Still: Crazy After All These Years

I recently decided to sit down with a science fiction classic, watching the original 1951 version of The Day the Earth Stood Still. It's a story about a visitor from another planet that in many ways now feels itself from another planet.

It is said that "the past is a foreign country," and that often feels true watching an older movie. This movie in particular feels that way, as so much of the behavior on display seems ridiculous. How much of what's depicted was a product of normal storytelling methods of the time? Or of the heightened style of science fiction in particular? 

Hard to say, but how much sense does it make for the military cordon around a landed flying saucer to be about 20 feet? For people to just be able to walk up and gawk? How much sense does it make for a mother to let a stranger she just met the day before babysit her son for a day? What to make of the strange mix of extreme underreaction and extreme overreaction peppered throughout the movie?

The Day the Earth Stood Still is slowly paced in the way of many classic films, but it's still thoughtful and concise about making its point. Nearly every scene speaks to its message, and it brings that message home in just over 90 minutes. One can imagine a younger Gene Roddenberry watching this and being profoundly influenced with many of the ideals that would later be foundational to Star Trek. Those are, quite simply: humans need to start thinking beyond their one, insignificant world. We need to transcend hostility and learn to be peaceful.

That's a timeless message, of course, but it's interesting (and difficult) to imagine just how that would have been received in 1951. For one thing, it was coming less than a decade after World War II. For another, it was coming almost a decade before even a simple unmanned object had been launched into space. In this context, this movie really seems to put the fiction in science fiction; the character who rings most truly (now, and probably then) is the presidential adviser who tries to explain to the alien Klaatu that nothing he wants to do is within the realm of possibility.

This movie is largely quaint, and hasn't aged especially well. Nevertheless, there are some nuggets to be pulled out for a modern audience. I'd grade it a C overall. If you're a science fiction fan who's never seen this classic, you might find it worth your time.