Genre:Sci-Fi - Action Release Date: Run time: minutes Director: Actors:
Zontar, the Thing from Venus also known as Zontar: The Invader from Venus is a 1966, made for television, science fiction film, directed by Larry Buchanan and based on the teleplay by Hillman Taylor and Buchanan. It is a low-budget color 16mm remake of Roger Corman's It Conquered the World (1956) which also featured an alien invader from Venus.The movie is arguably Buchanan's best known.At a dinner party with their wives, NASA scientist Dr. Keith Ritchie (Tony Huston) reveals to his colleague Dr. Curt Taylor (John Agar) that he has secretly been in communication with a three-eyed, bat-winged alien from Venus named Zontar who he claims is coming to Earth to solve all of the world's problems. However, as soon as Zontar arrives on Earth via a fallen laser satellite it quickly becomes obvious that the skeletal black creature has a hidden agenda, as it begins causing local power outages that stop telephones, automobiles and even running water from working and it starts taking control of people's minds using flying lobster-like "injecto-pods" that sprout from its wings. Only after his wife is killed does Ritchie finally realize that Zontar has come not as a savior but as a conqueror and he goes to confront the hideous alien in the sulfur spring-heated cave that it has made its secret base.
