Movies - The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth

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	Movies - The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth

The Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth is a novel written by H. G. Wells. Published in 1904, it is one of his lesser known scientific romances, aside from the various B-movie adaptations (see below).

The Book

Two scientists, Bensington and Redwood, conduct research into the growth process of living things. The result is a chemical foodstuff (which they name Herakleophorbia IV) that accelerates and extends the process past its normal cycle. Setting up an experimental farm, the pair test the substance on chicks, causing them to grow into giants.

Unfortunately, the slovenly couple hired to feed and monitor the chicks allow other creatures the food, and soon giant rats, wasps and worms are terrorizing the countryside. The chickens then escape and overrun a nearby town. Urged on by a civil engineer named Cossar, Bensington and Redwood take responsibility for the mayhem. Armed with buffalo rifles and explosives, the men hunt down the monstrous vermin and burn the experimental farm to the ground.

The rest of the book focuses on the humans that have been reared on the food. Redwood mixes the substance into his own son’s bottle, causing him to grow and making him wholly dependent on it. Other children are given the food, including Cossar’s three sons, a princess, and the grandson of the couple hired to look after the experimental farm, Albert Caddles. Unwilling to stop feeding it to them (doing so would prove fatal), Cossar and Redwood look after their massive offspring until they finally reach 40 feet in height.

The rest of the world doesn’t take so kindly towards the young giants. Fear and mistrust run rampant, goaded by an opportunistic politician, John 'The Giant Killer' Caterham, as well as the occasional outbreak of giant vermin (mosquitos, spiders, etc.). Despite their attempts to prove useful to society, the giants are restricted and segregated at every turn, while Bensington is driven into hiding by an anti-giant mob.

The worst treatment is reserved for Caddles. Having been forced to spend most of his life working in a chalk pit, he one day sets out to see the world he has been isolated from. Walking right into London, surrounded by thousands of tiny people and confused by everything he sees, he demands to know what it's all for and where he fits in. Getting no answer and told to return to his chalk pit, Caddles wanders aimlessly until he is finally gunned down by the police.

The conflict is brought to an inevitable head. The book ends on the eve of all-out war between the 'Pygmies,' small in body and mind but vast in numbers, and the 'Children of the Food,' who claim to fight not just for themselves, but for growth itself in all its forms. Whether they succeed or not is left unanswered.

The Socialism of Wells' latter years permeates the book. The giants are clearly intended as the superior beings. They are all equals, with no class or racial distinctions (Redwood’s son causes a scandal in the 'Pygmy' world when he and the princess fall in love) and seek to improve their lives and the lives of others. Only the small people with their small minds (devising petty laws against them and treating them with flagrant hostility) stand in their way. Unhindered, they seek to continue growing and improving until they finally become, as the book’s title suggests, gods.

The Movies

Perhaps inevitably, it is mostly through the movies that the story is remembered. The Food of the Gods was released by American International Pictures in 1976, written, produced, and directed by Bert I. Gordon and starring Marjoe Gortner, Pamela Franklin, Ralph Meeker, John McLiam, and Ida Lupino. Based on a portion of the book, it reduced the tale to an 'Ecology Strikes Back' scenario, common in science fiction movies at the time. The food mysteriously bubbles up from the ground on a remote island somewhere in British Columbia. The couple that discover it (McLiam and Lupino) consider it a gift from God, and promptly begin feeding it to their chickens. Soon, rats, wasps, and worms consume the substance, and the island is crawling with giant vermin. A professional football player (Gortner) and his buddies are camping on the island, and one of them is stung to death by the wasps. Also thrown into the mix are an expecting couple, the owner of a dog food company (Meeker) hoping to market the substance, and his assistant (Franklin), a "lady bacteriologist." Eventually, the survivors are trapped in the farmhouse with the rats swarming around outside (or at least swarming around a photo of the house) and Lupino promising God that she’ll never sin again. The football player eventually blows up a nearby dam, flooding the area and drowning the rats (who can’t swim due to their extra weight). But the food survives and is consumed by cows, who give tainted milk, which is then drunk by schoolchildren in the fishing-for-a-sequel ending. The movie was not very successful. However, it did receive a Golden Turkey Award for Worst Rodent Movie Of All Time, beating such competitors as The Killer Shrews (1959), The Mole People
(1956), The Nasty Rabbit (1965), and Night of the Lepus
(1972).

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