Journey To The Seventh Planet is a routine and familiar space travel film

Review by Steve D. Stones

From the team of Ib Melchior and Sidney Pink, who brought us – The Angry Red Planet (1960) – Journey To The Seventh Planet (1962) has similar plot elements to The Angry Red Planet. Similar plots had been shown on the big screen in many science-fiction films of the previous decade – such as Cat Women of The Moon (1953), Fire Maidens of Outer Space (1956), Queen of Outer Space (1958) and the most horrible of the group – Missile To The Moon (1958).

Like the above mentioned films, Journey To The Seventh Planet takes us to familiar territory with five young men who arrive on a planet, then encounter sexy, scantily dressed women who fulfill their lustful desires. One of the sexy ladies is Danish actress Greta Thyssen, who also starred in the cult classic – Terror Is A Man (1959) and appeared in later Three Stooges shorts. The crew's real mission is to investigate a radiation source coming from the planet Uranus.

The year is 2001, and the United Nations is now the complete governing body of the entire world. The United Nations selected a crew of five men to represent an international expedition. The expedition is to last for ten days as the crew investigates the source of radiation on the planet Uranus.

Even before landing on the planet Uranus, the crew succumbs to a planetary force that appears to control their minds. When landing on the planet, one of the crew members experiences a state of deja vu in knowing he has been to the location before. The location appears to be a place where the crew member spent time as a child. In this particular sequence, actor John Agar pulls up a small tree from out of the ground and is puzzled that the tree has no roots. The look on Agar's face as he examines the tree is unintentionally funny.

As the crew investigates the area, a large opening in a tall bush is discovered. The opening appears to be a portal into another world. Before entering the portal, some of the crew members experience hallucinations and mirages of experiences and places of their past.

In full space gear, the crew enters the portal into a surreal, petrified forest of paper mache rocks and styrofoam particles used for snow. The group encounters a stop-motion Cyclops dinosaur that is killed by crew member Karl with a ray gun shot in its eye. In a second attempt to explore the petrified forest, the crew encounters a giant Cyclops brain who is the source of what is controlling their minds. This is familiar territory for actor John Agar, since he battled a giant brain in The Brain From Planet Arous (1957) that also controlled his mind.

Some of the music used in Journey To The Seventh Planet may sound familiar to science-fiction viewers of the 1950s and 60s. The music is also heard in Invasion of The Saucer Men (1957) and Roger Corman's film - The Last Woman On Earth (1960). English speaking voices were later recorded over the Danish actresses' voices.

Perhaps it's not fair to compare this film with director Pink's earlier effort – The Angry Red Planet (1960), but I find Journey To The Seventh Planet to be a bit on the dull side and very leisurely paced in contrast to the earlier Pink film. Even the beautiful Danish women featured, such at Thyssen, cannot save the film.

Journey To The Seventh Planet only has two monsters in the entire film for the crew to encounter and overcome. The Angry Red Planet brought us the interesting octopus plant monster, the iconic rat-bat-spider, a creepy three eyed alien who peers into a space rocket, and the giant amoeba gelatin shaped cyclops monster. 

Plus, The Angry Red Planet also employed an interesting marketing gimmick known as “Cine-Magic” in which scenes shown on the planet Mars are filmed with a red filter. Writer Ib Melchior's greatest effort is – Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964).

For further information about the life and career of writer and producer Ib Melchior, see Robert Skotak's book – Ib Melchior: Man of Imagination (2000 Midnight Marquee Press). Happy viewing.

Queen of Blood a decent B sci-fi film of the '60s

By Doug Gibson

Not many know it, but the 1960s was a fertile field for low-budget science fiction space operas. Like 1970s slasher films, the sci-fi genre had not been co-opted by A studios yet. There was a wide variety of low budget scifi, running the gamut from Edgar Ulmer to Hugo Grimaldi to David Hewitt and even Mario Bava.

I'd say among the best of the lot was Bava's Planet of the Vampires, the worst including Space Probe Taurus and Hewitt's Wizard of Mars, although that kitschy film is still a lot of fun. Other mediocre offerings of low-budget scifi include The Human Duplicators, and also that silly film with Richard Kiel as an oafish monster that miniaturized spaceman overpower, when they're not making out with teeny alien women (can't recall the title). Hewitt's Journey To the Center of Time isn't too bad, though, despite its five and dime budget.

Somewhere in the middle, with a definite tilt toward the positive, is the 1966 scifi "Queen of Blood," which you can watch on Amazon Prime or buy as "Planet of Blood" from Sinister Cinema. As you can see above from the green alien woman, it has one creepy monster alien. I use the term "alien" because I think, not unreasonably, that this film played some inspiration for the eventual film "Alien." Our title monster is on a space ship with several astronauts, including an earth woman, and victims get picked off in solitary fashion.

So, the plot: Earth has discovered communications with aliens. The head of all this is a slumming Basil Rathbone, who chews the scenery well as a scientist/administrator who regards gathering and storing information on aliens as more important that the personal welfare of human astronauts, or frankly the earth's future. Speaking of astronauts, a couple of them are played by star John Saxon and future bigger star Dennis Hopper. The obligatory love interest female astronaut, and these films usually had 'em, was played by Judi Meredith.

Once earth learns that the aliens are in distress, earth sends some assistance. Eventually, our human astronauts discover a mysterious colorful (in the hue sense) alien woman (Florence Marley) who is as mentioned, creepy to the max. She doesn't talk, has a smile that would suit Medusa and shies away from any contact. While the astronauts are separated, she preys one the unlucky one, hypnotizing them and sucking out all their blood. The others discover their colleagues dead and the Queen of Blood asleep, with blood trickling from her mouth. She's satiated, until she wakes up again to feed.

Although on my first watch of the film I wished we could learn more about the alien, maybe have her speak, on second viewing I realized that keeping her silently mysterious, even after she's revealed as a killer adds to the sinister themes. Why is she doing this? Is she even aware of its evil, or is it normal behavior among her planet?

I won't give away any more of the plot except to point out that the film does extend beyond the action and horror to illustrate the callousness of scientific obsessives who care far more about keeping the blood-sucking aliens alive than the astronauts in their care. Rathbone is the chief example of this sentiment in the film.

Queen of Blood is a fun, at times shocking 1960s' offering. It was released through a larger studio, MGM, and made a lot of money, although the film has the look of a lower-budget offering. Saxon is good as the chief astronaut and Hopper exudes the charm that more audiences would discover.

Watch the trailer below and check this out if you haven't seen it.