Alien Zone

This is an odd 1978 film. It's an anthology film: four short films, and a framing story.
The framing sequence involves a man visiting a town for a convention (and to cheat on his wife). He gets lost in a storm as he tries to make his way back to his hotel and ends up being taken in by the town mortician (played by the late Canadian actor Ivor Francis). The mortician shows the man some of the bodies lying in state in his establishment and tells the story of how each of them died.
He tells four stories. The first is about a teacher who hates children who goes home and is killed by -- gasp! -- children. The second story, the worst of the lot, is about a man who lures women to their deaths in his apartment. There seems to be little point to this story, unless they were trying to be funny and failed utterly. The third story concerns an American and a British police detective trying to outdo the other with the powers of there deductive reasoning. This sequence stars veteran actors Charles Aidman and Bernard Fox and is actually entertaining. There's some genuine wit in the script and Aidman and Fox are having a great time chewing the scenery. The fourth story concerns a man who has no time for the less fortunate people of the world, until he ends up being one himself.
Finally, our cheating convention goer has had enough and heads back out into the storm, only to be confronted by the husband of the woman he was cheating with. Looks like the mortician has another customer.
I can only imagine that the title, Alien Zone, is some sort of homage to Rod Serling, because there ain't no aliens in this movie. Clearly, this is in the flavour of a Twilight Zone, or Night Gallery, and as a basic idea, it doesn't work too bad. The mortician has an endless supply of corpses to tell stories about, each one is a little mortality play with a twist ending, and then there's the final twist in the framing story. However in execution, this movie doesn't cut it. The script is mostly awful (save for the two detectives' story), the acting worse (again, save for the detectives), the direction just as bad, and the film looks like it was made for about $14.95.
If you do watch it, turn it off after Aidman and Fox have done their bit. That's the only part worth watching.

Good Against Evil

This is a 1977 tv-pilot about a writer (played by Dack Rambo) who teams up with a priest (played by Dan O'Herlihy) to battle a devil worshiper (Richard Lynch) and his merry band of cronies.
Rambo's character meets and falls in love with a woman that unfortunately for him has been chosen by Lynch and his group to give birth to the Anti-Christ. It's all very 1970s, and clearly designed to cash in on the success of the movie The Exorcist; the climactic scene is in fact the exorcism of a young girl just as in the more popular (and better) film.
The only other notable feature of the film is that it's the first television appearance of Courtenay, BC's own Kim Catrall, now famous for playing Samantha Jones on Sex and the City.
And then there's the DVD cover which has nothing at all to do with the movie. Does that look like 1977 American tv to you?

Idaho Transfer

Scientists are working on a matter tranference system, but they discover that their system can be used not only to send people from place to place, but to the future. They discover that 56 years in the future, something calamity has destroyed mankind. So the project scientists have been sending research teams to the future to determine what happened, but also to make preparations for permanent habitation. Only young 20-somethings can make the trip; older adults die if they attempt to make the journey.
Karen (played by Kelley Bonahan) joins her sister Isa at the facility, which is run by their father. Karen is a troubled teen but joins Isa for a transfer to the future. Isa injures herself, and Karen, trying to save her sister, performs the transfer back incorrectly and Isa dies.
Karen is not dealing with her guilt very well, but she joins the expedtion to the future.
Something happens in the past, and the transfer system no longer work. The group decides to head out to Portland where other groups are planning to meet up, but Karen discovers something and disillusioned, she heads back to the transfer station. There, Karen is attacked by one of the group who has gone mad and also returned. Karen discovers that the transfer machine is working again and transfers herself to....well, that would be telling.
This is an intriguing little film directed by none other than Peter Fonda. Fonda's directing career lasted only three films; it probably didn't help his career that the distributor of this film went bankrupt just as the film was released. Shot against beautiful Idaho scenary, it must have looked great during the short time it played on a big screen. It's a slow and haunting movie that is aiming higher than it can reach, but it is worth a look.
The cast is mostly unknowns, but they do a good job. The only star of note is Keith Carradine, two years before he would star in and win an Oscar for best song in Nashville.

