The sight of a flying saucer hovering over Washington in 1951 would have confirmed the fears of many Americans that the end was nigh. But, coming just four months after Christian Nyby and Howard Hawks had unleashed The Thing from Another World upon a petrified Cold War public, director Robert Wise's sci-fi classic was actually a welcome sign of hope that we might not be going up in flames after all. Based on Harry Bates's short story Farewell to the Master, this was also a bold attempt to increase the genre's credibility. From Bernard Herrmann's otherworldly score to Lyle Wheeler and Addison Hehr's deceptively simple designs, The Day the Earth Stood Still has had an incalculable influence on big-screen science-fiction. For all its philosophical solemnity and heavy-handed religious symbolism, Edmund H North's script deftly pokes fun at the Red-baiters who had done so much to foster the nuclear scare, while his notion that children accept without question what grown-ups are too cynical to see has continued to resurface throughout the blockbuster era, notably in those Spielberg landmarks Close Encounters of the Third Kind and ET. Wise slickly blends the docudramatic and the melodramatic without ever lapsing into pomposity or hysteria. Michael Rennie is a revelation as Klaatu, exuding dignity, sympathy and authority in a role that was originally intended for Spencer Tracy. Less successful, however, is Lock Martin, who plays giant robot Gort. He couldn't help the fact that his "solid metal suit" creased when he walked, but he might have made a better job of remaining stationary - especially bearing in mind the film's title.

An alien and a robot land on Earth after World War II and tell mankind to be peaceful or face destruction.