Much like The Day Of The Triffids (1962), the story Night Caller From Outer Space (1965) is an attempt by the British to infuse an essentially silly story with professional effort. Here we have a monstrous meteorite entering Earth’s atmosphere with neither an explosion or a crater left at its landing point, but just a small silicon-covered sphere. Found by the military in the company of a leading science team, they soon discover the sphere is actually a matter transceiver – but at the cost of the science team’s leader. Worse yet, the creature that comes through escapes the military compound with the matter transceiver in tow.
But it’s the connection to Ganymede, a moon of Jupiter, which is most puzzling. A number of young women in London and neighboring towns have gone missing, and somehow it’s connected to the creature – but how?
The police not accounting for the impossible, and a couple of bodies, and in the end, the creature escapes with the women. His goal? They will become the mothers of a new race of Ganymedeans, a race that is fatally damaged by their own hubris. As he leaves the horrified police behind, he shouts they needn’t worry about their safety.
Call it dark if you like.
This story has a few things going for it. The science, outside of the one incredible part allocated to it, doesn’t do too badly most of the time, although there’s a few head-shakers in the bunch. The lead female character is quite strong, and I liked her a lot – I wish she’d had more lines and scenes.
But the motivation of the Ganymedeans was more than a little difficult to take seriously. Perhaps if we’d spent a little more time with the creature, we’d have more empathy for the antagonist – but that would have shattered the tension the moviemakers are at pains to build.
In the end, this is not as good as The Day of the Triffids, and that’s too bad. It was a solid professional effort, undone by the script.