Shadow of Chinatown

This 1936 film is feasture-length version of a 15-part serial. It stars Bela Lugosi five years after his success in Dracula, and many years before he fell in with Ed Wood's gang.
A beautiful Eurasian girl and a mad scientist (that would be Lugosi) have been hired by a European import firm to destroy a group of Chinese merchants so they can take over their business. A scrappy newspaper reporter and her hunk boyfriend decide to investigate.
It's a bit of a light-hearted lark, and horribily over-acted in parts, but some of the action scenes are ingenious and well-done. Bela barely appears in the movie at all, probably a smart move.

Eternal Evil

Paul Sharpe, a tv commercial director, has been studying astral projection under the tutelage of a mysterious woman named Janus. At first, projecting his spirit out of his body brings him a sense peace and contentment. Unfortunately, while he sleeps his spirit has been taking unauthorized trips and killing people in a muderous rage, including his own family.
This is a 1985 Canadian film, also known as The Blue Man. Why, I don't know. It stars Winston Rekert as Sharpe, a familiar face on Canadian tv probably best known as the star of Neon Rider,and Karen Black as Janus. Eagle-eyed viewers should also be able to spot Lois Maxwell, the orignal Moneypenny from the Connery/Moore James Bond films.
The film plods along at its own pace and manages to overcome its inexpensive look and feel to deliver a couple of good scares.

Evil Brain From Outer Space

Let's get this out on the open right from the start: Evil Brain from Outer Space may just be the best movie title ever!
This 1964 film is edited together from three Japanese Starman short movies. The three original movies totalled 159 minutes in runtime, while this edited version clocks in at a quick 79 minutes. As so much is cut from each movie, the film veers wildly from underdeveloped plot point to underdeveloped plot point, from action scene to scene with lightning speed, in a rush of quick and cheesy action-packed Grade-Z mindless silly fun.
The brain of Balazar, an evil scientist from the planet Zemar, has been assassinated. Somehow his brain has been preserved and ends up in a suitcase on earth. His followers have followed the brain to earth. (They're followers. That's what they do, alright? They follow!) Only Starman, an alien superhero sent to earth to fight atomic evils in his disturbingly tight leotards, can save us!
Along the way to defeating the brain, Starman must defeat a monster who is also attacking earth (who also wears disturbingly tight leotards), and assorted groups of Balazar's followers (again with the leotatds).
This is all pretty corny and silly, but it is presented with enthusiasm. And the action scenes, as cheap as any you'll ever see, use imaginative camera tricks and angles to good effect.
Fire up the corn-popper and enjoy!

Death Warmed Up

This 1986 New Zealand thriller is a hokey horror-revenge movie. I've had two tries at watching this movie before I could watch the whole thing. That's dedication, let me tell you. A teen is hypnotized and ordered to kill his parents. After blowing them away with a shotgun (and taking out a lamp as well, just to be safe), he's locked in the looney bin with no memory of having done the awful deed.
He's released seven years later, and decides to take his revenge on the man who hypnotized him, but the man is now the head of a large pyschiatric institute and he seems to be creating his own army of mutant zombies. I guess. I don't know, it's hard to follow.
There's a car chase that looks straight out of The Road Warrior. There's lots of blood and heads blowing up. If you like that sort of thing, this is the sort of thing you'll like.

