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What's your preference: the American or British version? SPOILERS

posted 12 years ago by Htom_Sirveaux
21 replies | jump to latest

I have to go with the American version, and it has nothing to do with me being American. The British version certainly has several good aspects such as the extended observatory scene (despite the fact that nobody could "land" on Jupiter or Saturn, something I'm sure they must not have known yet) and the scene of the ship taking off and detonating, but it overused stock footage and the ending was lacking. The ending I preferred was the one where it turns out it was all just a nightmare, but the nightmare turns out to be a premonition. The "Twilight Zone"-styled endings have always tended to appeal more to me.

"Just repeat to yourself, 'It's just a show; I should really just relax.'"

[–] hobnob53 12 years ago

Yes, the US version was far better. The extended observatory scene is pretty weak, in my view: interesting but obviously tacked-on and kind of pointless. The change insisted on by British distributors -- that the events be depicted as reality, not a dream -- also required the new ending, Franz and Carter putting the "little man" to bed, all of which seemed rushed and a bit sappy. The American version is the one to watch, though the British film is certainly worth seeing. Both are available on the DVD.

[–] Htom_Sirveaux 12 years ago

Oh yeah, I got them both, thanks. Until I bought the DVD, I didn't even know there were two versions.

But yes, I prefer the American ending to the British ending.

"Just repeat to yourself, 'It's just a show; I should really just relax.'"

[–] hobnob53 12 years ago

My wife, who's English, never knew there was a different American version till I showed it to her.

I first learned of the different UK version when I saw it in the 80s. But there's a story there, too. I just posted a thread about the broadcast of the film on IFC on 4/28/12, which demonstrates there's actually at least three versions of this film around.

[–] arbilab 12 years ago

I liked the hybrid. I would NOT like the US ending altered.

_______________________
It's twue! It's twue!

[–] hobnob53 12 years ago

I agree, the US ending should not be replaced, but then it really doesn't work well in the hybrid. To me, that's the weakest version of all -- trying to have it both ways and not succeeding in either. You're better off choosing the straight version of one or the other. I know a few people who prefer the more literal UK version. I can't see that, but to me it's better to pick that film than try to opt for a made-up "hybrid"...which, by the way, wasn't ever an official release of the film. It was spliced together decades later to try to give people parts of each. To me, that makes it an artificial and illegitimate variation of the movie to begin with. It simply doesn't kick together well.

Have you seen this "hybrid" version?

[–] arbilab 12 years ago

Saw it Sat 4-28 on IFC cable. Only version I've seen in decades. Previously US-only, including original second run neighborhood theater. Never saw the UK-only. Liked the extended dialog in the observatory.

_______________________
It's twue! It's twue!

[–] hobnob53 12 years ago

The DVD has both the "pure" US and UK versions. You should pick it up (it retails for $8 - $10 or less). It's interesting to see the actual UK ending, which of course also has the tacked-on extended observatory scene.

[–] Htom_Sirveaux 12 years ago

I could deal with the hybrid too, having read about it. I thought the scene of the starship exploding was halfway decent for the time; I know they had that in the British version, but I'm pretty sure it was only implied in the American version.

"Just repeat to yourself, 'It's just a show; I should really just relax.'"

[–] lrcdmnhd72 11 years ago

Hi Hobnob53,
You may remember me from a few years back. I just made a post about a mistake made about Lt. Blair (Invaders from Mars/1953) stating that David's parents were, "The coldest pair I ever saw." Actually it was Sgt. Finley (Walter Sande) who said that at the police station fairly early into the movie, only he said, "pair," instead of couple. Lt. Blair was the demolitions expert and had no contact with David's parents.
Best.

[–] hobnob53 11 years ago

Hi lrcdmnhd72,

Of course, I remember you, and I don't think the last time was so long ago. Good to talk with you again, you always have interesting things to say.

I just saw your other thread and made a brief reply on it before coming over here. You can see my comment there.

The same mistake exists in both the British and American versions!

Do you have a preference between them?

[–] lrcdmnhd72 11 years ago

Hi hobnob53,

I have a rather strong preference for the U.S. version which I first saw as a kid in a small Michigan town back in 1953 where I spent three of the happiest years of my life. I guess that's why this movie has a special meaning to me. I believe that IVM/53 was the first science fiction movie that I ever saw.

