Robot Monster (1953) - The worst movie ever made? Well that's one of its reputations spread by those trying to make copy or sell a book, but those same people have obviously never seen a Ray Dennis Steckler movie if they proclaim Robot Monster to be the worst movie ever made. It is actually a very successful movie, but more on that later.
The evil Ro-Man has destroyed all life on Earth with his death ray, but somehow overlooked eight people, two of whom are pilots he kills in short order anyway and so this leaves only six survivors for the rest of the story. So consider the scenario: an alien invader with the technology and know-how to knock out the world's military forces and all human life on Earth, save for 6, is about to be outsmarted by the most idiotic bunch of people he couldn't have possibly in a million years missed.
Now as hokey and mindless as that plot may sound...it is exactly that.
Well how can that not be the worst movie ever made? Well, because it is so entertaining in its ineptitude. Some seasoned actors and some, well let's face it, bad actors speak dialogue so juvenile it must have been written by school children. Goofs abound throughout the movie including the camera being bumped and knocked off scene, a rocketship hurtling through space being bombarded with cosmic rays providing enough light to show that it's just a guy dressed in black holding a rocketship model, an evil alien who appears to be a gorilla wearing a space helmet carrying the heroine of the story off in his arms while she is seen in shots to be laughing and enjoying herself, oh the horrors.
Yes, Robot Monster is one messed up production that still somehow succeeds in being amazingly entertaining in its short running time of barely over an hour. Despite whatever the makers of this may have intended, and of one thing I'm pretty certain is it wasn't this, what they ended up with is one incredibly funny movie.
Despite Robot Monster's low budget of $16,000 it was shot in stereoscopic 3D using a two camera system, which very probably took up most of the budget. And with regard to the budget, the going story I have heard for years about the Ro-Man costume is that they did not have the budget for a proper spaceman suit so they hired an actor with his own gorilla suit and just added a space helmet to that. And an additional stunner is this was musically scored by Elmer Bernstein.
Robot Monster is simply not a well made movie. It could actually be used in a course on how not to make a movie. And yet it is very entertaining, it grossed one million dollars at the box office when it was released on a $16,000 budget, and it has burned a place in our collective consciousness of movie history to be remembered for ages. It may not be a good movie, but it was by far a very successful movie and remains a very entertaining movie for many.
I give it 2 1/2 Daggers for its entertainment value despite its many flaws, or perhaps because of them.
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