Doomsday Machine

Our film opens with an American spy breaking into the Chinese Embassy. With the help of another agent on the inside, she discovers that the Chinese have built a doomsday bomb. She reports to her superiors that the bomb will go off in just over two days.
We jump to the seven-man crew of the first US Venus probe preparing to launch for it's two year trip. For some reason, the launch has to be hurried, and three of the men are ordered to be replaced by three female officers.
Then comes the launch. The crew are strapped in into La-Z-Boy recliners wearing motorcycle helmets. No, really. Recliners and motorcycle helmets. Someone sacrificed their living room furniture for this movie. They use stock footage of an Apollo take-off, but the rocket in the movie is more along the lines of a classic Destination: Moon big-finned space-ship. Then suddenly it looks like a round space station. Then it becomes a different round space station. Then it's a different finned rocket!
Anyway, it turns out that the Pentagon decided to put the women on board to preserve the American species just in case the Chinese ending up destroying the world. And before you can say, "Whoops, apocalypse!" the earth is laid waste in a montage of clips from Japanese monster movies.
The astronauts realize that the future of the human race now depends on them, so naturally they pair off and start,er, arguing. They have to dodge meteors from the remains of the Earth. Interestingly, the meteors made from the bits of earth come from in front the ship, not behind it where the Earth actually is.
It turns out that they need to drop a bunch of weight from the ship in order for it to land on Venus safely. Some people will have to sacrificed. In a remarkable coincidence, the bitch female astronaut and the bastard male astronaut luckily get sucked out of an airlock.
As they come in to land, two of the astronauts go outside to repair the ship and are believed lost. But they find an old Soviet Venus probe and manage to make their way to it.
Now things get strange, because the ending of the film was never shot in 1967, and when filming resumed in 1972, none of the actors were available. Probably they didn't want to available. Anyway, the last scene of the movie is the two astronauts who board the derelict Soviet craft. They are filmed in spacesuits with opaque visors so that you can't see that they aren't the original actors, and their dubbed voices really don't resemble the original actors' either.
Anyway, they board the Soviet ship and are trying to get it going. They spend an inordinate amount of time bumbling around silently in the dark until a disembodied voice announces to them that the American ship has been destroyed. It turns that Venus is home a race of super-powerful intergalactic busybodies who speak in stilted English: "Last of Man, listen. Of this, we will tell you." They decide that instead of allowing the last two humans alive to land, they will propel the spacecraft on a journey beyond the rim of the universe. Whatever the hell that means.
This film originally began life when filming began in 1967 as Armageddon: 1975. For reasons lost to obscurity, the film was never finished and it was shelved. In 1972, someone got hold of the film and added additional scenes, namely the teaser scene at the beginning with the secret agent, and the ridiculous ending.
Look for Casey Kasam (America's Top Ten and the voice of Shaggy from Scooby-Doo) as a Mission Control Officer, and Mike Farrell (B.J. from tv's M*A*S*H) with one line of dialogue as a reporter.

End of the World

This 1977 film stars Christopher Lee as Father Pergado. The good Father witnesses a bizarre fatal accident, then discovers that an alien has taken his form and is going to destroy the world. Meanwhile, a scientist is detecting strange messages from space that seemed to predict a devastating earthquake that occurred in China. More messages from space arrive predicting more disasters, but the scientist also detects messages from earth in response. Turns out the message is coming from a convent run by Father Pergado. Or at least the alien that has taken him over.
Yes, the nuns are all aliens. Clearly the writer has issues with Catholicism.
This is just bad. This is a pay cheque movie -- let's cash our cheque and go home.
The professor's computer makes the sound of the Enterprise bridge from Star Trek. No, I swear! Someone got hold of a Star Trek sound effects record (this was 1977 after all) and made a loop out of it to run anytime someone fires up a computer. Also, a lot of other sound effects sound suspiciously like they came out of Star Wars. I kept hearing lightsabres for some reason.
No argument, this is awful. It's not even bad enough to be cheesy.

Embryo

In this 1976 film, Rock Hudson plays a veterinarian who strikes a dog while driving during a rainstorm. He takes the dog to his lab to try and save it, but the situation quickly becomes more complicated as he realizes that the dog is pregnant and is too badly injured to survive. He tries to save the puppy fetuses, but they all die save one. It will die too, unless he uses an experimental growth hormone he's been working on. He save the pup, but it grows at an accelerated rate.
He discovers that if he treats puppy with the drug, its growth rare is accelerated, but off the drug the dog ages at a normal rate. The dog also seems to be of above average intelligence, but unbeknowst to the doctor the dog also has an evil viscous streak. He decides to try the same experiment on a human embryo.
He gets hold of a living 14 week-old human fetus and using his growth hormone is able to bring it to term in a matter of days. Unlike the puppy, the baby continues to age even without the treatment and in a matter of weeks she grown into Barbara Carrera. Like the puppy however, she also also has a vicious streak.
This is a long, dragged out movie that takes a long time getting anywhere. Roddy McDowall has a brief cameo that livens things up, but otherwise it really drags. It also never really addresses the ethical questions it raises. It was made two years before the first "test tube baby" was born, the perfect time for a thoughtful examination of these issues, but it dodges those questions to concentrate instead on being a slowly-building thriller. It fails on that count, too.

