The Day the Sky Exploded (1958)

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Good movie but grossly overrated

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

One problem that has long bothered most filmmakers, since the dawn of cinema, is the smoke-and-mirrors magic act itself--namely, getting big, great, creative ideas that movie watchers will be interested in and like, while getting these ideas across in as budget-conscious a manner as possible. Take this film, 'The Day the Sky Exploded', for instance (but make sure you give it back--I liked it LOL). Rome-born director Paolo Heusch (who later made the no-budget enjoyable thriller, 'Werewolf in a Girl's Dormitory') wisely utilized as much stock footage as humanly possible, and a fine cinematographer in future horror-aficionado hero Mario Bava (though his name is bizarrely misspelled in the film's credits), to credibly bring his ambitious ideas of widespread panic and civil unrest to fruition.Mildly problematic is the dated way that women are portrayed here. Usually in older films, this isn't bothersome to me, simply because it was so widespread, and thus expected to a certain extent, but that doesn't mean it was right. For example, the only two principal women in the film are the wife of the main astronaut, who basically is left to complaining that she doesn't get enough attention from him while the world is in chaos, and a math expert, considered 'cold' because she dares to simply think about her job, who basically falls to pieces when the going gets tough (though, to her credit, she comes to her senses). And, playing the devil's advocate for a moment, it was kind of crappy that it was a Russian who went crazy and made thinks difficult for the scientists who were binding together to try and save the world. But those are minor nit-pickings.It made me very happy to watch this valiant cinematic attempt. It left me far more satisfied than later, big-budget efforts in the area, such as 'Deep Impact' and 'Armageddon'. Some fanfare for the common man, please! =)

Not a bad premise at all about an eclectic group of scientists trying to send a man in space and achieving that dream only to falter in his descent by causing a bunch of meteors to gather together in one big clump and head toward Earth for its final destruction. The scientists scurry and hurry to find a way out of this doom and that is when the day the sky explodes is relevant. This movie has some things going for it. It is extremely thought-provoking - almost to the point of too much perhaps. It becomes so talky and leaden throughout and is aided by wooden performances and extremely cheap sets. Catch that rocket ship move like a snail! The acting, as I have said, is nothing particularly good nor is the direction nor is the script - which plods and plods. The film does get somewhat interesting in the last fifteen minutes or so, but by that time my eyes were almost glazing over from sleep. There are some brilliantly shot scenes despite the low budget and those were probably set up by cinematographer Mario Bava(one of the greatest horror directors of all time). You can get a sense of his visual artistry here and there, but let's face it - he hasn't much to work with. The Day the Sky Exploded has some real neat ideas but just less than compelling execution.

On the surface, this little End-of-the-World number doesn't seem to have much to offer a viewer accustomed to modern science fiction films with budgets that are bigger by several orders of magnitude and state of the art computer and modeling graphics to sell the story. There seem to be a grand total of maybe 5 actual sets built for the movie.Most of the action is carried by stock footage scenes which are in turn linked by endless chunks of expository dialog.Most of the "live" scenes that carry the action involve people shouting into microphones or typing furiously on the "calculators". The characters are pure cardboard and character development is strictly by rote.And the whole thing is filmed in black and white.On the other hand, if you view this 'naively', as if you hadn't already seen "Meteor", "Deep Impact", or "Armaggeddeon", it's possible to appreciate the abrupt change of the movie's story arc from "exciting space adventure" to "End of the World Suspense Thriller", as the seemingly happy escape of the astronaut from his malfunctioning "atomic rocket" leads to unexpected consequences. If you think about it, that was a pretty creative conception for the time. The Eurocentric aspect of the production also gives the movie a somewhat unusual feel, even if the romantic lead is supposed to be "American" (actually, he was Swiss!) Most of the actors are pretty good at fleshing out their cardboard characters (with one or two exceptions - for instance the little boy obviously had no idea of what he was doing).The direction is workmanlike, and much of the live cinematography is really pretty good - moody lighting, stark chiaroscuro outlines, good compositions, etc.And the editors do a much better job of integrating the stock footage into the movie than many other examples of the genre (say, the original "Invasion USA") - the movie doesn't feel nearly as disconnected and airless as it might have in less skillful hands. "The Day..." suffers a bit from a less-than-stellar dubbing into English - there are bits of awkward dialog and tin-eared readings that cost this movie at least one star in my judgment. But I've heard far worse, and the problems here aren't enough to ruin the movie watching.I saw this movie as part of the "Nightmare Worlds" 50 movie compilation, and I would say it is easily the best of the 10 movies I've found time to watch so far.

"A space mission goes awry when the experimental rocket malfunctions, forcing the astronaut to eject in an escape capsule an sending the rocket into deep space, where it explodes. The explosion causes a group of asteroids to veer from orbit around the sun, setting them on a collision course with Earth. With the impending doom approaching the planet, the nations of the world desperately attempt to come up with a plan to destroy the rogue planetoids," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis."The Day the Sky Exploded" in English, with Swiss star Paul Hubschmid (as John McLaren) becoming the first man in space. The movie optimistically suggests admirable cooperation between nations of the future. Yet, its scientific knowledge misfires. The American rocket man's accident causes asteroids to run amok. Is it Armageddon, or can danger be adverted? Sit through acres of stock footage, and little excitement, to see the answer... ** La morte viene dallo spazio (9/4/58) Paolo Heusch ~ Paul Hubschmid, Fiorella Mari, Madeleine Fischer