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Music from THIS ISLAND EARTH (and Other Alien Invasion Films): Composers: Herman Stein,
Ron Goodwin, Henry Mancini, et al

Monstrous Movie Music - MMM-1954, TT: 60.12, 47 tracks (stereo) ***** (Highest Rating)

Producer: David Schecter, Kathleen Mayne, - Performed: Radio Symphony Orchestra of Slovakia, -
Score Reconstructions: Kathleen Mayne – Conductors: Masatoshi Mitsumoto, Kathleen Mayne

by Ross Care

This 2006 Monstrous Movie Music release is a continuation of David Schecter’s on-going

exploration of the outer limits of classic (and not so classic) genre scoring. The key score in this excellent

compilation of world premiere recordings is Universal International’s THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955),

one of the studio’s more elaborate sci fi features. As Schecter’s notes explain, UI was a low-budget film

factory in the 1950s, its scores produced in an assembly line, sometimes cut-and-paste (cue recycling)

process in which the collective composers often remained anonymous. Ironically, UI still managed to

evolve one of the most unique sounds of the studio era. The all-original THIS ISLAND EARTH is

primarily the work of Herman Stein, assisted by UI horror veteran, Hans Salter, and new kid on the

block, Henry Mancini who commenced his celebrated career scoring programmers at UI.

The score itself is simply one of the very best of the period. It’s heard here complete with 27

cues that aurally outline the film’s screenplay about earth scientists abducted by aliens to help fight an

interplanetary war. The music is characterized by a duality representing earth and its humans by a noble,

warmly symmetrical tonal sound, and the aliens and their influences by brief but weirdly evocative,

harmonically askew cues. Though little time is actually spent in outer space and much of the film looks

like a Technicolor Douglas Sirk melodrama, Stein’s other worldly score definitely keeps the alien

ambiance firmly in the foreground of any viewer’s consciousness.

An early electronic keyboard, the Novachord, plus harp, celeste, marimba, bass marimba, and

vibraphone, add to the alien mood, but the skillful use of exotic motifs, mild dissonance (including tone

clusters), and economic but evocative orchestral effects are the key elements in the score’s impact.

Especially effective: “Robot Plane,” with its almost new age harp arpeggios under string harmonics and

tremolo, and “Exeter’s Mansion,” a kind of extraterrestrial pastoral that drifts though a gorgeous series of

shifting modulations and anticipates Herrmann’s ethereal FAHRENHEIT 451 sound. Printed musical

examples are provided, including Stein’s chromatic “Metaluna” motif that is heard throughout the score,

often on the Theremin-like Novachord.

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The compilation includes eight cues from Ron Goodwin’s THE DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS, and

two brief main titles, Walter Greene’s manic genre-lite toccata for Roger Corman’s WAR OF THE

SATELLITES and Daniele Amfitheatrof’s recycled 1942 cue for EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS,

an early Ray Harryhausen production that is tracked with other previously existing cues ranging from

George Duning to Miklos Rozsa.

Attractive packaging and artwork (including an especially colorful CD label), embellish a 39-

page booklet chock full of everything from author John Wyndham’s full name to photos of the composers

(and Schecter’s adorable dog). I’ve always been intrigued by the lesser-known scores and composers of

the UI music department and by other low budget, mostly tracked/library cue scores such as the early

Harryhausens and other genre efforts from Columbia, and Schecter’s knowledge of the territory is

enlightening, meticulous and encyclopedic. Indeed together with the first two Monstrous Music releases

Schecter’s notes provide an exhaustive, but often droll and never academic chronicle of this generally

uncharted but vital macro-phase of classic era scoring. And his documentation is well backed up by the

excellent performances of the scores themselves, all of which should be of interest to fans of both genre

scoring and Golden Age orchestral film music in general.