The Day the Sky Exploded

Atomic rocket XZ is set for the first flight to the moon. Although it is an international effort, an American is chosen for the first flight. The launch goes well, but when he blasts out of orbit something goes wrong. He's forced to abort the mission. He returns safely when his capsule plunges back to earth; however, his atomic rocket carries on out of control on into space.
Sometime later, animals all over the planet begin to act strangely and they seek shelter. Soon scientists detect something coming towards earth. It turns out that the atomic rocket has exploded and sent an asteroid on a collision course with the earth. Vast evacuations have to take place as the asteroid will impact the earth in a matter of days.
It seems hopeless, but then a scientists figures that if the US and the Soviets fire all their nuclear missiles at the asteroid, it will be destroyed, thus saving the earth. Does the plan work? That would be telling.
This 1958 Italian film was originally known as La Morte viene dallo spazio. It was released on the US in 1961 where it was also known as Death Comes from Space and Death From Outer Space.

King Kong (1933)

It’s been years since I’ve seen the original King Kong, I gotta tell ya, this film rocks!
The new special edition DVD features the fully restored 1933 cut (not the 1938 "censored cut" which most casual viewers would be familiar with), and it looks gorgeous. It probably hasn’t looked or sounded this good since its original release.
And yes, the acting is a bit over the top, the dialogue a bit corny, and the special effects don’t hold a candle to what can be done today, but 70 years later, it still holds together remarkably well. The plot, as if you didn’t know, concerns a film-maker who’s heard rumors that some thing exists on a south sea island. He takes his camera crew and a young ingénue (Canada’s own Fay Wray) to the island and discovers the thing is Kong, a giant ape. He plans to use Wray’s character as bait to lure Kong into capture, and then showcase the ape in a traveling show and make millions. The plan goes wrong as Kong falls in love with the bait, and trying to find her, escapes in New York, causing mayhem and death.
The film is full of classic cinema images and moments. And being the 1933 version, many scenes of violence have been restored. Kong was vicious and brutal.
The special effects, for their time, are staggering. This was the Star Wars of 1933. No one had ever seen anything like this. The film-makers who trace their inspiration back to Willis O’Brien’s 18-ich tall Kong miniature are too numerous to mention, but some that are featured on the supplements are Peter Jackson, Ken Ralston, Bob Burns, Rick Baker, Ben Burtt, and Ray Harryhausen. And speaking of supplements, there’s an hour-long biography of Merion C. Cooper, who produced Kong, and a nearly three-hour documentary on the film itself. Considering that almost no behind the scenes material exists from the actual production itself and that hardly anyone involved is still alive, the documentary does a fine job showing how the film was made.
If you haven’t seen Kong in a while, and remember it as being hokey, well, yes, you’re right. But Kong still has the power to overcome all the pitfalls that a 70 year-old movie has for a 21st century audience. Yes, it’s cheesy, over-acted, hammy dialogue, with cheap sets, and crude special effects. It still works, and works brilliantly. Check it out. You owe it to yourself. And Kong.