[–] kbarada 11 years ago

Don't mean to cut into your conversation Ircdmnhd72, but what you said about the small town in Michigan and happiest years of your life struck a cord with me in a couple of ways.

I was 7 years old in 1953 and we (all the neighborhood kids) were starting to go the the Saturday matinees for usually sci-fi movies, many of them from the 30's and 40's. Parents would drop us off by the carloads. Some Tarzan and Abbott & Costello thrown in too. What a great time. Theater management just about stopped trying to keep order as we all screamed and laughed at the top of our lungs. It was the post war baby boom in action!

Reading your post it occurred to me how close we had become as a country by the 1950's. So many shared experiences. TV and the movies must have played a large part. I grew up south of Mobile, Alabama along the Gulf Coast and left there when I was 16. It is remarkable that you were having the same experiences in "far away" Michigan.

Yes, I agree that those were my happiest years of my life. To me it was an idyllic time. Thanks for reminding me of the happiness we had. Sorry you only had the three years. I think we both went on to other things that were satisfying, but nothing that ever compared with the 1950's

[–] hobnob53 11 years ago

If I can add my bit, lrchmnhd72 and kbarada (and I remember seeing you around the IMDb boards too), you guys have a slight advantage over me in that I was born the year IFM came out, so never saw it in the theater. My memory comes from seeing it on TV in New York City in the early 60s. I think maybe watching it alone on television was even scarier than with an audience in a movie theater, though back then it was only in black & white. I recall the amazement I had when I finally saw the thing in color in the mid-70s!

Which, come to think of it, was with a huge group of students at the University of Missouri, watching a four-film 50s sci-fi festival one Saturday night. So I did get that "theater experience" after all -- except we were all in our 20s, and probably just as much trouble as being 5!

But I agree with you, kbarada, good and bad (and let's not kid ourselves, there was some bad), there was nothing like the 50s. Or its movies!

[–] DeepFriedJello 11 years ago

Funny, all the recent post on this in the last few days. I was going to comment on the two versions. I wonder the reasoning of the different ending in the UK version. Did Brits want to make it scarier, as something that could take place, and Americans should leave the theater thinking how it was just a dream and nothing to worry about.

[–] hobnob53 11 years ago

The reason I've read was that British exhibitors claimed that British audiences would never accept the dream ending, that they'd want a more literal, straight story. (Apparently these people hadn't seen Ealing's Dead of Night.) So the producer called the cast back in and shot a new ending, as well as the extended scene of Jimmy Hunt looking at various models of flying saucers in Arthur Franz's office. These insert scenes were very obvious in that Jimmy had grown since the original filming and had a different haircut.

The American ending was somewhat ambivalent, since young David wakes up and appears to witness the saucer crash again, though the sound is that of an airplane. Evidently that was too vague for the Brits.

My wife is English and had never seen or known of the original ending until I showed the US version to her. She, for one, prefers the American cut.

[–] kbarada 11 years ago

Hey Hobnob53. Yeah, I've read you often on these boards. You have great insights and memories of these old movies and the era. Thanks for the reply.

...I agree with you, kbarada, good and bad (and let's not kid ourselves, there was some bad), there was nothing like the 50s. Or its movies!

Yes, there was for sure some bad in the 50's. The good memories seem to blot out most of that. Hey, you were in college in the 70's. Probably as good as the mid to late 60's when I was in college. Now that was an intense few years. I am reminded of the lyrics to an old song:

"It's a fine line between Heaven and Hell When the good makes you feel like you should
It's a fine line between Heaven and Hell When the bad makes you feel just as good."

I think my first real sci-fi movie experience was The Thing from Another World 1951. They would show all kinds of movies at the Saturday matinees regardless of when they first came out. Probably saw it in the mid 50's and I was forever hooked on the genre. Probably the most frightening movie I can remember.

Well, enough of my random thoughts.
Please feel free to respond. We're just killing time on or off topic on these boards anyway.

[–] hobnob53 11 years ago

Oh, I don't know, kbarada, I think we do more than just kill time around here.

I always wondered about your IMDb name -- I've assumed it was in honor of The Day the Earth Stood Still, short for "K[laatu] barada [nikto]." I like it a lot!

