Popcorn Crunchers, Reel 89 Trivia Quiz

Answer: All of these are true.

Colonel Briteis was the astronaut who made the first orbital flight around the Earth, four years before the setting of "Project Moonbase". Colonel Briteis is the commander of the first mission to orbit the Moon. Ernestine Barrier played the role of Madame President of the United States. This is set in 1970.

Answer: Phantom Brain Suckers

In "The Brain Eaters" (1958), creepy-crawly aliens take over people's brains. In "The Brain from Planet Arous" (1957), an alien comes to earth to take over a scientist's mind and to thereby rule the planet. In "The Brain that Wouldn't Die" (1959), a crazed medical doctor keeps his decapitated girlfriend's head alive in a casserole dish.

In African mythology, the Mamlambo is a cryptid, also known as "the brain sucker", which lives in the Mzintlava River near Mount Ayliff in South Africa. It appears during lightning storms and kills people. In the "Resident Evil" universe, a Brain Sucker is a creature birthed by an arthropod infected with the t-Virus. "The Brain Sucker" is a juvenile novel written by Glenn Wood in 2012. The title describes a machine, not an entity. "Brain Sucker" is a song on the album "Brain Drain" released by the band Distributor in 2018. There does not appear to have been a motion picture titled "Phantom Brain Suckers" in the 1950s.

Answer: a furry hominid giant with a warthog's face

The three aliens in the spaceship release a hairy, very tall, bipedal creature with a face that looks very much like that of a warthog. It has big feet which leave odd footprints unrecognizable to the Sámi people. This hideous yeti-like creature goes rampaging about, killing reindeer herds, destroying Sámi houses and tents, disabling the scientists' airplane, and kidnapping the beautiful Diane Wilson, geologist Dr. Vance Wilson's niece. Lars Åhrén plays the monster but his mother wouldn't recognize him in that outfit and make-up.

Answer: Lyn Osborn

Lyn Osborn (1926-1958) plays Artie Burns, the partner in crime of Joe Gruen, in "Invasion of the Saucer Men". The two con artists are in Hicksburg looking for an opportunity to score. Osborn was born in Wichita Falls, Texas. His big break in show business came with the role of Cadet Happy on "Space Patrol" on both radio and television. Shortly after completing the filming of "Invasion of the Saucer Men", he died at age 32 following surgery at the UCLA Medical Center for a brain tumor.

Answer: She is employed by an evil foreign power.

Dr. Myra, played by Katherine Victor, is a mad scientist employed by an unnamed foreign Eastern nation to develop a drug/gas that will turn people into mindless slaves. Their plan is to take over the United States without firing a shot by gassing the population and turning all Americans into obedient mindless slaves.

This notion is somewhat reflective of the Zeitgeist which feared Russian nuclear missiles and perceived schemes to rule the world.

Answer: Edward L. Cahn

Edward L. Cahn shot "It! The Terror from Beyond Space" only a year before making "Invisible Invaders" (1959). Beginning in 1955, he directed a series of horror and science fiction films including "Creature with the Atom Brain" (1955), "Zombies of Mora Tau" (1957), "Invasion of the Saucer Men" (1957), "Curse of the Faceless Man" (1958), and "The Four Skulls of Jonathan Drake" (1959).

He displayed a simple, straightforward approach to directing which resulted in films made on time and within (low) budget.

Answer: Ferde Grofé Sr.

Ferde Grofé Sr. (1892-1972) was a distinguished American composer and arranger who was also a piano virtuoso. Probably his two most well known accomplishments were his tone poem "Grand Canyon Suite" and his orchestration for George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" in 1924.

The score to "Rocketship X-M" was pressed as an LP and later as a CD. It contains pieces titled "Good Luck", "The Motors Conk Out", "Palomar Observatory", "We See Mars", "The Atomic Age to Stone Age/The Chase", "The Tanks Are Empty", and "The Crash". Grofé used an exotic electronic musical instrument called a theremin in the score.

It was unknown in movie music until this time and thereafter became a standard in science fiction films because of its weird sound.

Answer: acting

Gloria Talbott (1931-2000) was an American film and television actress who began acting as a child. Her sister was also an actress. In addition to her many one-time appearances on television, Talbott was known as a "scream queen" for her roles in motion pictures such as "The Cyclops" (1957), "The Daughter of Dr. Jekyll" (1957), "I Married a Monster from Outer Space" (1958), and "The Leech Woman (1960).

Answer: a tropical Pacific island

Without getting too specific, the film sets itself in Kalai, a remote Pacific atoll with appropriate palm trees and grass huts. (There is a Kalai Island in Zambia and a city called Kalia in Thailand, but this atoll is fictional.) When the local natives dance the dance that precedes the execution of a murder, it looks very much like the hula.

Answer: It is destroyed by a bomb planted on board.

The flying saucer was not an alien aircraft. It was the invention of an American scientist, Dr. Lawton, played by Roy Engel. In the culminating event, Turner, Lawton's assistant, steals the flying saucer and intends to fly it to the USSR which will pay him a million dollars for the ship. As it takes off, it explodes in midair. Dr. Lawton explains to Mike and Vee that he planted a bomb on board in contemplation of just such an event.