The Alpha Incident

Sometimes you can't put it any other way: this is a really bad movie.
A Mars space probe has returned to Earth with a microorganism from the red planet. It is accidentally released and exposure to it has forced four strangers into quarantine while scientists try to find a cure for the alien virus.
It's basically four people stuck in a room, with occasional cut-aways to the scientists working on the problem, and the army enforcing the quarantine. Now when I say "scientists," I mean two guys in a small room with a microscope, and when I say "army," I mean one guy in a General's uniform who talks on the phone while he smokes a cigar.
This leads to one hysterical moment where the General orders over the phone that a quarantine needs to be set up to contain the spread of the virus. We cut to a shot of a couple of tanks driving across a field. We cut back to the general yelling into the phone: "Tanks? We don't need any tanks! It's only four people, goddammit!" And we never see the tanks again. That's brilliant filmmaking!
But really, this is just trash. And it's not even good trash, it's just trash. One of our four quarantinees is a woman who decides for no apparent reason to change into a negligee, and that stupid pseudo-sexy music plays as she changes. This is as low-brow as you can get.

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians

Despite the fact that this film is universally regarded as one of the worst ever made, I do have a soft spot for it. Apart from it being the height of Pia Zadora's film career, I remember that when I was a child one of the local tv stations would run this every Christmas. Even as a nine year-old kid, I could tell it was pure silly hooey, but it was certainly harmless hooey.
The plot, if that matters, is that Martian children who have been exposed to too much Earth tv have grown sullen and listless (not unlike Earth children exposed to too much Earth tv), and can't stop thinking about one person they have heard so much about: Santa Claus. So the Martian leader, Kimar, decides that Earth has had Santa long enough and decides to kidnap him! Consternation and general uproar! But Voldar disapproves of his leader's plan and opposes him at every opportunity. The Martians succeed in kidnapping Santa, but also kidnap two Earth children as well. But the spirit of Christmas grows in Kimar's heart and eventually he releases Santa, and eveyone is happy blah blah blah.
The real hero of the piece might just be the villain Voldar. He opposes the exposure of Martian culture to this mythical figure of Western consumerism, and let's face it, that's probably a wise point of view. One could view him as a cultural freedom fighter, but this film is not sophisticated enough for an in-depth examination of economic imperialism, and Voldar remains simply what society decrees him to be, a scenery-chewing bad guy.
Yes, this is an insanely cheaply made movie that is sloppily directed. Kids should love this, but for an adult, it's a long 86 minute to endure.

The Man With the Screaming Brain

B-movie king Bruce Campbell stars in (and co-wrote and directed) Man With the Screaming Brain. Campbell plays an American businessman who, along with his wife, is in Bulagria for a business meeting. He’s the typical "ugly American," loud, impatient and impolite. His marrige is on the rocks, and he doesn’t help matters by flirting with a mysterious gypsy woman. His wife helps even less by giving their cab driver an extra big tip. It turns out that the cab driver was engaged to the gypsy, resulting in all manner of murder and mayhem. Fortunately, the bodies end up in the hands of a mad Bulgarian scientist (Stacey Keach(?!)) who (with his Russian assistant played by Ted Raimi) has a knack for transplanting brains and resurrecting bodies.
Essentially, this is pretty silly stuff. It gives Bruce Campbell a chance to do his best Steve Martin impression, and his character ends up sharing his brain with his wife’s lover, the cab driver. Shot on location in Bulgaria, the film has pretty good production values for a film of with a limited budget.
There’s a good number of extras for a low budget movie. There’s some behind the scenes docs, but the best one is a short feature where Campbell and his writing partner chart the 20+ years it took to get this film made. This was worth the price of the DVD all by itself.
Nothing in the film is overly impressive, yet nothing is really embarrassing either. Well, maybe Ted Raimi’s version of Russian rapping. Thankfully, it’s short. Otherwise, it’s a solid and enjoyable, fun B-movie.

