Monsters to the rescue
By Mark Voger, author
“Holly Jolly: Celebrating Christmas Past in Pop Culture”
Me and my “Dark Shadows” buddy at the Orange County Register still exchange “Happy Frid-Day” messages most weeks. Sick as I am of the incessant drumbeat of coronavirus coverage, I didn’t really want to blog about it. But I got on a roll, making my buddy coronavirus memes utilizing classic monster-movie stills. Some of them are even funny …
VIDEO: To wrap up this exercise in gallows humor, I’m sharing the trailer for Edward L. Cahn‘s sci-fi/horror hybrid of 1959, “Invisible Invaders” (below), starring John–Ford-company-player-turned-“Mole People”-hero John Agar. Cahn’s film is sci-fi because it concerns an alien invasion. But it’s also horror because, nine years before George A. Romero‘s “Night of the Living Dead,” it presents an army of lumbering zombies with arms outstretched. (John Carradine‘s participation, too, adds a touch of horror cred.) I haven’t seen “Invisible Invaders” since I was in grade school, when I caught it one Saturday night on Channel 48 in Philly. (Loved it!) I reckon this makes an appropriate “lockdown movie,” since COVID-19 is, itself, an “invisible invader.” Stay safe.
UPDATE! Read my “Invisible Invaders” review HERE.