The 1950s was a golden age for science fiction cinema. The decade saw the appearance of a succession of genre classics, including The Day The Earth Stood Still, The Thing From Another World, The War Of The Worlds, and This Island Earth.

The period’s movies reflected America’s fascination with the possibilities of future technology, and also a creeping sense of paranoia about the subversive potential of Communism, reflected in spectacular “Reds under the bed” films such as Invaders From Mars (1953) and Invasion Of The Body Snatchers (1956), in which an insidious alien menace stripped mankind of its individuality.

Of all those ’50s classics, one film stands among them all as a true sci-fi icon. Released by MGM in 1956, director Fred M. Wilcox’s Forbidden Planet was the most expensive and ambitious genre film to appear on the big screen in decades, requiring the construction of huge sets and the creation of groundbreaking special effects. The resulting film was so pricey (its budget amounting to almost $2 million), that profits were slim on its original release.

Nevertheless, Forbidden Planet has grown into a genre classic; the epitome of a ’50s sci-fi movie, its influence and contribution to sci-fi cinema is arguably as great as Stanley Kubrick’s celebrated 2001: A Space Odyssey. As we’ll soon see, Forbidden Planet could even be described as the grandfather of two of the late 20th century’s towering giants of pop culture: Star Trek and Star Wars.