The Thing From Another World '51 is one of my favorites. I'm glad they put back the footage cut from it in the 70s, apparently to more easily fit in a 90-minute time slot on commercial TV. They just wrecked it instead.

Over the years I've gotten to appreciate different sci-fi films, and in different ways, than when I was a kid. Hence, IFM has gotten even better over time...though I always liked it, and found it one of the scariest sci-fi films ever. Another alien flick that has become one of my favorites of all is The Man From Planet X, which is another one I've known since childhood, but which just gets better and better with each viewing, especially now that I know more about its background and production. Its sense of isolation, of a menace lurking just out there in the dark, is very similar to The Thing and even Invaders From Mars, and makes these films very intense.

They're also more "personal", one-to-one if you see my point, vs. the mass destruction shown in such excellent films as The War of the Worlds, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, and some others, and that's what makes them especially scary.

They certainly required using your imagination and allowing the ideas to hook you as much, if not more than, the visuals...which as we've said, don't always hold up too well. But they were incidental to the story, there to convey atmosphere and move the plot along, as opposed to being empty eye-candy as so much CGI is today. And I wouldn't have them any other way.

We do need to be careful about waxing too nostalgic, I guess. Next thing you know we'll be yelling at kids to get off our lawns! That didn't do Lewis Stone (Andy Hardy's movie dad) too much good.

[–] kbarada 11 years ago

Yep, that's exactly what my screen name is in homage to. You are the first one to ever pick up on that. I really liked the way Patricia Neal (as Helen Benson) said those words to Gort in TDTESS. I left the "nikto" off as I thought it would be too obvious. Another classic movie!

Invaders from Mars was really frightening to young minds of the day since all the authority figures i.e.. police, teachers, parents, had come under the mind control of the Martians. Now that is really scary to a young person.

Perhaps you read my post from 1-15-09 on how I got in trouble at school over IFM. I think the hysterical laughter was just our way of dealing with such a disturbing prospect of authority figure mind control. As you said, it was the fear of what we couldn't see or understand that was especially scary.

Gotta go now. Some kids just rang the doorbell and left a burning paper sack of something.....

[–] hobnob53 11 years ago

I'm the first one to get that? Wow.

I've always wondered how expressive Klaatu's language must have been for Gort to know exactly what to do on the basis of, really, only two words: "barada nikto". "Klaatu", of course, is just his name, so Gort knows who the message is from; thus those final two words must have really conveyed a hell of a lot!

I haven't seen the post you mentioned but will look for it. Meanwhile, when you go to stomp on anything outside, make sure the sand you're standing on isn't opening up to the accompaniment of an eerie chorus....

(I grew up in a beach community off the south shore of Long Island, and believe me, after my friends and I watched that movie, we were petrified of setting foot on the ocean front!)

[–] Leopardman4 8 years ago

I've always wondered how expressive Klaatu's language must have been for Gort to know exactly what to do on the basis of, really, only two words: "barada nikto". "Klaatu", of course, is just his name, so Gort knows who the message is from; thus those final two words must have really conveyed a hell of a lot!

Yes --

Unless "barada nikto" just means "read my mind or I'll kick your little tin culo..."

[–] Htom_Sirveaux 12 years ago

I actually saw Tobe Hooper's 1980s remake before having seen this one; I was just a kid at the time. It wasn't until I rented it that the guy at the video store told me it was a remake of a 1950s movie. That kind of spurred my interest to see the original.

All in all, a valiant effort by Hooper with some interesting and unsettling moments, but not one of his best. The original is, of course, far superior, despite the obvious limitations in special effects and makeup. Some years later, I saw the original on TV, and I was very pleasantly surprised by it.

The same thing kind of happened to me for "Night of the Living Dead," though I knew about that one before there was even a remake for it. I had seen several scenes from the original, but never the whole thing. When the 1990s remake came out, I saw that one in its entirety first. Imagine my admiration upon finally getting around to watching George A. Romero's original classic about a year after; it's no wonder the movie reportedly received ten-minute standing ovation upon its first release.

"Just repeat to yourself, 'It's just a show; I should really just relax.'"

What's your preference: the American or British version? *SPOILERS*

What's your preference: the American or British version? SPOILERS