CAT WOMEN OF THE MOON

US, 1953, 64 minutes, Colour/Black and white.
Sonny Tufts, Victor Jory, Marie Windsor, William Phipps, Douglas Fowley, Susan Morrow.
Directed by Arthur Hilton.

This 1953 science fiction film is considered a candidate for one of the It’s So Bad It’s Good films.

In its defence, it was produced in 1953, sixteen years before the landing on the moon. During the 1950s, with such films as Destination Moon, This Island Earth, It Came From Outer Space, there was a proliferation of B-budget science fiction films. However, the science knowledge was limited as is evident in this film, given the interior of the spaceship, the ignoring of issues of gravity, the length of the journey… The special effects are also very basic, the cavern on the moon, the very artificial spider that terrorises Marie Windsor, the landscapes of the moon.

The acting is not particularly strong at all – Sonny Tufts being very wooden as the leader, Victor Jory his usual tough self. Marie Windsor is the astronaut who is under the influence of the mysterious cat women (perhaps because of their black clothing and look) who have inhabited the moon for many centuries. It is a surprise for the astronauts as well as the audience to find this colony of women in very sophisticated circumstances on the moon – doing without men, wanting to get the secrets of the rocket ship, falling in love, being violent…

The plot is absurd – and is the material for parody. Perhaps in the 1950s it did not seem so absurd but, of course, in hindsight it does.

Of historical interest – and the music was composed by Elmer Bernstein (The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape). His name is spelt incorrectly in the credits. He also scored Robot Monster, another film which like this one, used some sequences for 3D and in colour. In some video prints, the 3D sequences look blurred and would need 3D glasses to appreciate them.