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The wonderful thing about the magnificent sci-fi film The Day the Earth Stood Still is that it’s about so much more than it’s about.

On the surface, it’s about Klaatu (Michael Rennie), a visitor from a planet a few million miles away, who comes to warn of the Earth’s potential destruction if its inhabitants do not give up their aggressive ways.

It’s a simple enough message, but right from the start, poor Klaatu can’t catch a break. He tries to give a peace present to nearby soldiers, who respond by shooting him. He tries to tell the President’s rep to arrange a meeting between all world leaders, but the leaders won’t agree to such a meeting unless it’s on their home turf. Then he tries to move among the citizens to learn their ways and gets sold down the river by a macho guy who wants to impress his girlfriend (Patricia Neal), who ends up siding with Klaatu.

What the movie is really about is fear of strangers. It was, after all, made at the beginning of the Korean War conflict and during HUAC hearings, both of which were intended to root out “reds” or “pinks” (i.e., people who don’t think like us). And whenever Klaatu tries to speak of his belief in non-aggression, he gets shot down, figuratively or literally. The movie’s message is more timely than ever: Why are we so afraid of peace, anyway?

Michael Rennie was a British actor, unknown in the U.S. at the time of filming. He was chosen so that, instead of seeing a famous movie star come out of a spaceship, you’d see a believable alien. Rennie, Neal, and everyone else in this fine movie pull off the acid test: Sci-fi motifs and dialogue that could have been laughable in other hands (watch Plan Nine from Outer Space if you’re ever looking for a hoot) are completely plausible here.

Kudos are also due to Leo Tover’s glistening cinematography and Bernard Herrmann’s eerie score, both of which contribute considerably to the movie’s heightened atmosphere. Don’t watch this one alone, or in a paranoid state.

The most unfortunate line of dialogue in the 1976 version of King Kong is when Jack Prescott (Jeff Bridges), as proof of Kong’s existence, points to jungle debris and says, “Who do you think made that mess – some guy in an ape suit?”

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what I think.

In between the original 1933 version of King Kong (a classic and the best version –- no arguments allowed) and Peter Jackson’s 2005 version (which put me off but obviously has its fans), there came producer Dino De Laurentiis’ version –- which, to cop a much-used phrase from Roger Ebert, knew the words but not the music.

The movie attempts to “modernize” the story with a plotline about Fred Wilson (Charles Grodin), a greedy executive of an oil company named Petrox (“Pet Rocks,” isn’t that cute?). Wilson is sailing his crew to an uncharted island that promises hoards of oil that will help Petrox lead the way during the ’70s energy crisis. Stowing away on the Petrox ship is Prescott, an “environmentalist professor” who tries to show Wilson the political incorrectness of his greedy ways.

Bridges and Grodin seem pretty game for the plot conceit. On the other hand, there’s Jessica Lange, making her unfortunate film debut as Dwan, another of the ship’s passengers. Dwan is a would-be actress who talks like a flaky flower child. From this performance, you’d never have guessed that Lange would go on to be an Academy Award winner.

Other than hippie girl Dwan, the most head-shaking aspect of the movie is King Kong himself — who is shown, alternately, as a man in a gorilla suit (special effects artist Rick Baker) and a robot (designed by Carlo Rimbaldi, who went on to better things when he designed E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial years later for Steven Spielberg).

(SPOILER ALERT!) I feel compelled to mention that the only element that might spoil the movie’s fun for you is the setting of its climax. Whereas the ending of the 1933 movie famously took place atop the Empire State Building, here Kong climbs to the top of the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center. That was obviously intended as a novel climax at the time of the movie’s release, and just as obviously, it might have negative emotional resonance for some viewers now.

Other than that, the movie is quite the valentine to 1970’s America in all of its tacky glory. So join us for some laughs this Sat., Oct. 3, at 4:30 p.m. EST at Twitter.com. Use the hashtag #SatMat to get the link to the movie online and to comment on the movie throughout our viewing of it!