Snow Devils

Although Italy was known for sword and sandal films (such as the Hercules and Machiste pictures) and the so-called spaghetti westerns in the 1960s, the country made many other types of movies...including some sci-fi. "La Morte Viene dal Pianeta Aytin" ("Snow Devils") is one of quite a few sci-fi movies that were dubbed into English and marketed in the States. While the film would look like absolute garbage when "2001: A Space Odyssey" debuted just a year later, for 1967 the effects are actually generally pretty good...at least when they weren't using cheap and fuzzy stock footage here and there during the story.

When the picture begins, the temperatures around the planet are on the rise and snow is melting everywhere. An expedition in the Himalayas stumbles into the cause...some aliens who have been there for 100 years waiting to unleash their plan. What is the plan of these big, furry blue aliens? To flood the Earth and then quickly freeze it to turn the planet into a giant glacier, as that's the sort of temperatures these aliens like. And, since they also plan on taking over the planet, who cares what happens to the humans?! Can our intrepid heroes defeat the aliens at this base? And, if they do, will it stop the climactic problems...or is there another battle looming in the near future?

The film is modestly entertaining albeit a bit silly here and there. But for a 1960s sci-fi movie, it's actually reasonably good. Too bad the magnificent special effects with "2001" would soon make these Italian exports look mega-crappy in comparison.