Forbidden Planet (1956)

Director:

Fred M. Wilcox

Writers:

Cyril Hume (screenplay)
Irving Block (story) ...

Release Date:

15 March 1956 (USA)

Genre:

Romance | Sci-Fi | Thriller

Tagline:

IT'S OUT OF THIS WORLD! (original print ad - all caps)

Plot:

A starship crew goes to investigate the silence of a planet's colony only to find two survivors and a deadly secret that one of them has.

Plot Keywords:

Planet | Monster | Philologist | Space | Genius

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 1 nomination

Cast

Walter Pidgeon	...	Dr. Edward Morbius
Anne Francis	...	Altaira 'Alta' Morbius
Leslie Nielsen	...	Commander J. J. Adams
Warren Stevens	...	Lt. 'Doc' Ostrow M.D.
Jack Kelly	...	Lt. Jerry Farman
Richard Anderson	...	Chief Quinn
Earl Holliman	...	Cook
Robby the Robot	...	Himself
George Wallace	...	Bosun
Robert Dix	...	Crewman Grey (as Bob Dix)
Jimmy Thompson	...	Crewman Youngerford
James Drury	...	Crewman Strong
Harry Harvey Jr.	...	Crewman Randall
Roger McGee	...	Crewman Lindstrom
Peter Miller	...	Crewman Moran

Runtime:

98 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Colour:

Colour (Eastmancolor) (as Eastman Color)

Aspect Ratio:

2.55 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Perspecta Sound encoding) (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

Iceland:L | USA:Approved (certificate #17605) | USA:G (re-rating) (1972) | Canada:PG (Manitoba/Nova Scotia/Ontario) | Sweden:15 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-12 | UK:U | Argentina:Atp | West Germany:12

Company:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Trivia:

The film was originally conceived and approved by MGM's Dore Schary, himself no fan of science fiction, as a B-picture. The studio's art department, still headed by veteran Cedric Gibbons pulled out all stops. The budget ballooned to $1.9 million and barely managed to break even amid a dismal year for the studio. The relative failure of the film was cited as a reason for Schary's ouster soon after.

Goofs:

Continuity: As Alta talks to the commander after being found kissing Lt Farman, her position changes from being side-on to face-on to the commander.

Quotes:

[Lt. Farman offers the brilliant but innocent Altaira some sugar for her coffee]
Altaira: But you keep helping me. After all, you're not Robby.
Lt. Farman: [chuckles] I wouldn't mind being Robby in certain ways. Uh, that's only in *certain* ways, of course.
Altaira: I can see that was probably very clever, but I don't seem to understand it.
Lt. Farman: There's no rush.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Uchu Kaisoku-sen (1961)

The Best SF Film Of The 1950s

FORBIDDEN PLANET is the best SF film from the golden age of SF cinema and what makes it a great film is its sense of wonder . As soon as the spaceship lands the audience - via the ships human crew - travels through an intelligent and sometimes terrifying adventure . We meet the unforgetable Robbie , the mysterious Dr Morbuis , his beautiful and innocent daughter Altair and we learn about the former inhabitants of the planet - The Krell who died out overnight . Or did they ?

You can nitpick and say the planet is obviously filmed in a movie studio with painted backdrops but that adds to a sense of menace of claustraphobia I feel and Bebe and Louis Barron`s electronic music adds even more atmosphere

I`m shocked this film isn`t in the top 250 IMDB films .