The Giants of Rome

My first question would be, How this film get into a box set of sf films? You could stretch the definition of sf to include a Hercules film because of the fantasy elements, but this is a straight-up Roman gladiator film.
Filmed in Italy in 1964, this flick (originally called I Giganti di Roma) is one of the less well-known of the genre -- it doesn't even have a Wikipedia page.
The forces of Rome set out to defeat the Druids but discover that the Druids have a powerful secret weapon. Cladius Marcellus (played by Richard Harrison) leads a squad of Roman soldiers behind enemy lines to find and destroy this weapon.
Where's Russell Crowe when you need him?
There's just not much to say about this film. If you like this sort of thing, it's the sort of thing you'll like.
What's really interesting is that someone feels that star Richard Harrison is worthy of his own Wikipedia page, quite a substantial one in fact. Although almost unknown in his native USA, he began starring in Italian action films in the 1960s and had a long career in B-movies and developed a large European cult following. He made spaghetti westerns, as well as more sword and sandal epics, although oddly enough this film isn't listed on his Wiki page.
He also turned down the part of the Man With No Name in A Fistful of Dollars, and once said, "In my opinion, it is a death wish for an actor to be in too many B or should I say C movies. Maybe my greatest contribution to cinema was not doing A Fistful of Dollars, and recommending Clint for the part."
In the 1970s, the era of the spaghetti western ended, and Harrison began starring in exploitation films like Dig Your Grave, Friend...Sabata's Coming; The Godfather's Friend; You Can Do a Lot With Seven Women and Voodoo Baby (aka Black Orgasm). He even played American President Andrew Johnson in a 1982 Iranian production Hajji Washington.
His career took him to the Philippines in the 1980s were he made where a few really low budget action flicks, then to Hong Kong where he made one film for filmmaker Gordon Ho. However, Ho used Harrison's scenes over and over again in dozens of Ninja films like Cobra Vs. Ninja, Golden Ninja Warrior, and Diamond Nínja Force. Harrison now runs an electronics company called Gladiator Electronics.
I also discovered that sword and sandal films are properly referred to as peplums, which is Latin for the kind of tunic favoured by the costume departments because they were easy to make. So now we've both learned something. You learned what a peplum is, and I learned that I would rather have my skin flayed off with dull glass shards dipped in acid and rolled in lemon juice than watch another one.

Cosnos:War of the Planets

This 1977 Italian film (originally called Anno zero - guerra nello spazio) reminds me a lot of Space: 1999 -- the sets, the themes, the special effects and especially the costumes all seem drawn from it. In fact, I'd swear the makers of this film went to the Space: 1999 yard sale when the series ended and picked up everything they could. It makes sense that Space: 1999 would be influential at this time -- it was the biggest thing in SF in 1977...at least until Star Wars came out in May and showed everyone how it was done.
An earth spaceship is ordered to investigate a strange planet. Although his ship has a near-sentient computer nicknamed Wiz, Captain Hamilton (played by John Richardson) has an intense distrust of computers. His ship is attacked as it approaches this rogue planet, but they manage to land safely. They investigate and meet the inhabitants: green men with pointed ears in loincloths. They are being subjugated by computers, so this is right up Hamilton's alley. He vows to help the aliens destroy the computers. He destroys the head computer, as in 2001 (another clear influence), which also results in the destruction of the planet. And there's a neat little twist at the end.
There's some interesting ideas in this film and if you can stand watching a cheap, derivative, wooden and obviously 1970s-style film, this might be worth searching out in a video store.

Alien Contamination

This 1980 film is known by a number of names, including Contamination: Alien on Earth and Toxic Spawn. The original version is called Contamination and runs about 10 minutes longer than this version and is significantly more bloody. And after having watched the "cut" version, that's saying something.
A cargo ship sails into New York Harbor. It seems abandoned, but upon investigation, the crew are discovered to have ripped apart by something. In the holds, the investigators find large large containers of coffee, but hidden inside the coffee are large green eggs that look like giant limes. When these eggs are touched, they explode, spraying a green liquid everywhere. The liquid is toxic to living creatures, and makes anyone who comes in contact with it explode.
Any relation to Alien is purely coincidental.
The eggs, it turns out, came from Mars. A recent Mars mission went wrong -- on return, one astronaut disappeared, and the other had a breakdown and became an alcoholic. The astronauts has entered a cave on Mars where they discovered hundreds of these eggs.
Any further relation to Alien is purely coincidental.
It's discovered that the eggs explode when they get warmer, so when a human touches one, its temperature goes up and it explodes. But when a warehouse full of them are discovered, they are destroyed by flamethrowers. Strangely, none of them explode. Go figure.
They follow their only clue, and go to the coffee plantation that the coffee came from. Turns out of friend the missing astronaut runs the plantation. Bet you didn't see that one coming, eh? Somehow the aliens have taken over his mind and he's shipping the eggs all over the world in coffee shipments.
This is a pretty dumb and derivative movie. The writer and director, Luigi Cozzi, wanted to do his version of Alien, and he surely did, and interestingly, he foreshadowed Aliens by having a sequence with what amounts to the queen alien. But really this is just slow-motion blood-letting. Yawn. Next.

