Warning from Space (Uchûjin Tôkyô ni arawaru)
Directed by Kôji Shima
Written by Hideo Iguni from a novel by Gentaro Nakajima; English dialogue by Jay Cipes and Edward Palmer
1956/Japan
Daiei Studios
First viewing/Amazon Instant

[box] After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say ‘I want to see the manager.’ — William S. Burroughs [/box]

I should have heeded the warning.

Aliens shaped like stars covered in cheap fabric hold a pow wow on Planet Paira.  Number 1 is chosen for a mission to Earth to contact Dr. Kamura.  Sightings of flying saucers begin to increase.  Unforunately, the terror of seeing the motionless alien causes panic among the Earthlings.  So Alien Number 1 returns to Praia where it is transformed into the likeness of a tap-dancing night-club singer.  Alien Number 1 reportedly does a number of very suspicious things before finally making contact with Kamura.  When she does, Paira delivers its message.  A runaway planet from another galaxy is due to enter the shared orbit of Earth and Paira and will wipe out both planets unless it can be stopped.  Paira wants the nuclear nations to cooperate to detonate atom bombs sufficient to alter Earth’s orbit (????).  The only other possibility is an untested explosive formula that some bad guys are after.

After I saw pictures of the aliens, I had high hopes for this movie.  Unfortunately, the smiles come only in the first five minutes.  After that, very little happens.  I watched a dubbed version but have no reason to believe subtitles would help in the least.

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