Claysaba Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

BelSports This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Sammy-Jo Cervantes There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

TxMike A movie came out in 1951, it was during a longer period that became to be known as the cold war. It was a fictional movie, but also a cautionary message for all of us on Earth, not to keep developing weapons of greater destruction. It was "The Day The earth Stood Still."This movie, "Space Children", borrows its themes from the earlier movie. Here the USA has a base on the coast of California, and are prepared to launch "The Thunderer", a missle that will put a very powerful weapon in orbit 1000 miles up, and it will be able to destroy any target on Earth, if we decided it was a grave threat.In this story an alien from space is discovered in a cave on the beach by a band of children roughly ages 14 to 6. It reminded me of a small octopus head, with barnacles, and somewhat pulsating. It made no noise, but it communicated by telepathy with the older boy, whose dad was a scientist just assigned to the base. Its mission turned out similar to that of the aliens in "Earth Stood Still", to protect us from ourselves, and to prevent the new weapon from being launched into space.This is definitely a "B" movie, but a good example of the 1950s black and white Sci-Fi movies. The dialog is very bland, the acting serviceable, and the climax anti-climactic. Much of the filming has the band of children running around the beach, going back and forth, sometimes with adults.In modern times, with more interesting cinematography, acting, color, and special effects, this movie is not much else but nostalgia. Now that we know so much about space exploration, it is fun to see how they depicted these fictional stories just when space exploration was about to begin.

Michael_Elliott Space Children, The (1958) * 1/2 (out of 4) This minor sci-fi flick has pretty much been forgotten by everyone, which might not be too shocking on its own but director Jack Arnold has a very big following for his other films in the genre like THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN and CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON so it says something when one of them is pretty much forgotten. This time out a group of parents take their kids to a missile launching site where the kids are soon lured into a cave by a mysterious light. Inside the cave is an alien who takes over the kids and use them to try and get their parents to give up their nuclear connections. Even at just 68-minutes this movie is just way too slow and poorly shot to be of much interest to anyone. I think it's obvious that Paramount didn't spend too much money on the film as everything from the cinematography to the special effects look rather cheap. The "alien" here actually looks like a glowing brain that continues to get bigger as the film goes along. In a cheap, Roger Corman type of way the effect looks OK but you can't help but think they were trying to do something more but were unable to due to the budget. Another problem are the kid actors who are just downright bland and boring in their parts. I found them to be rather laughable at certain times and none of them were good enough to keep me interested in what was going on. The supporting cast includes some familiar names like Jackie Coogan, Richard Shannon and Raymond Bailey. The film is clearly trying to be yet another THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL clone but nothing in it works. The message is rather silly and everything else is just too cheap or being to be entertaining. There's no question Arnold was a major name on the genre and his work deserves to be rediscovered by those unfamiliar with it but at the same time they should keep forgetting this one.

sol1218 ***SPOILERS*** Despite its very low ratings from the movie critics the movie "The Space Children" is one of the most thought-provoking motion pictures to come out of Hollywood in the 1950's in its addressing the dangers of nuclear proliferation and the cause for nuclear disarmament. "The Space Children" ranks right up there with "The Day the Earth Stood Still", which was released seven years earlier in 1951, in making that very important point crystal clear to the movie going public.With their dad David Brewster, Dave Williams, working as an electrical technician at the Eagle Point Project young Bud & Ken, Michael Rey & Johnny Crawford, are somehow contacted through mental telepathy by this "Brain" from outer space. The two boys are told by the "Brain" to go to this secluded cave on the beach for farther instructions.At the cave both Bud and his kid brother Ken find a number of like-wise kids there who's fathers, like Bud and Ken's, are involved in the Eagle Point Project. The Eagle Point Project is being fined tuned to send a missile into space that will, after going into orbit around the earth, be able to launch a nuclear weapon anywhere on the planet in case a war breaks out between the US and the Soviet Block including Red China.The children are instructed to convince their parents working on the project to stop the launch of that missile called "The Thunderer". The children are told telepathically that if the missile is launched there'll be dire consequences not only for the country, the US, who launches it but the entire earth as well!The movie has the children, mostly preteen-agers,try to convince their parents to get the missile launch stopped with only Bud and Ken's dad David Brewster finally seeing the light. That's only after David was paralyzed by the "Brain", that looks like a pipping hot blob of lava, from outer space when he tried, with a bolder, to smash it. Getting his feelings, by his son Bud touching his arm, back David desperately tries to get the missile launch called off but is declared, by those in charge of the launch, either delusional of suffering from burnout. It's then that David is ordered by the head of Project Eagle Point Lt-Col Manly, Richard Shannon, to be sent to a local military hospital for much needed rest, from the stress of his heavy workload, as well as be put under mental observation.With the Thunderer scheduled to be launched within the hour the children now on their own, with the ""Brain" directing them, enter totally unnoticed, as if their invisible, by the military sentries the super secure missile site and somehow disarm the Thunderer making it totally useless! It's during that same time that Dr. Wahrman, Raymond Bailey, one of the top engineers at Eagle Point also realizes that what Bud and his fellow adolescents are saying is the God honest truth! Seeing with his own eyes the kids involved in a number of strange and unexplained incidents leading up to the missile launch Dr. Wahrman came to the conclusion that their being guided from something from outer space with powers beyond his imagination!The film has a bittersweet ending with Bud and his brother Ken as well as the rest of the children proving, by the "Brain" revealing itself to those in charge of Project Eagle Point, that their right about the dangers of testing Thunderer and the dangers of nuclear testing for strictly military purposes. What leaves the audience and the "Space Children" a bit concerned is will they-the adults running the world-now learn from what they've seen and stop nuclear testing. Or will that timely lesson have to implemented on them, with deadly force if necessary, by their space neighbors who are now monitoring them here on earth as well as in the far off and distant universe!

AngryChair The children of some US rocket scientists come under the spell of a strange alien being that seems to want them to sabotage the nations defense!Another B thriller from director Jack Arnold (who directed the classic Creature from the Black Lagoon in 1954), this one is a bit more intelligent than the average drive-in sci-fi fodder. The Space Children is actually an anti-war film kind of in the tradition of The Twilight Zone, the story does indeed resemble a story that one would see on the classic TV series. Arnold lends some steady direction, creating an occasionally eerie atmosphere (who could ever forget that spooky final image of an ill-fated Russell Johnson?) and a decent alien creation. Kudos go to a chilling music score.The cast isn't half bad, the youths of the film being especially good.A worth-wild watch for those who like the films of this era.** 1/2 out of ****