1950s Sci-Fi. How can this thread have gone so long without having mentioned Professor Quatermass?! At times, I feel THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT (AKA: THE CREEPING UNKNOWN), is my personal all-time favorite film [other days it might be the 1951 Thing from Another World or 1935's Bride of Frankenstein]. I'm also a huge fan of other Hammer efforts like THE CRAWLING EYE (AKA: THE TROLLENBERG TERROR) and X THE UNKNOWN. Of course, QUATERMASS  XPERIMENT was followed by the almost as good, some would argue even better QUATERMASS 2 (AKA: ENEMY FROM SPACE). Just great films every SF fan should see IMO. Also want to mention the popular trend of finding planets inhabited only by women and every rocketship trip being threatened by a meteor shower was very common (although this might also have been often done in the SF serials of the 1940s - Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon). Anyways this was done in many 1950s films like CAT WOMEN ON THE MOON, ABBOTT AND COSTELLO GO TO MARS, MISSILE TO THE MOON and QUEEN OF OUTER SPACE. Have to admit I have a decided soft spot for these. Two more faves from the 1950s not yet mentioned are IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE (with it's paranoia gone crazy story written by Ray Bradbury and directed by the one and only Jack Arnold) and FLIGHT TO MARS, which may be somewhat laughable nowadays, but certainly proves entertaining enough and really set the groundwork for a lot of imitators in that era.

That was 50's?! I should have listed that *smacks head* doofus, doofus, doofus!

Weeeelllllllllll.....Technically it was made in 1960, but that can easily be tossed aside since it was still in the same era and a fun little movie.

Everbody's already said my top favorites Forbidden Planet and The Quartermass Xperiment. But I'd like to add The Twilight Zone, while it ain't a movie it is a brilliant piece of sci-fi. Rod Sterling and the other writers/producers were genius's for cooking that show up.

I think that something that sets "The Thing" (the original) apart from so many other 50's science fiction films is that the dialog and interaction moves at a breakneck pace throughout the story.  Many of the films back then had a more methodical pacing, but "The Thing" tends to race off and carry you along.

The 50's is definitely the best decade for Sci-fi films.  I love too many of them to decide on a favorite.  A few that come to mind at this moment are "Robot Monster," "It Conquered the World," and "The Brain From Planet Arous."  As you can see, I like mine with plenty of cheese!  The 50's was a bit of a dry spell for horror movies though.  There were a few good ones, but I'd say the 30's and 40's were the decade for American horror films.  Then the Europeans took up the slack in the 60's and 70's.

Oh, for sure. Its that realistic 'talking over one another' that helps sell the story, in a subcontious way.
PHANTOM FROM 10.000LEAGUES...Yee-hee-hee! I had a ball with that turkey...A hero who first gives his name as Ted Baxter (Oh, louuuu!) , an office wall thats a gunrack fir spearguns, and...THE DINGY OF DEATH! That rowboat is used for every on water scene, and it protends death, for all but the hero...Oh, the cheese,the cheese...

That Quatermass movie was "50's?  Really? 
Whoops!  I just looked:  Almost all of them '50's, '50's, '50's . . .
I do like those, but I guess I tend to forget their '50's origins as my favorite Quatermass is most definitely 1967:  Quatermass and The Pit, aka 5 Million Years to Earth.
That said, I do love a good alien devouring a secret installation movie!  Bravo Quatermass --
peter johnson/denny crane

As a boy I spent a lot of Saturdays at the local theater watching 50's horror/sci-fi, I love all those old movies, If I started to list them I'd have to list them all, good or bad they were always entertaining. Even the worst would usually have at least one almost genuinely scary moment, most actually had at least a few truly scary scenes, and the good ones are true classics. They seem to appeal to something in all of us. I tend to get sudden inspirations and binge on these films so rather than a list of favorites, I'll list a recent holiday viewing.
Attack of the Crab Monsters
Them
Beginning of the End
Killers from Space
It, Terror from Beyond Space
The Thing (original)
I then started on "The Atomic Submarine", but reality intervened and I was forced to stop about 15 minutes into the movie. Tonight I think I'll watch it from the beginning.

