DAY 18. RESURRECTIONISTS: Watch something that came out on one of the many reissue labels that we love like Arrow, Criterion, Bleeding Skull, Scream Factory, Indicator, Vinegar Syndrome, AGFA etc.

The majority of my paycheck? That goes to my wife.

The rest goes to movies.

Arrow Video gets a good chunk of what I have and they’ve been putting out an amazing mix of films this year, including plenty of wonderful Japanese films like 1958’s Uchūjin Tokyo ni arawaru. (Spacemen Appear In Tokyo), which was released in the U.S. as Warning from Space. It was the first color science fiction movie made in that country.

Made by Daei, the same people who would gift us with Gamera, and released in the U.S. eleven years after it came out in Japan, this movie has been pointed to as one that Kubrick watched as he grew fascinated with science fiction.

The Pairan aliens of the film are perhaps the best reason to watch this. They’ve never looked better than now, with the gorgeous remastered transfer that’s on Arrow’s new disk. Designed by avant-garde artist Taro Okamoto, they’re unlike any aliens we’d imagine in the West. Instead of humanoid creatures, they’re stars that dance their strange ballet toward camera as they wonder how to reach Earth’s scientists.

One of those aliens decides to take the form of entertainer Hikari Aozora and reach out to our scientists and World Congress to borrow our nuclear weapons to obliterate another planet in the path of our world called Planet R. As no one decides to listen to her, we’re forced to deal with all the impact of having a rogue planet come closer and closer to us. The whole “listen to science’ mantra that our world is ignoring happens here as well, but sadly, we don’t have human-sized star aliens with one giant eye to right our course.

Trust me, just watch those Pairans bounce around your screen is worth the price of this blu ray. The new Arrow Video edition of this movie also features commentary by Stuart Galbraith IV, author of Monsters Are Attacking Tokyo!, and a newly restored English dub track.

DISCLAIMER: We were sent this film by Arrow Video. That said, we spend a lot of money on movies and don’t change our reviews just because we get review copies. Buy physical media!