Synapse Films has now released an "Atomic Special Edition" of Invasion, U.S.A. on DVD. A group of Manhattanites and tourists sip beer and swap chit-chat, feeling safe and secure in their postwar, American-made comfort zone. But a mysterious stranger named Mr. Ohman (Dan O'Herlihy) pokes holes into the barroom patrons' illusory sense of security by questioning America's readiness for true Communist aggression, physical or ideological. We know there's something a little odd about Mr. Ohman because of his elusive, otherworld accent, not to mention his curious habit of swirling red wine in a decanter. He is as suspect as Robert Cornthwaite's Russian-looking hat in The Thing From Another World (1951). But the beer-swilling regular guys in the bar are so taken with Ohman's eccentric rhetoric, they fall into a kind of spell, literally hypnotized by Ohman's red wine going round and round in that nice and shiny decanter. Suddenly, the patrons wake up to unconfirmed reports of a mysterious invasion on the west coast, as well as to Mr. Ohman's inexplicable disappearance, which no one seems to question. Faced with the invasion of a faceless enemy (the invading army is never identified directly as Soviet) and the free-for-all destruction of American cities by atomic bombs, each average Joe and Josephine in the watering hole is put to their own sink-or-swim patriotic test.
George Sylvester (Robert Bice), a dead ringer for Babe Ruth, is the owner of a tractor factory who tries to retrofit his business to begin making war machines. Sounding like a 1950s-era Hank Hill or, as Synapse's liner notes peg as "John Wayne on sedatives", rancher Ed Mulfory (Erik Blythe) is desperate to get back to his family in Arizona. But it is lothario newscaster Vince Potter (Gerald Mohr) who wants to do the most patriotic deed of them all: earn a paycheck reporting the news and continue to make the moves on the beautiful Carla Sanford (Peggie Castle). Potter heroically spells out in layman terms what it means to be a true American in times of crisis when he says, "War or no war, people have to eat and drink...and make love!" Okay, so it's not exactly Jeffersonian, but Potter is better at putting into perspective his love life and the current war. "The last time I met a girl I like, they bombed Pearl Harbor," Potter muses. In either case, Potter's incongruous pronouncements fit perfectly in this weird, What-If doomsday scenario.
Aside from the implausible dialogue, dead serious performances and a plot that could have been written by a half-mad Rod Serling, Invasion, U.S.A. boasts several delights. Noel Neill, famous for playing Lois Lane on television's The Adventures of Superman, pops up as a TWA airline ticket agent, who has the unpleasant task of informing a customer that Montana has been "A-bombed." As laughably portentous as the news sounds, funnier still is that before the traveler tells Neill his trip to Montana is for pleasure, she asks if his Montana destination is for business, as if his traveling intentions to Montana made any difference, now that it was obliterated.
Veteran character actor William Schallert makes an appearance as a news commentator who lists the newly radioactive American cities. Schallert's lengthy career is an endless dossier of atomic exploitation films, monster flicks, and science fiction tales, and director Joe Dante paid homage to Schallert's illustrious career when he cast Schallert as a mad scientist in the vastly underrated Matinee (1993). Most impressive in Invasion, U.S.A. is the marvelous use of endless stock footage. Not content with just footage of tanks, airplanes and other military hardware, the producers get away with the use of stock footage of American soldiers. The invading army is using American uniforms as disguises, you see.
Synapse's DVD also features a 30-minute cut-down of a 60-minute public information short subject produced in 1962 by Warner Brothers for the Defense Department called Red Nightmare (also known as Freedom and You and The Commies are Coming, The Commies are Coming). Narrated somberly by Jack Webb, Red Nightmare is structured like Invasion, U.S.A., only the nightmarish warning to be on guard is much more personalized. Instead of a cross section of citizens, it's one man who has the cold water of fear thrown on his electric security blanket. It's as if George Bailey got a glimpse of what Bedford Falls would look like with a thick coat of Red. Red Nightmare is directed by George Waggner, famous for directing Universal's The Wolf Man (1941). (For some unaccountable reason, Waggner's on-screen credit is spelled WaGGner.)
The DVD also has other goodies, like two official defense department audio recordings, "The Complacent Americans" and "If the Bomb Falls," both of which you can listen to as a secondary audio track over Invasion, U.S.A.. The excellent liner notes are by Bill Geerhart of the Conelrad website, which has provided a useful, if arguable, list of 100 indispensable "atomic" movies, each accompanied by short comments and a still or lobby card.
Invasion, U.S.A. is one of the weirdest films on DVD, but in a good way. It's an entertaining look at 1950s America and a great introduction to a nearly defunct subgenre, the Atomic-cum-Red Menace film. Instead of dumping the film onto a no-frills, cheap DVD edition, Synapse has put out a superior production of a hilarious and unique film.
For more information about Invasion, U.S.A., visit Synapse Films. To order Invasion, U.S.A., go to TCM Shopping.
by Scott McGee
