Apparently, Amazon Prime has a collection of campy 1950s and 1960s science fiction movies that you can view, if you dare.  One thing they have going for them is that they are not particularly long, which is great if you are pressed for time like I was on the day I viewed The Angry Red Planet (1959).  If the short run time is not appealing, then at least they make great joke fodder, if you are into mimicking Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988-1999).  The Angry Red Planet has all the hallmarks of other films that appeared on that beloved show.  One of these is its low-budget, though they did attempt some kind of cheap visual effect to give the sense of being on the title celestial body that actually looked pretty neat, considering the era during which it was made.  What initially made it stand out for me was its description on the streaming service, making it sound roughly like an Alien (1979) knockoff.  I can find no link between the two, but perhaps my review of The Angry Red Planet will give you the same idea?

Mars Rocket 1 (MR-1) had been missing since it entered orbit around The Angry Red Planet.  In case you do not know what the title refers to, it is Mars.  The four-person crew, consisting of pilot Colonel Thomas O’Bannion (Gerald Mohr), biological expert Dr. Iris “Irish” Ryan (Naura Hayden), (general?) scientist Professor Theodore Gettell (Les Tremayne), and Chief Warrant Officer Sam Jacobs (Jack Kruschen), have been unresponsive to attempts at communication for weeks.  Yet, all of the sudden, MR-1 is detected traveling through space by the United States military.  A meeting of people tasked with making decisions opts to remotely guide the ship back to Earth in the Nevada desert.  Upon its landing, the only two left alive are Colonel O’Bannion and Dr. Ryan.  “Alive” is a relative term since Colonel O’Bannion has some kind of growth attached to him, also covering his face, and Dr. Ryan is delirious.  Doctors are puzzled as to how to help Colonel O’Bannion.  All the data records from their craft appear to be blank as well.  This leaves Dr. Ryan as the only person capable of providing any explanations.  Once she is relatively calm and in a hospital bed, the military begins to question her.  From here, the overwhelming majority of the film is told in one long flashback.  The MR-1 had a smooth launch and routine voyage to Mars.  They reported all they did along the way as one might expect from any space mission.  Even though they lost communication after reaching Mars orbit, their descent to landing on the planet closest to us went on without a hitch.  It should be noted here that you should forget anything you might already know about Mars.  This one has flora and fauna that the crew go to explore shortly after their arrival.  Before their first excursion, though, Dr. Ryan shrieks when she sees a three-eyed Martian peeking in the window from outside.  This does not deter her from going with the others.  Chief Warrant Officer Jacobs immediately tests out his new toy, which looks to be some kind of freeze ray.  I guess the plant life did not appreciate this unprovoked act because what looks like a human-sized Venus flytrap grabs a hold of Dr. Ryan’s leg and tries to make a meal of her.  She is saved by Professor Gettell wielding a machete, and the carnivorous plant is finished off by Chief Warrant Officer Jacobs.  This is enough excitement for now, I suppose, though they take it as basically just another day at the office.  The following morning they are back at it, but this time they tangle with a forty-foot tall cross between a bat, a rat, and a spider.  Take a look at the movie poster if you do not want to take my word for it.  Professor Gettell is wounded, and when they return to MR-1, Colonel O’Bannion makes the decision to cut short their stay on Mars.  Unfortunately, when they attempt to blast off the planet, they are held in place by a type of force field, or so they surmise.  Professor Gettell speculates that this is the doing of some kind of intelligent control.  Whatever it is, they are forced to venture back onto the surface.  They believe (for nebulous reasons) that the source of their lift off issue is on the other side of a lake they found on their last misadventure.  Luckily, they have an inflatable boat (which, huh?) that they use to paddle across it.  About half-way there, they begin to see a technologically advanced city with buildings, they claim, a half-mile tall.  Before they can get any closer, an enormous creature emerges from the water and starts heading in their direction.  The crew frantically reverse course with this alien blob closely following them.  They make it back to their ship, but as they are trying to close the hatch, Chief Warrant Officer Jacobs is absorbed by the giant amoeba.  This is what they decide is the monster as it tries to do the same to MR-1.  Dr. Ryan comes up with the idea of using electricity to deter their attacker, which proves successful.  As the danger subsides, a Martian voice (Don Lamond) comes over their communications equipment, and it is at this point that Dr. Ryan faints.  She awakens after they have made it off Mars, Professor Gettell warning her about a substance beginning to cover Colonel O’Bannion before the scientist succumbs to his wounds.  This brings us back to current.  The electricity idea is how they deal with Colonel O’Bannion’s condition, and before too long he returns to normal.  Indeed, Dr. Ryan is at his bedside reminding him about the date he promised (sigh) when they are played the recording of the Martian voice.  It contains a warning to never return to Mars, and that is when the movie ends.

To be more specific about the Martian warning at the end of The Angry Red Planet, the alien makes the claim that while humans are technologically advanced, they are “spiritual infants.”  This statement caught my Catholic attention, though some historical background is necessary.  As I have discussed with other films of its ilk, it was made during the Cold War.  In addition to fears of communist invasions put on the big screen in the form of space aliens, there was also a healthy aversion to the weaponry of the two main opponents in this global conflict.  I am speaking of nuclear bombs.  When these extra-terrestrials are not landing on Earth and causing a raucous, they are sending us warnings about the threat these devices pose to civilization.  The idea here is that, as more advanced species, they have experienced these troubles and can steer us in a better direction.  This is the “spiritual infancy” to which the Martian voice referred, though it may not sound like it.  Yet, again, you have to think about the times in which the movie was made.  It was not so un-Christian an era as it is today, though cracks were beginning to form.  Still, at that time, the Catholic Church in the United States had one of its most prominent voices speaking out against nuclear weapons.  Venerable Bishop Fulton Sheen, who had his own radio and television shows, called them a source of moral chaos.  This fits with the general views the Church has on devices of mass destruction, calling for wholesale disarmament.  These were not popular positions to have on such things, which is probably why Hollywood ignored them.  I am no Martian, but getting rid of such weapons might be more like spiritual adulthood.

I am not sure that it takes an adult to watch The Angry Red Planet.  In doing a little research on the film, I learned that its writer, Sidney Pink, came up with the idea by pitching it to his children.  In a sense, you have a script literally written by a five-year-old.  So, yeah, unless you get a kick out of seeing such things as I discussed in the introduction, you might want to skip this one.