In 1953, no one had walked on the moon yet, so, hey, for all we knew there WAS a small underground group of women in black catsuits there who wanted to kill Earth men and steal their rocket ship. Nothing surprises me anymore.
Another thing that doesn’t surprise me: This movie stinks. Yet another irresistible title conceals a very resistible film. I’ve had a better time doing laundry.
It’s a cool story. Five space travelers land on the moon. Four men, one woman (and yes, there is a love-triangle subplot happening among three leads, not that you’ll care). The lady navigator (Marie Windsor) insists on landing in a particular area on the dark side of the moon. Why? She can’t explain it. It just feels right.
Turns out that she’s being psychically manipulated by, yep, the weird moon women, who are luring them into a trap that involves lots to talky scenes in which they try to seduce the men as part of a plan to kill them off, learn what they can and then steal their stuff for the survival of their ailing matriarchal society.
Great idea. Sounds like fun. I love “battle of the sexes” shit in movies.
But then director Arthur Hilton shoots it like he’d rather being doing HIS laundry. Lots of simple master shots, no interest in the characters or story. None of this is a good time or sexy or funny. Just point, shoot, cut, print. They already had a great title. Why trouble yourself to make a worthwhile movie to go along with it?
Hilton’s most distinguished credits are as a film editor for oodles of TV shows and B-movies. Meanwhile, the cast’s veteran character-actors (Sonny Tufts, Victor Jory) put in the bare minimum to earn those paychecks, though Marie Windsor has a pretty great scream in her, which we get to hear in a brief scene in which the cast is attacked by huge moon spiders. The Cat-Women, meanwhile, are simply credited as “The Hollywood Cover GIrls”.
The stand-out name here though is Elmer Bernstein from back in his early years, before he became one of the biggest film score composers in Hollywood and when his name might be misspelled in the credits of low-budget movies by someone who forgot the “i before e, except after c” rule.