 I love 'em all too. Funny thing...even the old 'classic' supernatural monsters had a 50's sci fi twist to 'em...in the WEREWOLF, Steven Ritchie is turned into a wolfman by science,not by a curse,and the traditional zombies are as a result of invaders from space,and not voodoo. Giant gorilla (KONGA) and dinosaurs (GODZILLA) are the result of scientific or atomic f%ck ups...not the inhabitaints of misty 'Lost Worlds'...and vampires too -(John Beal in the VAMPIRE and the Itailian ATOM AGE VAMPIRE.) Even the feel of some of them (the MAN from PLANET X,directed by horror and noir vet Edgar Ulmer) had a Universal Pictures aura to them.

 Watch the trailer to the MAN from PLANET X...with it's foggy hills and twisted dead trees...you could almost be in Translvania...

                         http://youtube.com/watch?v=h7kEf-rW7ks

That's a brilliant trailer, actually --
Brilliant, because it shows you that the "monster" looks like a Pinnochio reject & yet you still want to see the picture.
The girl-in-distress is very convincing & seems a good actress.
But . . . Cheeseball City, re. the Man From Planet X Himself -- I bet they stole that mask from a local opera company & doctored it themselves --
Love the spaceship!
peter johnson/denny wooden boy

I love all the 50's sci fi's, from giant bug movies to space paranoia fare.  TEENAGERS FROM SPACE was a lot of fun, and I don't think it's yet been listed in this thread.

All those mentioned so far, put me down with 'smiles.'  The 50's was the Golden Era...

If I'm not mistaken Teenagers from Space has what to me has always been a truly frightening scene, the one where the hobo gets in the back of the truck carrying that ridiculous crawfish monster. You see the truck then hear him screaming along with a crackling snapping noise that I've always thought were his bones breaking as he's dismembered and eaten. I still have the occasional bad dream along these lines.

A lot of my favorites have already been mentioned, especially the 50's Quatermass films.  The Quatermass serial versions of "Quatermass II" and "Quatermass and the Pit" are even better than their Hammer counterparts IMO.

Two other huge favorites are THE CRAWLING EYE a.k.a. THE TROLLENBERG TERROR (Jase mentioned this one) which is a sublime example of how a Lovecraft movie should be made (even though this isn't based on a Lovecraft story), and THE ABOMINABLE SNOWMAN with Peter Cushing and Forrest Tucker--the best Yeti movie ever made, period.

The first two Hammer Frankensteins (CURSE and REVENGE) were also made in the 50s and technically science fiction, so I would add them to my favorites list as well...though really they are responsible with HORROR OF DRACULA for starting the 60s technicolor horror phase.

One tends to forget just how old some of these things really are --
Yes, the great Hammer Dracula & Frankenstein were both '50's films -- good Gawd!
The Quatermass and The Pit BBC-TV serial is so old that it even got the BBC Radio Goon Show parody treatment!!
peter johnson/denny crane

Oh, the memories! Funny thing is, the 50s are soo far away for me. I basically grew up in the 80s, televisionally speaking. So my first memories about then-current TV experiences are awkward 80s series like The Fall Guy and others. Still, my fondest memories belong to some 50s classics:

Invaders from Mars was the scariest thing I've ever seen, along with, surprisingly, Arsenic and Old Lace.

I also vividly remember The Incredible Shrinking Man, but in a rather astonishing than frightening way.

Them was actually the first movie I saw in English, on the telly in some hotel room in the US while on vacation with my dad (who also likes these kind of movies...) when I was eleven years old. It is one of two movies I remember from this vacation. The other was some pirate flick, I can just recall two pirates arguing about something in front of an open treasure chest, one gets angry and smashes the lid of the chest and cuts off the hand of the other pirate. Probably I should move this to the "What was that film" section...
 I later watched Tarantula back home, also scary but not as horrible as Invaders from Mars.

