311 – It Conquered the World with
Short: Snow Thrills
éééé
Things I liked about the movie:
The monster.
Shiing!
Icky bat angels.
Impressions
This is probably the goofiest monster in any movie. Goofier than Gamera, Guiron, crawling eyeballs, giant lobsters, “giant” gila monster. Only Joe Don Baker is really even close. This thing is a giant zucchini or pickle with a comically evil facial expression and a huge underbite like a bulldog. It communicates telepathically, which is a shame, because if it could talk, it would be hilarious to watch. I’m always mildly bothered when aliens from faraway planets have human features. So I guess I have to give this one credit. To slap a goofy face on a giant pickle – well, that’s downright imaginative.
Synopsis
Short: A film
showing off various winter sports with great enthusiasm. Sadly, it’s so lame that you just find
yourself laughing. The narrator is
trying really hard to get you involved, but you find yourself hoping the ice
breaks and he falls into the icy lake.
Movie: A satellite disappears. Anything even remotely electrical in a small town stops working. A crazy guy who talks to a radio (Lee Van Cleef) is convinced that some aliens from Venus are coming to take over the world and convert it into a utopia of slavery and fascism. There’s a lot of talking, arguing, disbelieving, sitting around, believing again, and car chases during which the cars suddenly stop as if they’re powered by Microsoft Windows. The alien converts humans into helpers by sending bat-like creatures to land in their hair and attach little antennae. When this happens, the victim becomes stoic and gets his or her electricity back. Finally, the wife of the crazy guy gets fed up and confronts the giant, peace-loving pickle, who promptly eats her (oh, the irony!). The crazy guy gets cold feet like in Night of the Bloodbeast. He kills the pickle with a flamethrower but he himself is also killed in the process, thereby giving the audience the satisfaction that justice was served.
You do feel sort of a vague pang of loss for the wife, who is the only character you were rooting for. Peter Graves gives a claw-your-ears-off moralizing speech reminiscent of some old Star Trek episodes, in which Kirk says even though men are idiots, they have feelings and that makes them cool. It rivals in stupidity the speech given by Eros in Plan 9 From Outer Space.
Host Segments
Segment one: Joel and the bots rehearse for Star Search.
The Mads’ invention exchange idea is dead guy costumes complete with nooses (neese?). Joel invents a walkman type thing that lets you listen to the ocean by hooking up headphones to a shell.
Segment two: Servo’s a fake announcer for imaginary winter sports (based on the short). Joel and Crow try to keep up as the sportsmen.
Segment three: They’re having dinner and insult the food in imitation of the movie.
Segment four: Joel and the bots try to think up other famous movie star siblings.
Segment five: Peter Graves gave a ridiculous, moralizing, never-ending speech about how man is so great because he has feelings. Joel and the bots keep listening to it over and over as if they’re fascinated by it.
Stinger – more of the Peter Graves crap.
Riffs
During the short
Narrator: Fast becoming one of the most popular of winter sports is shiing. And, “shiing” is the correct pronunciation they tell us.
Joel: Yeah, well you're full of skit.
Servo as narrator: Cross Country
Shee-ing Amid Skenes of Winter Magnifishence in Shanada's Shnow-sovered
Playgroundsh
During the movie
Peter Graves goes home and his house has power, implying that his wife must be under the control of the alien.
Riff [whispering]: The lights work. The drawer works.
Joel (as Tom Anderson): Honey, why can't you just let me once take over the world?
Joel: Yeah, everybody gets a day off at the end of the world. Didn't you know that? It's a free day.
Crow, as Peter Graves: Next on Biography, me being terrorized by a giant plastic flying mitten.
Crow, as static line goes down screen: Do not adjust your set; we can make it stupid!
It Conquered the World IMDB Page