Invasion USA - Television Tropes & Idioms

Mr. Ohman: The manufacturer wants more war orders, and lower taxes. Labor wants more consumable products, and a 30-hour week. The college boy wants a stronger army, and a deferment for himself. The businessman wants a stronger Air Force, and a new Cadillac. The housewife wants security, and a new dishwasher. Everyone wants a stronger America, and we all want the same man to pay for it. George. Let George do it.

Tractor Manufacturer: I disagree with you — I don't want to let George do it!

Mr. Ohman: Then you must be the exception?

Tractor Manufacturer: No — I'm George! (Everyone laughs)

—The movie gets Anvilicious about the Aesop at the beginning.

Invasion: USA is a 1950s Glurgefest that purports to show the American audience how quickly the Cold War could heat up and the importance of the military-industrial complex.

One day in a bar, with news of Cold War tensions on the TV, a reporter comes in to ask the patrons — a motley bunch from all walks of life — if they support allowing the U.S. government to take over companies in the name of the cold war effort. Most of the patrons are skeptical except for a strange man nursing a wine glass at the end of the bar — one Mr. Ohman (Dan O'Herlihy), who delivers a What The Hell, Citizen speech to everyone accusing them of just wanting to wish their problems dead instead of doing what needed to be done. After mesmerizing his audience with his speech before leaving, the patrons quickly discover that the U.S. is now in the middle of World War III, as the ~~Soviet Union~~ "Enemy" conducts an audacious plan to invade the North American mainland, with both nukes and paratroopers flying freely. The main characters try to do what they can, but somehow every request of the military-industrial complex that they'd been complaining about or ignoring comes back to bite the U.S. at the worst possible time, and the cast starts dropping like flies before the Red onslaught.

In the end, through the germanic man's hypnotizing the entire bar into seeing visions of what might be, the naysayers are shown the evils of their ways and pledge to be more patriotic afterwards. And the reporter hero manages to win the affections of the heroine from the tractor manufacturer who brought her to the bar.

Not to be confused with the 1985 film starring Chuck Norris fighting a much smaller-scale Soviet invasion.

For tropes and episode details related to the MST3K version, please check out the episode recap page.

Invasion USA contains the following tropes:

A Glass of Chianti: Ohman's nursing a glass as the film begins — and hypnotizes most of the bar with it.
All Just a Dream: Just as the last of the main characters dies, the characters awaken from a trance, still in the bar at the start of the film, discovering Ohman hypnotized them and the entire events of the film concerning the Soviet invasion were a cautionary tale.
All Your Base Are Belong to Us: The United States; but more importantly, the bar.
Arc Words: "If I had my life to live over again."
Broken Aesop: To defeat Communism, we have to let the government take central control of all industry, presumably according to some kind of ~~five-year~~ plan...
Chekhov's Skill: Ohman is described as a hypnotist by the barkeep during the cast introduction. You don't say...
Deadline News: A reporter covering one battle against the Enemy's forces has his signal cut off while his position is being overrun. Also, the reporter hero's final broadcast near the end of the film.
Did Not Do the Research: the film makes many mistakes on the nature of conventional and nuclear war. No regarding the mass dropping of paratroopers on a contested landing zone, city destorying nuclear weapons (described as being the same strength as Little Boy, Hiroshima) are used against airfields and the use of a nuclear torpedo is dipicted as being hit by a conventional torpedo.
Dirty Communists: One even menaces a good, clean American woman.
- Her assailant also overlaps with Husky Russkie.
Empathy Doll Shot: After the Hoover Dam flood, one is shown floating in the aftermath.
Follow the Leader: This was the basic script for American invasion paranoia films like Red Dawn and Homefront. John Milius probably saw this film and when he did, it was like Traffaut seeing Citizen Kane for the first time.
Hammer And Sickle Removed For Your Protection: A prime example. "The Enemy" is never directly named, but near the end the movie just gives up and goes with the full-on Russian accents for the bad guys.
Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today?: There's a lot of accusations of being a sissy in the film. The Marty Stu TV reporter, of course, is a man's man.
Hey, It's That Guy!: Dan "Grig" O'Herlihy as Ohman.
- Also, Phyllis Coates and Noel Niell, who both played Lois Lane in the Adventures of Superman TV series from The Fifties.
Hollywood Tactics: ranges from the enemies liberal use of nuclear weapons to paratrooper being dropped while under machinegun fire.
It's a Wonderful Life
Invisible President: Though only because the movie refuses to show the president looking at the camera.
It's Raining Men: The way the enemy invade america
Killed Mid-Sentence: The traffic controller at Peace Harbor, Alaska — the "Enemy"'s beachhead for the invasion.
Meaningful Name: Mr. Ohman, who hypnotizes everyone into seeing an Omen of things to come.
Omniscient Council Of Vagueness: The "Enemy"'s war room, with a huge wall map of the United States and "the most feared Geography teacher of Central High".
Rape as Drama: See Dirty Communists.
Similarly Named Works: As Mike puts it reading the cast page of the credits — "Starring these people, and Chuck Norris!"
Spot the Imposter: Used when the "Enemy" sends its troops disguised as Americans to infiltrate Washington, DC, and one infiltraitor claims to be from a Chicago unit.
Guard: Ever see the Cubs play?
Infiltrator: (confused) Cubs? A cub is a small animal, a bear... (Blast Out ensues)
Stock Footage: Used in long montages to show the progress of the war. Rather noticeably, one of the pieces supposedly showing the destruction of New York in fact used footage from the London Blitz. At the end of one of these...
You Keep Using That Word: Apparently, the writers seem to be under the impression that the "Atom Bomb" is merely some kind of High Yield Explosive, that has nothing to do with leaving a thousand mile wake of irradiated fallout. Hence, "The Enemy" throw nuclear weapons like peanuts, blowing up airfields, dams, battleships, small out of the way towns, and cities (repeatedly), technically negating the very concept of an "invasion", since there'd be nothing actually left to occupy for about fifty years.
You No Take Candle: "The Enemy" all speak in heavily accented, broken English. Even to each other.
- To be fair, they were instructed only to speak English, as practice.