I just watched The Horror of Spider Island yesterday. I got BOTH 50 movie classics (scifi and horror) from my girlfriend for christmas (brag, brag, brag...). It is indeed not the pinnacle of b-movies, but is has it's moments. I totally agree with Andrew here. In my private double feature, I enjoyed Atomic Age Vampire more...

My favorites (in no particular order):

* JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH
* WAR OF THE WORLDS
* FORBIDDEN PLANET
* THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN
* THE FLY
* WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE
* THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL
* INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS
* THE BLOB

Oh man there are so many great 50's movies that are in the B group I doubt I could make a complete list of them.

But ... hmmm ... Attack of the 50 foot Women, Them, Creature from the Black Lagoon, It!, The Fly, and about a 100 or so more.

I have to agree that the decade itself really generated so many great movies thanks to the red scare, atoms for peace, the first true explosion of pop culture. I never saw any of them first hand, but thanks to the like of Commander USA's groovy movies and others I had my chance.  I don't want to seem redundant but Forbidden Planet was probably my favorite. I loved the special effects which were pretty good for its day. Concerning the Invasion of the Body Snatchers, I hate to say it but I'm a fan of the 70's version over the original probably because I saw that one first. Here are some others in no particular order:
The Blob
The Fly
Mant
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
It Came From Outer Space
 

The Fly, baby!   :hot:

Return of the Fly, baby!   :hot:

-with Vincent Price.

Hey!  That's so funny that you'd name "Mant" as a '50's fave, when it's actually a modern parody, with John Goodman --
Just shows how it got that "50's feel down pat -- I like it too --
I know a lot of people here didn't like it, but I thought,as a modern parody,  "The Lost Skeleton of Cadavara" got a lot of the '50's feel exactly right also --
peter johnson/denny fedora

Finally some love for Cadavera.  Very funny and inspired spoof of the 50's sci-fi genre.  Plus, Fay Masterson is smoking hot.

LOL... I was hoping somebody would catch onto Mant. Yeah, I threw it in their as a kicker. But yes, they really did do a good job in creating that authentic flavor. And John Goodman pulled off his part too, he's in my list of favorite actors.

Iv'e never seen the movie,but I wonder if the title is a take on the old Famous Monsters sponsered Aurora model kit-'the Forgotton Prisoner of Castel Mare'...?
(http://i93.photobucket.com/albums/l79/RCMerchant/prisglow2-1.jpg)
 

Surprised no one mentioned my favorite '50s SCIFI:
NOT OF THIS EARTH (1957 ~ which seems to be impossible to find on DVD... any suggestions?)

I also like some mentioned flix like:
THE BLOB
THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN
INVADERS FROM MARS
THE THING (FROM ANOTHER WORLD) One of the best thrillers yet made...
INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS
20 MILLION MILES TO EARTH
Oh, and some of the flix seem to be from the '60s like IT! (1966)

There is a It! from 1966 I was talking about It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) I just forgot the rest of the title.

http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0051786/ (http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0051786/)

Of course, IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE.  Nice to know somebody reads my posts!   :teddyr:

I watched so many of the great SciFi movies on the late show as kid.

My favorites would have to be in this order

Forbidden Planet - The great effects provided by Disney, the wholes setup became the inspiration for Star Trek and so many others that followed.

The Thing - first of the flying saucer pictures and it had me hiding behind the couch as a kid. My brother who has posted here a couple of times as OldSouthern actually hid under the seats at the theater.

Them - My great aunt laughed her head off when I was watching this on Chiller Theater at her house.  "Look it's giant p**s-ants", but hey they were spooky to me. I used the wonder if I heard that noise they made in the woods behind our house.

The Day the Earth Stood Still - I remember this first time I saw this on the NBC Saturday Night Movie when I was about 7. This was another early entry into the saucer genre.


I could name lots more, but they've mostly all been named.  There was so much drive-in fare made in the 50's that it would be hard to name all that schlock here.  I'm still discovering stuff I haven't seen. 

Just wait for the remake with Keanu Reeves are Klaatu.  I wish I was making that up.

I try not to, but on occasion I slip up. :teddyr: