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This perfect bound Serial Killer Calendar book includes detailed facts and trivia about serial killers for every day of the year. It also includes the best true crime artwork from around the world. Want to know what happened today in serial killer history? Its all in this one massive collection of true crime information. This is the perfect gift for any fan of history, murderabelia or the macabre.



 
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DINOSAURS CREATION EVOLUTION : CREATION SEMINAR BY DR KENT E HOVIND - SUBMITTED BY RYAN GELATIN

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KILLERS FROM SPACE

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REVIEW OF KILLERS FROM SPACE (1954)

From thatwasabitmental.com

Director: W. Lee Wilder

Starring: Peter Graves, James Seay, Steve Pendleton, Frank Gerstle

DOUG – Where do you come from?
DENEB TALA – From a planet yet unknown to you.
DOUG – You know my name. You speak English.
DENEB TALA – We speak every language.

If the title has you curious as to what this one’s about let me end your suspense – it’s about killers from space. And it’s shite.

A young Peter Graves (decades before his role as the white-haired Captain Oveur in Airplane!) plays Doctor Doug Martin, a scientist working for the US military.

After a spot of nuclear testing out in the desert, Doug is sent out in a plane to record data from the environment for research and testing purposes.

The latest Miley Cyrus video didn’t impress Steve too much

Sadly, Doug is about as skilled at flying as I am at giving birth and as such his plane plummets to the ground. Mysteriously though, his body is nowhere to be found.

Days later, to the astonishment of his colleagues, a dazed Doug stumbles back to the base. Seemingly fighting fit, the only cause of concern is a mysterious scar on Doug’s chest.

Curious as to why Doug has no memories of the crash or its aftermath, the military decides to keep Doug grounded for a while so they can observe him.

It’s pretty intense observation, to be fair

Pissed off that more nuclear tests are going on without him, an angry Doug breaks into the base’s safe, steals some top secret info and heads back into the desert with it, where he’s promptly caught and apprehended.

What’s going on? Killers from bastarding space, that’s what going on. Specifically, alien ones.

You see, it turns out that when Doug’s plane crashed his body was recovered by a group of aliens at a base of operations inside hidden caverns underneath the desert.

These are the aliens. Yes, seriously. Stop laughing, this is fucking serious

The aliens operated on Doug to save his life (hence the scar) but only because they needed something from him.

They plan to take over the world with giant mutant animals (of course), and they’ve been storing all the atomic energy created in the tests above ground in order to do so.

They also hypnotised Doug to make him their mole at the military base, hence the stealing of documents. But now Doug is free, no longer hypnotised, and having a bastard of a time trying to convince his colleagues that there are aliens with a load of atomic power living underground.

I do love a cheesy sci-fi flick but Killers From Space is just bad in every way. Scenes abruptly end mid-sentence, the performances are ropey (Graves aside) and the ending – in which Doug kills the off-screen aliens by cutting the nation’s power for ten seconds in an attempt to stop them containing the atomic power they’re storing – is one of the most underwhelming I’ve ever seen.

“Do you ever get the feeling someone’s watching you?”

The aliens themselves are also perhaps the worst example ever committed to celluloid. In fairness, this was before the days of the popular ‘grey’ design we all associate with aliens these days, so the filmmakers had nothing to go on.

That said, what they decide to go with is ridiculous: the aliens are simply normal people with large fake eyes which are clearly just ping-pong balls with dots painted on them as pupils.

Another cop-out is the scene in which Doug tries to escape the aliens’ caverns and comes face-to-face with their giant mutant animals. Well, I say face-to-face.

What really ensues is four mind-numbing minutes of Peter Graves wandering back and forth in half-arsed fear as blown-up footage of normal animals is played behind him. Four minutes has never felt so long.

“Oh Jesus Christ! It’s the biggest video wall I’ve ever seen! I’m DOOMED”

For all I know I’m being ignorant and Killers From Space was as thrilling as Saw back in the day, but these days it isn’t even funny enough to entertain as a cheesy film.

Three decades later, after starring in Airplane!, Peter Graves would become well-known for putting his arm over a young boy’s shoulder and asking him: “Joey, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?”.

I can’t help wondering if the original line had been “Joey, have you ever seen Killers From Space?” but it was decided that would be too offensive.


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THE SUPER MARIO BROS SUPER SHOW : PRINCESS I SHRUNK THE MARIO

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KRAA! THE SEA MONSTER

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REVIEW OF KRAA! THE SEA MONSTER (1998)

From stomptokyo.com

In the past we have heaped a fair amount of abuse on Albert Pyun, director of such films as Spitfire and Hong Kong '97. Before him, Charles Band, director and producer of Trancers was our whipping boy. Meet our new whipping boy, writer Benjamin Carr. Carr is apparently the new writer at Full Moon Studios, as nearly every new release we've seen from Full Moon has his name on it. The last film of Carr's we watched was Zarkorr! the Invader, which we panned in a big bad way.

In a newsgroup conversation with Mr. Carr, we made the mistake of calling Zarkorr "a tragedy." He took some umbrage at this. His exact words were, "No, no. Judge Dredd was a tragedy. Volcano was a tragedy. Daylight was a tragedy." While these statements are true, do they mean that Zarkorr is any less of a tragedy? Not really. It's just a different kind of tragedy. We once got really bored and watched Daylight for a second time because it was on cable. It's bad, but at least competent. In contrast, we never have and never will get bored enough that watching Zarkorr again will seem like a good idea.

Because we are gluttons for punishment, and also because we will watch anything with a giant monster in it, we decided that we should watch Kraa! The Sea Monster, the next in Full Moon's line of giant monster films. And there, right on the box, was Benjamin Carr's name.

Kraa opens with a title card, which informs us that we are looking at "Proyas - The Dark Planet." Alex Proyas, director of The Crow and Dark City, should probably sue. We are then introduced to the leader of Proyas, Lord Doom, master of all he surveys. Unfortunately, all he surveys is a smallish set that contains a throne, a pillar, a midget, and some mood lighting. Lord Doom is an undeniable homage to Dr. Doom from the Fantastic Four comic book. Homage. That's french for "steal."* As a matter of fact, Kraa! The Sea Monster's first line of dialogue ("Revenge is best served cold!") is an homage to either Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan or Paradise Lost, though slightly rephrased in such a way as to not quite make sense. (It should be, "Revenge is A DISH...") In any case, Doom sets forth to conquer Earth through the use of a giant monster, namely Kraa.

Who can possibly stand against this poorly costumed menace? Why, the Planet Patrol! All four of them. Led by Captain Ruric, these tireless defenders of the galaxy watch stuff happen on tv screens because their scenes were filmed separately from the rest of Kraa, presumably in an attempt to pad the movie to feature film length.

We arrive on the scene just in time to see a new recruit join the Planet Rangers, a young woman named Curtis. Curtis is a psychic, though the other three members of the Power Patrol don't believe in her powers. This leads to the most cliched exchange this situation can possibly engender. You've probably guessed which one we're talking about. Something happens, and the psychic asks "Where did that come from?" or something similar. And then someone present, usually the resident wise-ass, will say (say it with us...): "You're the psychic! You tell us where it came from!" That made us laugh the first 4000 times we heard it.

If it were up to us, we would give Colton Scott, who plays Captain Ruric, an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. It's not that he's any less wooden than the other actors. Hell, the four actors who make up the Planet Patrol make the kids on Saved By The Bell look like the Royal Shakspearean Theater by comparison. But we would give Colton Scott an Oscar because he delivers such lines as "Looks like Lord Doom is trying to heat things up again," and "Get ready to go to Earth. You've got a monster to fight," with a straight face. We know we couldn't possibly do the same, and we find his acheivment so noteworthy that he should be honored instead of hacks like Robin Williams and Jack Nicholson.

Just as we are getting used to the stomach-churningly bad acting of the Planet Patrol, the film shifts to footage of Kraa. Kraa is essentially a giant version of the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Actually, it looks like the version of the Creature that showed up in The Monster Squad, or the one that showed up in The Guyver. Kraa soon heads for New Jersey.

Why would he head for Jersey, other than for the obvious reason that Jersey could use a good destroying? And wouldn't destroying Jersey make the world a better place, and isn't Kraa supposed to be doing just the opposite? Wait, maybe Lord Doom's plan is subtler than we gave him credit for. Maybe he plans to have Kraa destroy New Jersey, and then the people of Earth will make him their leader out of pure gratitude!

We're getting way off topic here. The reason that Kraa heads towards Jersey is because that's where Mogyar landed. Mogyar is the only agent the Planet Patrol could find to fight Kraa. They send him to Earth, where he crashes into a diner. There he meets Bobby Machek and Alma James, played by the two cheapest actors the movie's producers could find. Mogyar is also hunted by an elite government unit that's sort of a combination of the Men in Black and the FBI agents from The X-Files, only without the equipment, intelligence, or fashion sense of either.

What is Mogyar? Well, he's a smallish alien crustacean with an Italian accent.

Ha ha! We got you! You actually thought someone would make a movie featuring a alien crustacean with an Italian accent. That would just be silly. That would never happen. (As Bobby puts it, "That would be absurd!")

No, Mogyar is actually a smallish alien mollusk with an Italian accent. We fooled you good, didn't we? Truth be told, Mogyar most resembles a slimy, overlarge head of lettuce, but mollusk is probably the closest we're going to come in the animal kingdom.

The reason for Mogyar's Italian accent should probably be explained. See, Mogyar was supposed to land in Italy where he was going to try to secure the help of some Italian scientists to build a super-weapon. Instead, he lands in Alma's diner by accident. (Keep this in mind, it becomes important later in this review.) So when Mogyar lands he only speaks Italian, and Bobby (R. L. McMurry) and Alma (Teal Marchande) give him a book so he can learn English. Apparently the title of the book was "Mario and Luigi Teach-a You To Be An Ethnic Stereotype," judging by the way Mogyar talks for the rest of the film.

Kraa wades ashore and begins to Stomp New Jersey. (Hey, that's a good name for a web site!) After a quick capture-and-escape sequence involving the aforementioned government agents, the two humans take their mostly-inanimate lettuce-head buddy to a nearby nuclear power plant to hastily construct a weapon capable of vaporizing Kraa. The government agents catch up with them once again, and an excruciatingly formulaic game of "will they fire the weapon or won't they" ensues. Kraa is eventually blown away, Lord Doom is taken down by the Mighty Morphin Planet Patrol, and once again, all is well with the Universe. The End.

One thing we complained about in our review of Zarkorr! The Invader was that the special effects footage was not well integated with the rest of the movie. How does Kraa fare in this regard? Not much better. Between the scene where Kraa first appears and his eventual destruction, Kraa pretty much wanders about, destroying stuff with no obvious purpose. There are no landmarks destroyed, unless you count the destruction of a large mural that reads "Godzilla." And that scene made us think of Laserblast, if that gives you any idea of the kind film we would lump Kraa in with.

There is one scene towards the begininng of Kraa's rampage which almost suggests that Kraa was supposed to be a misunderstood monster. Kraa is walking along a highway when he comes across a service station with a large advertising mascot. (We think it was "Tire King," but we could be wrong.) Kraa grabs the mascot, almost playfully. Then a tanker truck drives down the road and collides, for no discernable reason, with the service station, blowing it up. It would hardly be fair to blame Kraa for that!

Even later in the film, we are informed that the Planet Patrol has sent Mogyar's "mothership" on a collision course with Kraa in order to buy Mogyar more time. We are then shown cheap CGI footage of a pyramidal space ship streaking towards Earth, then bouncing off a satellite and flying off to the west. While this is supposed to be Mogyar's mothership, we are pretty darned sure that this footage was orginally supposed to be of Mogyar himself landing. The ship looks just like the one Mogyar lands in, its the same size as Mogyar's ship, and the "bouncing off a satellite" bit would explain why Mogyar landed in Jersey instead of Italy.

Special effects aside, this material could have been entertaining, but the whole movie is just so inept. The Planet Patrol sequences are so hilariously separate from the Earthbound action that after a while they begin to take on the quality of a Greek chorus. None of the dialogue in the film consists of anything but the most overused cliches, with half-jokes thrown in every 20 minutes or so, until we get the ending joke ripped off from every episode of I Dream of Jeannie.

What does Benjamin Carr think of what he hath wrought? To quote the man himself: "As for Kraa, who can say? It, too, has gone through changes. It's not unusual for a movie to end up being something very different from what it was to start with."

We assume that what Mr. Carr means is that Kraa! The Sea Monster started out as a good movie.


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NIGHTMARE CITY AND ALIEN TERROR

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MY PET MONSTER : A LIVE ACTION VIDEOCASSETTE

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REVIEW OF MY PET MONSTER (1986)

From cinema-crazed.com

In the eighties if it was popular it had to have a tie in to something that involved merchandise. It didn’t matter what it was, whether it was Rubiks Cubes, Mad Balls, or even the Garbage Pail Kids, companies were always thinking about new ways to squeeze as much money out of their products as possible. In the eighties, My Pet Monster was a very popular kids toy that was simple in premise. It was a cute horned monster with plastic cuffs that kept its claws secure. The monster was gross enough for kids that loved monsters, but cute enough to warrant being a bed time toy. So naturally Hi Tops gave us an animated series for “My Pet Monster” and a much derided straight to video movie that reeks of a cash grab.

It’s not so much we get a movie about “My Pet Monster” it’s that the producers and writers behind the movie didn’t seem to have a good idea on how to turn the toy in to a good movie. I would have much preferred an “E.T.” meets “Gremlins” fantasy movie about kids that befriend a friendly but raucous monster. Here instead, we’re given a hokey tale of a young kid named Max who is cursed with becoming a purple monster thanks to an ancient statue during a field trip. Once the museum owner finds out Max can transform in to a monster, he hopes to catch him and study him, but Max and his friend Melanie try to conceal his identity while keeping his monstrous habits under control.

At only an hour, “My Pet Monster” wastes no time getting the plot in motion and is filmed very much like a TV pilot. It’s never made clear what kind of powers Max has, but he does become a monster when he’s very hungry. We also never find out why no one else was turned, or why he was chosen to become a monster. Either way its best not to put too much brain work in to the premise. It’s also best not to put too much thought in a movie with a sub-plot about a poodle, and with a monster whose mechanical suit barely seems to work if at all. “My Pet Monster” is another absolutely awful cash in on an eighties fad, and one whose value is centered on nostalgia and nostalgia alone.


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HE LIVES : THE SEARCH FOR THE EVIL ONE

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MONDO FLASH

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EXPLORERS

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GALAXINA

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REVIEW OF GALAXINA (1980)

From reflectionsonfilmandtelevision.blogspot.com

Hollywood has often been dubbed "The Land of Broken Dreams," and considering the tragic fallen star of the space adventure/comedy, Galaxina, one begins to truly comprehend that tag. 

Heading into the 1980s, lovely Galaxina star Dorothy Stratten was Playboy's Playmate of the Year, and a celebrated guest-star on Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1979 - 1981) in the episode "Cruise Ship to the Stars."  

Most importantly, the performer was successfully making the difficult leap to "A"-list film projects, a transition that would ultimately be appreciated by movie critics such as Vincent Canby.  He noted of Stratten in Peter Bogdonavich's They All Laughed (1981) that she "possessed a charming screen presence and might possibly have become a first-rate comedienne with time and work."

Alas, you may recall the unhappy ending of this story. 

Dorothy Stratten was murdered in 1980 by her estranged husband, Paul Snider. Almost instantly, Stratten became a household name all right, but as the "true crime" victim  in productions such as the TV-movie Death of a Centerfold (1981) starring Jamie Lee Curtis, and Bob Fosse's Star 80 (1983) starring Mariel Hemingway. 

Watching Galaxina even today -- thirty years later -- you can't help but mourn Stratten.  Galaxina is a low-budget, science fiction romp -- low-browraunchy and scattershot -- and yet Stratten's presence is the glue that holds the chaotic thing together.  She is on-screen rarely in the first half of the film, barely speaks throughout the second half, and -- as a "robot" -- is not even really called on to emote much.

Yet, Stratten possessed that special something that can make or break a movie star.  Even playing an emotionless machine in a bad, low-budget movie, Stratten had that sparkle in her eye, and could readily hold the attention of the viewer. 

As for the movie itself, I wish very much I could make some positive comment here, but truth be told,  Galaxina is a pretty unfunny, uninspiring, witless affair.  

In fact, Galaxina makes me think I was probably too rough on Spacehunter (1983) a few weeks back.  By point of comparison, that 1983 film is a masterpiece in forging atmosphere and crafting imaginary worlds.  There, at least, there was evidence of some authentic thought and consistency about the movie's larger universe. 

No such luck here.

What little of interest exists in Galaxina mostly involves Stratten's performance, and her nice chemistry with co-star Stephen Macht.   Even as an adolescent genre sex fantasy in the vein of Barbarella (1968)or Starcrash (1978), Galaxina remains a crushing failure...a bore. 

As The New York Times opined "some of the ads for ''Galaxina'' suggest that it is sexy; it is not." 

That's a blunt but accurate assessment of the film.  I rarely write so negatively about a film -- especially one with a cult following -- but this is a really, really weak movie. 
Galaxina commences with a Star-Wars-styled title-crawl that announces that by the year 3008, space travel has become routine.  As a consequence of "increased traffic," the United Intergalactic Federation is formed, along with a police force.  Aboard Police Cruiser 308, "The Infinity," is a robot servant with a very special nature.  Galaxina (Stratten) is a humanoid machine with "feelings."

The Infinity is commanded by cranky, arrogant Captain Cornelius Butt (Avery Schreiber) and manned by Lt. Thor (Macht), who believes he has fallen in love with the mute Galaxina.  But when Thor tries to kiss the object of his adoration, she sparks and short circuits, and he receives painful electrical shocks.

After the pursuit of Darth Vader-styled alien in a mask named Ordric (voiced by Percy Rodrigues), the Infinity is ordered by authorities to Alta One to recover a mystical artifact called "The Blue Star."  The only problem is that the trip will take twenty-seven years, and the crew will have to be ensconced in cryo-chambers for the duration.

During the long journey, Galaxina makes good use of her time alone.  She watches transmissions from Earth and learns to speak and act as a human female so she can be with Thor upon his awaking.  She also  adjusts her body temperature so she will feel warm to the touch.  As far as sex is concerned, Galaxina informs Thor that, well, she can requisition all the appropriate parts...

Once at Alta One, Galaxina is sent on a dangerous mission to retrieve the Blue Star, and is captured by strange humans who worship a motorcycle deity named "Harley Davidson."  Galaxina is rescued by Thor, but Ordric returns and takes over the ship...
Galaxina isn't exactly "tension to the fourth dimension" as the trailers promised. There's an unwritten rule in Hollywood that comedies should rarely -- if ever -- be over ninety minutes long, and Galaxina feels like a virtual eternity at ninety-five minutes.  In fact, the film feels dull and overlong.  . 

Another secret to crafting a good comedy is to squeeze the laughs together; to cut out all the stuff between that doesn't work, so that the solid laughs just barrel on, one after the other. 

Again, that's not what happens here.  There's a lot of dead air, another factor which contributes to the film's lack of vitality.

Galaxina's sense of humor arises from two arenas, primarily.  The first arena is the Mad Magazine-style "parody" of genre movie classics.  Specifically, the tenor-voiced Ordric and the title scrawl (and flashing laser beams) originate from the then-current Lucas blockbuster, Star Wars (1977). 

Secondly, an entire subplot about an alien prisoner called a "Rock Eater" (Herb Kaplowitz) recalls the "it's time to feed the alien" interlude with Pinback (Dan O'Bannon) from John Carpenter's far superior space comedy, Dark Star (1975).

There's also an unfunny but early riff on Ridley Scott's Alien (1979) in Galaxina.  Here Captain Butt eats an alien egg during a meal (on a dare, no less), and it eventually returns as a diminutive alien creature that seems to imprint on him as Mommy.  If you've seen Spaceballs (1987), you've seen the chest-burster gag done better.  In fact, even Stewart Raffill's The Ice Pirates (1984) -- with its messy "space herpes"--  is also a superior variation on the same joke.

Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek (1966-1969) gets a lengthy jab here too, via the presence of a puppy-eared, emotionless bartender named Mr. Spot on Alta One.   He even wears the famous blue uniform, albeit with a crooked insignia. 

The best, and perhaps most subtle gag in the film involves the weirdo alien culture on Alta One that worships Harley Davidson, a fun twist on the Alpha/Omega Bomb-worshipping mutants of the post-apocalyptic Beneath The Planet of the Apes (1969).

Outside the genre, the general tenor of the film is sort of akin to Animal House's (1978)  raunchiness and low-brow humor.  One scene set at a cosmic whorehouse called "Kitty's" combines that brand of humor with the aliens from the famous Star Wars cantina.  It's actually one of the movie's better scenes, despite the rubbery make-up and bad one-liners.

The second arena of comedy which Galaxina exploits involves non-sequitur and ostensibly funny character names.  Captain "Butt," for instance.  Another unfunny gag -- repeated until you want to pull your hair out -- involves a heavenly choir launching into celestial hymn whenever a character in the drama speaks the name of "The Blue Star."  The dramatis personae actually hear the heavenly chorus in all its angelic glory, and look around, baffled, for the source of it.


The best touches in Galaxina tend to be throwaway, minuscule ones.  For instance, there's one very interesting outer space composition in which an ancient 20th century space shuttle is seen, catastrophically damaged.  It tumbles across the movie frame, nose-over-engine, but is left unremarked upon by the narrative and unnoticed by the futuristic characters.  The shot is visually well-accomplished, but more importantly it nicely suggests that the universe of the movie has a real, detailed, even mysterious history.  

Later in the film, there are also some well-staged shots on the dangerous world of Alta, the "Western"-styled planet of alien human-eaters.  Director William Sachs lights all of these scenes with a color filter, in a lush, overripe, almost golden-red hue.  In this unnatural alien light, Galaxina appears quite beautiful -- but different -- her blond hair now a deep, attractive auburn.  That very look, incidentally -- a red wig on a gorgeous, porcelain-complexioned female -- was later popularized in early 21st century production such as J.J. Abrams' Alias. (2002 - 2005).

I can't really slam Galaxina on its low budget, but still,  it is pretty difficult to enjoy the movie when you are constantly noticing, for instance, the Adam West/Burt Ward Batmobile parked outside a saloon on Alta.   That kind of touch just takes one out of the action, out of the movie's reality.  And even a space comedy requires some sense of basic reality and believability.
The greatest disappointment with Galaxina must surely be the film's poor treatment of the titular character.  This android is beautiful and fit, but never really comes across as an independent, self-directed, individual entity.  Galaxina demonstrates the capacity to self-actuate and grow, in her decision to alter her body temperature and learn to speak (from TV commercials...) but the reason behind this decision is that she has fallen in love, conveniently, with Thor...the only guy around who is not a complete and total idiot

Love is a powerful motivating force, of course -- even to robots, apparently -- but movie-goers drawn to Galaxina want to know more about her; about her extraordinary nature.  Why has this particular model proven susceptible to human feelings?  The movie never tells us.  It never even hints at a reason.

It doesn't help, either, that Galaxina hardly appears at all in the first half of the film, except seated immobile in a control chair during cutaways; no more than, essentially, a very pretty mannequin.  Or that, when she does get into the action, late in the film, she almost immediately requires rescuing by macho Thor.  That sort of traditional damsel-in-distress role hardly seems appropriate for an adventure of the year 3008, and it doesn't do anything to make Galaxina fit the mold of great genre sex icons like the aforementioned Stella Star or Barbarella. 

Hell, I would have taken Bo Derek's Jane in John Derek's Tarzan of the Apes (1981). 

Basically, you just wish this movie would mythologize, build-up and idolize the Galaxina character. As an action hero. As a space hero.   As a gorgeous robot of extraordinary capability.  Anything.  And the movie steadfastly refuses to do the job.  Again, the approach is scatter shot and inconsistent.

Today, I suppose that this movie is of interest because it features a tragic star-in-the-making and some good 1980-era outer space effects.  If you saw it back in 1980, perhaps you have a nostalgic attachment to boot.  But there's not even one well-told joke in this mix.   As the ads promised back in the day, Galaxina is indeed "too good to be true..." 

 

 

 

 


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APRIL 7 VHS MOVIE REVIEW : KILLERS FROM SPACE (1954)
From horrornews.net

SYNOPSIS:
“Atomic scientist Doug Martin is missing after his plane crashes on an reconnaissance mission after a nuclear test. Miraculously appearing unhurt at the base later, he is given sodium amethol, but authorities are skeptical of his story that he was captured by aliens determined to conquer the Earth with giant monsters and insects. Martin vows to use existing technology to destroy them.” (courtesy IMDB)

REVIEW:
Though hardly a household name these days, Billy Wilder is still a respected filmmaker, and with weighty dramas like Stalag Seventeen (1953), major romantic comedies like I’m A La Douche…I mean, Irma La Douce (1963), and even a couple of Marilyn Monroe vehicles under his belt, Wilder’s reputation as a writer/director will no doubt remain secure for generations to come.

With an outstanding resumé like that, the news that this week’s film is one of his brother’s will certainly be a disappointment. W. Lee Wilder was living proof that talent genes are not evenly distributed among Hollywood siblings. While Billy was directing Bogart and Hepburn in Sabrina (1954), brother Lee was wandering around in Bronson Canyon shooting the obscure science fiction thriller Killers From Space (1954), with a typically lethargic script by his son and frequent collaborator, Myles Wilder.

Killers From Space is a film which, in other hands, might have turned out exceedingly well. Myles Wilder’s screenplay makes a good-faith effort to transform a fairly standard fifties alien paranoia plot into a deadly serious espionage thriller, taking the subtext of movies like The Thing (1951) or Invaders From Mars (1953) and bringing it right out into the open – like a rabbit in a mine field.

Killers From Space may well be the first alien abduction movie. UFOs were on people’s minds in 1954, and yet abductions were not the UFO headlines of the time. They were contactees like George Adamski, who met a peaceful long-haired blonde male alien from Venus out in the desert in 1952. His claim made the headlines less than two years after the movie The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951). Killers From Space wants very badly to be a Martian Manchurian Candidate (1962), and with somebody like Jack Arnold in the director’s chair, there’s a good chance that that’s exactly what it would have been.

But instead, Killers From Space got stuck with W. Lee Wilder’s virtuoso tedium and half-assedness. Scarcely a moment goes by that doesn’t reveal some extraordinary creative misjudgment. Take the aliens, for example. Most contemporary filmmakers with no money were content to dress their spacemen up in peculiar costumes and let the audience assume that a planet with a similar environment to Earth’s would produce similar organisms. Wilder, however, wanted his aliens to look alien, but unfortunately all they could afford were ping-pong balls cut in half and painted to create the bulging eyes of the Astronites. An ineffectual effect, but notable for being one of the earliest uses of ping-pong balls in science fiction.

Speaking of special effects, check out the high-tech plasma screens the aliens use for surveillance and video-conferencing with their leader, as well as playing mpegs of the other planets they’ve visited. Very modern, except the controls seem to be some kind of telephone switchboard, and there’s a hideously dangerous and utterly pointless Jacobs Ladder attached, probably because it looks really important.

It would be terribly amiss of me if I didn’t mention our star, Peter Graves. His brother, James Arness, played the flaming carrot known as The Thing in the 1951 science fiction classic, and the government agent looking for Them! (1954) – but is most famous for playing Marshal Matt Dillon for about five million years in Gunsmoke. But Peter Graves, after a successful career of minor roles in major films like Stalag Seventeen, and major roles in minor films like tonight’s offering, was recruited by Desilu Studios in 1967 to replace Steven Hill as the lead actor on Mission: Impossible. Peter played Jim Phelps, the sometimes gruff leader of the Impossible Missions Force, for the remaining six seasons of the series. He was the last man to boss around Martin Landau, who was subsequently promoted to Commander and wisely shot into deep space.

After the series ended in 1973, Peter played a supporting role in the Australian film Sidecar Racers (1975) and promptly fell in love with the country. To prove his love, Peter even made a guest appearance in the teen soap opera Class Of ’74, playing himself. Couldn’t he drink poison or cut off his ear, like normal people? Mission: Impossible was revived in 1988 for two seasons, this time filmed in Australia with Graves the only returning cast member from the original series. He was reportedly offered the role again in the 1996 film remake, but refused to play Phelps as a murderous traitor. Jon Voight had no such qualms. More recently Peter can be spotted sending himself up in films like House On Haunted Hill (1999) and Men In Black II (2002). But better remembered are Peter’s previous genre efforts including Death Flight (1977), It Conquered The World (1956), The Beginning Of The End (1957), Parts: The Clonus Horror (1979) and of course tonight’s presentation, Killers From Space. We may consider it camp today, but in 1954 it filled the theatres with screaming little kids on Saturday afternoons. In fact, you can enhance your home-theatre-viewing pleasure by borrowing some children from a nearby neighbour, and making them scream by forcing them to watch Killers From Space!

Let me get this straight. Simply turning off the electricity for ten seconds starts a nuclear reaction that destroys the Killers From Space and their giant monsters? So, intergalactic travel? Yes. Batteries? No. Their superior technology is no match for our flakey power grids. How does he do it? Somehow director Lee Wilder finds a way to make a chase scene in the bowels of a power plant boring, and give a hostage situation all the tension of waiting for a bus. I hope you don’t find it too tedious, though. I wouldn’t want you to use that as an excuse for not returning next week. I’d miss you too much. So I’ll see you seven days from now, when I attempt to answer the eternal question “How Low Was My Budget?” for Horror News. Toodles!


APRIL 7 VHS MOVIE REVIEW : UP FROM THE DEPTHS (1979)

It's pretty hard to imagine that this pitiful excuse of a monster film actually got a theatrical release back in the day, but what's even harder to imagine is how poorly it turned out considering the talent in front of and behind the camera. An underwater tremor unleashes a bloodthirsty creature that threatens the lives of a small Hawaiian island (actually filmed in the Philippines). When shark heads and other body parts of sea creatures wash ashore on the beach of a once-popular seaside luxury resort owned by Mr. Forbes (Kedric Wolfe), he blames it on the nephew/uncle team of Greg (the late Sam Bottoms; HUNTER'S BLOOD - 1987) and Earl (Virgil Frye; BOBBIE JO AND THE OUTLAW - 1976), who run a charter boat operation that cons the paying customers of Forbes' resort into going on phony underwater treasure hunts. When Forbes' pretty assistant, Rachel (Susanne Reed), witnesses the creature killing one of her friends and can't get Mr. Forbes to believe her, she joins forces with Greg (who witnesses the creature killing one of his rubes [played by Filipino staple Ken Metcalfe]) and ocean biologist Dr. Whiting (Charles Howerton) to find a way to stop the monster from killing more innocent people. Mr. Forbes tries his damnedest to keep word of the deaths from reaching the ears of his customers or the press, but that becomes next to impossible when human body parts begin washing ashore. When the creature attacks and kills several more of the resort's tourists, Mr. Forbes offers $1000 and a week's stay in the Presidential Suite to any tourist who bags the creature. Of course, all the tourists automatically disregard the bloody attack the night before and greedily take to the ocean en masse to kill the monster. When the tourists (Many of them too drunk or too stupid beyond believability) prove not up to the task, Greg uses the now-dead Dr. Whiting's body as chum (!) to entice the monster before blowing it up with explosives. Too bad that the viewer couldn't get as swift a death as the creature, because we'll have to keep the images of this film in our brains for the rest of our lives. This horror film, directed by Charles B. Griffith (screenwriter of the cult classic LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS [1960] and director of such films as EAT MY DUST [1976] and DR. HECKYL AND MR. HYPE [1980]), is so bad, it almost reaches a new plateau of awfulness. It's a movie that is so shitty, I felt I had to wipe my ass after watching it. Nearly every technical credit is sub-par, including editing that looks to have been performed by someone going through detox, post-synch dubbing that sounds like it was recorded in a closet, and a monster that looks so ridiculous, I can't imagine how anyone in the cast kept a straight face when looking at it (imagine a shark with a couple of extra dorsal fins glued-on to it's body, done with the technical ability of an Ed Wood flick). Maybe it's because the cast realized when they got on set what a crap sandwich they signed themselves onto, as everyone looks and acts like they just got back from a loved one's funeral. The screenplay, by Alfred M. Sweeney (credited to Anne Dyer on posters and ad mats), is just a jumbled mess of horror clichés with no connective tissue, as sequences jump from one scene to the next without making any sense. People in this film do the most idiotic things imaginable and I let out an audible groan when all the tourists took to the ocean to kill the creature for a measly thousand bucks and a free week's stay at the resort (even the tourists that were injured the night before!). It's this type of contempt for the audience that makes this film a contender for the worst JAWS rip-off of all time (and, yes, I'm taking DEVIL FISH [1984] into consideration). Producer Cirio H. Santiago must of thought so, too, because he tried to redeem himself by directing a remake, DEMON OF PARADISE in 1987, but you know that old saying, "You can't polish a turd" had to come into effect, making DEMON one of the worst films in the late Santiago's long list of directorial efforts. UP FROM THE DEPTHS is an inane and slow-moving 85-minute piece of crap, which deserves all the bad vibes you can muster. Really, it's that bad. Also starring Denise Hayes, Chuck Doherty, Helen McNeely and Randy Taylor. Originally released theatrically by Roger Corman's New World Pictures and then on VHS by Vestron Video. Not available on DVD. Thank your lucky stars. Rated R for one scene of topless nudity. The blood and gore are practically non-existent (the bloodiest it gets is the sight of a torn-off arm on the ocean floor). { text from critcononline.com }

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