Popcorn Crunchers, Reel 98 Trivia Quiz

Answer: a 104-year-old man who had the means to eternal life

A centenarian artist, scientist, and medical doctor, Dr. Georges Bonnet, looks to be in his thirties but is actually 104 years old. He and his colleague, Professor Ludwig Weiss of Vienna, discovered a way to transplant a fresh parathyroid gland into a person every ten years. He also has an elixir which can extend the expiration date of his expiring gland by four weeks but no more.

Answer: When Vampires Ruled the Earth

"The Day the Earth Stood Still" (1951) stars Michael Rennie as the spaceman; the 2008 remake stars Keanu Reeves. In "Target Earth" (1954), alien robots invade Chicago. "This Island Earth" (1955) is about Earth scientists recruited to assist the people of Metaluna to prevent the destruction of their planet. "Daybreakers" is a 2009 science-fiction horror film in which vampires have come to dominate the world, farming the few remaining humans to provide them with blood.

There was no film titled "When Vampires Ruled the Earth" produced in the 1950s.

Answer: a giant monocular cephalopod

There had not been a monster living in the depths of the cove on the Mexican coast before the atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll. Since then, mysterious deaths had been ascribed to such a monster. Those who had seen it described it as a giant one-eyed octopus-like beast.

Some said its single eye glowed red. It was capable of leaving the water to snatch a person, a cow or a dog from the shore.

Answer: Hans Conried

Hans Conried was an American actor but his roles tended to be of whacky foreigners. He played, for example, Uncle Tonoose (a Lebanese) on TV's "Make Room for Daddy" (1955-1964), Professor Kropotkin (a Russian) on the "My Friend Irma" radio and film series, and Schultz (a German) on the CBS Radio program "Life with Luigi".

His role as Dr. Jess Rogers in "The Monster That Challenged the World" was an entirely serious role -- no accent, no comedy -- as a scientist.

Answer: a drug to stop disease and aging

Carter's goal is the elimination of all disease so that humans may live forever. "Man will be ageless," he says to his assistant Oliver. Oliver replies, "I'm afraid you're on the wrong track. Your formula may work on internal cells, but it causes violent disfigurement to sensitive exposed skin areas."

Answer: There is none.

There is no relationship between "The Flying Saucer" and "Earth vs. the Flying Saucers" although these movies are sometimes confused with one another. "The Flying Saucer" was independently made; there is no credit provided for special effects. "Earth vs. the Flying Saucers" was released by Columbia Pictures; Ray Harryhausen did the special effects.

Answer: black pins, white pins, and no pins

Black pins indicate plots are already filled. No pin indicates a plot which is unsold. A white pin indicates a purchased plot which is unoccupied. Robert Kraft's trouble begins when he accidentally places black pins rather than white pins in the two plots just sold to newlyweds Stuart Drexel and his wife Elizabeth.

In order to obtain the remainder of his trust, Stuart must prove to the trustee that he has purchased these plots. The couple is promptly killed in an automobile accident and Kraft wonders if he caused their deaths by his pin-pushing mistake.

Answer: acting

Clayton Moore (1914-1999) was an American actor best known for his portrayal of The Lone Ranger on television (1949-1952, 1953-1957) and in motion pictures. During a brief hiatus in his employment playing the Lone Ranger, he took a villainous role in the movie serial "Radar Men from the Moon".

The identity of Moore with his Lone Ranger character was so great that his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (2006) uses both his name and his character's: "Clayton Moore - The Lone Ranger".

Answer: Surrey, England, UK

The expedition to the 13th moon of Jupiter is a joint British-American project. A facility called the American-British Astronomical Station, Missile Section, Houndspoint, Surrey, England, is used for the launch. There is a Hound Point in Great Britain but it is on the Firth of Forth, in Scotland, not in Surrey.

Answer: the use of cruel/inhuman Nazi characters

Many stories dramatically require a bad guy, an antagonist, an enemy of the hero, or an all-around not-very-nice person. The Third Reich provided an abundant source of such examples of cruelty, inhumanity, and monstrousness. Many motion pictures of the 1950s and 1960s used Nazi characters as bad guys. The inclusion of sex and sadism led to many of these films being censored or outlawed.

Colonel Karl Osler, a mad Nazi scientist who performed ghastly experiments on people in German concentration camps, provides this nastiness in "She Demons". His henchpersons are appropriately uniformed in military garb bearing swastikas.

Another example of the subgenre is the trailer for a fake film created by director Rob Zombie for Quentin Tarantino's film "Grindhouse" (2007). Zombie's imagined movie was titled "Werewolf Women of the SS".