Invasions USA - by Michael Bliss (Hardcover)

About the Book

Of the twenty or so science fiction films produced in America during the 1950s, there is a fascinating subset of nine films that do more than portray an invasion. These films use the invasions as metaphors for assaults against the integrity of various things, such as the self, ...

Book Synopsis

Of the twenty or so science fiction films produced in America during the 1950s, there is a fascinating subset of nine films that do more than portray an invasion. These films use the invasions as metaphors for assaults against the integrity of various things, such as the self, marriage, and notions involving the supremacy of the human race.

Review Quotes

Invasions USA is a pretty good read, especially if you've seen the films he's chosen to discuss.

Throughout the decade [of the 1950s] there were almost 200 science-fiction films made, some of which could be read as analogies of communist brain washing, a particularly divisive subject at the time of McCarthyism. In his book, Invasions USA: The Essential Science Fiction Films of the 1950s, author Michael Bliss rejects the often held notion that these films were propaganda tools dealing with American anxieties but rather focuses on sexual politics in such cult films as the colorfully titled I Married a Monster From Outer Space (1958) or about alienation (pardon the pun) in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). . . .The book is a quick and easy read that rarely diverts from its subject.

About the Author

Michael Bliss teaches English and film criticism at Virginia Tech. He is the author of many articles and books, including Dreams within a Dream: The Films of Peter Weir (2000), Between the Bullets: The Spiritual Cinema of John Woo (2002), and Peckinpah Today (2012).