Counterblast

In this 1948 film, an escaped Nazi POW named Dr. Bruckner, the Beast of Ravensbruck (played by Mervyn Johns), sets up a lab in England under the name of a scientist that he brutally murders, Dr. Forrester. The Nazi underground wants him to work on a plan to vaccinate the German people against the deadly germs that they plan to unleash on the Allies in the next war.
Bruckner plan is complicated by an inquisitive lab assistant, and further complicated by the later arrival of a beautiful young woman who was hired by the real doctor to assist in the lab. The complications become extreme when the two lab assistant fall in love.
Bruckner develops a deadly infection and an antidote, and he plans to inoculate the female assistant with the antidote, then infect her a few days later. But after his test proves successful, his orders are to kill her and destroy the evidence, but he has fallen in love with her, too. What's a love-struck killer Nazi to do?
The most interesting thing in the film is watching Mervyn Johns. We've all seen him in another movie, the classic 1951 Alastair Sim of version Scrooge. Johns played Scrooge's meek long-suffering assistant Bob Crachit. That film is so ingrained in my mind that watching Johns expertly play a cagey and sadistic killer is a real revalation and a treat. In one scene, Bruckner as Forrester is asked to report to the nearby POW camp because a Nazi prisoner has been injured in a fight. As he treats the prisoner, the injured man denounces Hitler and Nazism. Left alone with his patient, Bruckner without hesitation or remorse dispatches the man with an injection of drugs. The smile on his face as checks the dead man for a pulse is horrifying.

They Came From Beyond Space

I've never understood why many 1960s dramas use those kind of Austin Powers-ish faux-jazz scores. To me, it's hard to take any sort of dramatic or action scene seriously when you've got this light, bouncy, almost comedic underscore playing against and undercutting the tension. Did 1960s film composers think this was an alternative to "old cinema"? Or were they just stoned all the time?
Fortunately, the music in this 1967 British film does not usually cut the film off at the knees. On the other hand, it doesn't help matters, either.
This is basically a rehash of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Scientists are investigating a meteorite that landed in a British field. They are summarily taken over by an alien life force, except for an American scientist who is recovering from a bad traffic accident for which a steel plate was installed in his head. He convinces one of his pals to wear a colander on his head as protection against the aliens' influence. It's not quite as goofy as it sounds, but not far from. The aliens have a plan to fly humans to the moon to use as slave labour.
The film holds together reseanably well until our heroes sneak aboard a rocket ship and confront the Master of the Moon.
No, really. That's his name.
The Master of the Moon is played by Michael Gough (Alfred from Tim Burton's Batman films) in whiteface and a bright orange robe and leotards. It's here that the film starts getting a little silly.
There's nothing terribly bad about this movie, expect for Michael Gough's leotards, of course. It's all done quite competently, yet like so many of these movies I've been reviewing it never rises above medicore.
The American scientist is played by Robert Hutton, and I spent the whole movie trying to figure where I've seen him before. He retired in 1975 (and passed away in 1994) and the only credit I recognize from his imdb.com profile is the James Bond film You Only Live Twice (coincidentally also from 1967). Guess I'm going to have to dig out my Bond discs or I won't get any sleep tonight.
The special effects, which are cheap but effective, were supervised by Canadian Les Bowie who would be most know for working on Roger Corman films and Hammer horror films, but he also worked on such films as 2001, Star Wars and Superman.