311-It Conquered the World

Film Year:  1956
Genre:  Science Fiction, Thriller
Director:  Roger Corman
Starring:  Peter Graves, Lee Van Cleef, Beverly Garland, Sally Fraser
MST Season:  3
Featured Short:  "Snow Thrills"

The Short

The movie going public will THRILL to seeing sporting events in any form, because we’re too fat and lazy to do it on our own!

Before television was a thing, audiences had very limited ways of following sports.  You had to see it live in order to see it in practice, otherwise you had to listen to it over the radio or read about it in the paper the next day.  Shorts like Snow Thrills were meant as a means of small glimpses to things that were difficult to see in certain parts of the country.  Snow Thrills gives us a look at the wonders of snow sports, and why you should spend your vacation at a ski lodge this winter and risk a broken leg.

Nowadays when it’s easy to watch the Winter Olympics every four years, Snow Thrills doesn’t seem all that special, but back then it was something fun.  It wasn’t something you saw every day, or even COULD see every year.  The stunts are cool, and audiences enjoyed them.  Snow Thrills serves its purpose.

The Movie

It Conquered the World features an MST all-star cast, made up of veterans we’d see time and again on the series:  Peter Graves (SST- Death Flight, Beginning of the End, Parts:  The Clonus Horror), Beverly Garland (Swamp Diamonds, Gunslinger), and Lee Van Cleef (Master Ninja I, Master Ninja II).  They all unite under the guidance of one of the most celebrated B-movie makers of all time, Roger Corman, who directed quite a few features on the series as well (Swamp Diamonds and Gunslinger both with Garland, and also Teenage Caveman, The Saga of the Viking Women and Their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent, and The Undead.  In addition to this, Corman also produced quite a few films featured on the series that he didn’t direct as well (Being from Another Planet, Attack of the Giant Leeches, High School Big Shot, Night of the Blood Beast, and Deathstalker and the Warriors from Hell).

This is the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon of MST, you guys.

It Conquered the World is a kinda Invasion of the Body Snatchers clone, at least it would be if Invasion had a giant rubber space vegetable squatting around.  This silly looking alien takes over the world by sending out pancake bats to bite the citizens of Earth and control them via mind control.  Peter Graves defies the monster and dodges the attacks, while Beverly Garland begs her mind-controlled husband, Lee Van Cleef, to stop this madness.

For Roger Corman, It Conquered the World actually isn’t too bad.  It’s cheap (is there any other kind of Corman) and it’s dumb (I repeat), but it’s brisk, entertaining, and you could get a laugh or two.  Reportedly when Beverly Garland first saw the titular “It” that “Conquered the World” she laughed in disbelief and kicked it over.  THAT’S the film we’re watching, folks.  A movie where even the actor don’t believe it and find it hilarious.

It can even be mildly engaging in spots as well.  Peter Graves not knowing who to trust brings a modest amount of suspense to the picture, and it leads to a somewhat strong scene in which he confronts his wife, who in being controlled by the alien creature.  For a cheapie like this any source of emotional investment, albeit light, is an epic win.  Keeping all this in mind, It Conquered the World is a bad movie on the technicality that it’s pretty crappy.  But it’s a good crappy.

The Episode

A lot of the charm of this particular episode has to do with the movie selected.  It Conquered the World is somewhat iconic in the bad movie circuit, at the very least for the evil alien the film presents (once you see it you’ll never forget it).  The movie is pretty funny on its own, and Joel and the bots could coast this episode and it could honestly still be pretty good.  Luckily they give it their A-game.  Laughs come from the movie and the theater seats in this one, and it’s easy to just sit back and let the giggles take you.  The crew gets a lot of mileage out of playing with “Corman Logic” especially, with one point late in the game featuring Peter Graves shooting first and asking questions later prompting Joel to respond “Um…you WERE all bad guys, right?”

Snow Thrills is also a successful venture.  The short is very visual, which means there is a lot for our crew to play with.  When they’re not mocking the sports, they take aim at the narrator, and especially get mileage out of his proper pronunciation of the word “ski,” which is supposed to be pronounced “shee” (“You’re full of skit,” Joel responds, the foul-mouthed bastard).  This leads to a lot of fun with the phrase “ski jorring” (pronounced “she-whoring”)

The host segments are mostly forgettable, with top prize being the solid skit where Servo narrates a Snow Thrills parody.  There’s an intentionally off-key song that doesn’t really rank among the series’ best, however that particular segment does include a fourth wall “wink-wink” where Servo questions the direction of the skit and Joel whispers to him that the movie is running short, so they need to pad the episode out.  Lackluster segments include a Servo and Crow bicker session and Joel trying to use Crow as a ventriloquism puppet named Peanut (and if this episode weren’t from the early 90’s, I would have sworn the “puppet named Peanut” was a reference to comedian Jeff Dunham).  The episode closes out with Peter Graves final speech being repeated over and over again, which is one of those gags which is funny at first, grows tiresome, then becomes funny again because of how long it goes on.  Invention Exchange involved a hanging man’s noose Halloween costume and the Sony Sea-man.

It Conquered the World and MST are something of a match made in heaven.  While I don’t feel the episode really reaches the heights of classic status, this one is definitely a must see.

Good

The DVD

While It Conquered the World isn’t on DVD yet (MST version or not, THANKS SUSAN HART!), it's possible to own a good portion of it.  Snow Thrills was featured as a bonus feature on Volume XXIV, on the Sword and the Dragon disc, respectively.  The host segments for this episode were also released on the Satellite Dishes disc of Volume XXXIX.