Mst3k – 306: Time of the Apes

This one took me a long time to get through. It’s not a bad episode, but just a combination of other commitments and laziness meant that this was a very disjointed reviewing experience.

                Of course, the movie is pretty disjointed too. Basically, here’s what happened: It was a Japanese TV show. Then it was edited down into two or three movies. Then it was further edited down into the monstrosity we are reviewing today. There is zero continuity, characters and plot points emerge without warning and vanish just as soon, leaving nothing but ripples of confusion in their wake. At any point in the film the characters could suddenly be anywhere, doing anything and their relationships and attitudes can change without warning.

                The plot we have left involves two children and their babysitter/teacher who go on a field trip to a science facility. There an earthquake hits, stranding them in freezing capsules which somehow transport them to a future ruled by apes…or an alternate dimension, or something! In any case, it’s “Planet of the Apes” as a Japanese TV show, edited down from perhaps thirty episodes to less than ninety minutes. The kids and lady meet up with Godo, a human resistance fighter or something, who has a feud with Gebar (really unfortunate name there), one of the ape officers who blames Godo for killing his wife and kids. Then the humans join up with ape child Pepe (whose gender is a mystery until the very end), there’s a semi-good ape commander, a flying saucer, a lot of escapes, and then it ends with the kids and lady back in the present and Godo trapped forever in an endless wasteland. Good times!

                After the discontinuity, the worst thing about this movie is the ape costumes. See, the masks don’t move. At all. The apes can’t even open their mouths. This isn’t just the Planet of the Apes; it’s the Planet of the Ventriloquist Apes! 

                The riffing is pretty strong here, with numerous ‘monkey’ jokes, observations on the bad dubbing, and comments on the lack of continuity. The guys always love ape jokes, and here they come thick and fast as a troop of monkeys flinging…well, they come often and are generally pretty funny.

                The host segments are pretty great too, with a darkly hilarious ‘Why doesn’t Johnny Care?’ a surreal ‘scopes monkey trial’ sketch, and an amusing turn by Crow delivering the ‘Ape Fashion Show.’ So, all in all, a solid episode, though the movie is a chore to get through.

Opening: Baseball season on the SOL! Joel puts one out the window and causes explosive decompression.

Invention: Gypsy patches up the hole. This might be the first time she chews them out in the motherly fashion she’ll later develop. Joel’s invention is the cellulite phone which reminds people to stay on their diets (it inflates when you order the wrong food). Frank has developed a miracle growth baby formula. It works…a little too well. Both are pretty amusing.

Another Sandy Frank film.

The credits play over still images of apes and monkeys.

And we open at breakfast in Japan where little Johnny is chowing down in preparation to going to visit a science lab.

(as Johnny)

Joel: “Off to meet my doom mom, see you after school.”

Johnny is joined by a little girl and a woman named Katherine who is their guide.

They talk about cold-sleep: cryogenic freezing.

Johnny’s shorts are very short indeed. Don’t the Japanese know how creepy that is?

Scientist expresses concern over an earthquake warning, but notes casually that “nothing will happen suddenly.” What, do earthquakes build up visibly before they strike?

And the scientist shows them the freezing process on one of the monkeys.

Crow (on the frozen monkey): “Kitty! It’s Snowball!”

Servo: “Rug-doctor: Steaming mad at monkeys!”

And they see a room with capsules for human freezing.

Johnny: “It’s just like they’re really dead. But they’re not!”

Joel: “But their souls are.”

Johnny goes into one of the capsules.

Katherine: “Now get out. Or I’ll get very angry.”

(earthquake strikes)

Crow: “See?”

Well, so much for the ‘won’t happen suddenly’ theory.

And the lab is destroyed while Katherine and the kids hide in the capsules, and are frozen when a rock hits the plot-contrivance switch.

Apparently the whole freezing process is controlled by a single lever.

Then they wake up on beds in the lab (now intact)

Joel (on the capsules): “It’s the Daleks!”

Servo: “EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!”

(they do indeed look a little like Daleks.”

They open a door (several times) to find a lecture hall full of apes!

Servo: “It’s a whole planet of Ron Perlmans!”

And the apes capture them and tie them to a tree

Katherine (to the girl, Caroline): “Don’t be afraid, we’re with you.”

Crow: “We’re doomed, but with you.”

And the apes start feeling their hair (yes, it’s kind of random).

Caroline: “What are they going to do to us?”

Servo: “I hope they lower your voice.”

Johnny: “I don’t want to be killed by a monkey!”

Crow: “I want to die by my own hand!”

Crow (on the advancing ape commander): “Come on, girls! We’re gonna give ‘em a makeover they won’t believe!”

And now they carry them off to a slag heap to, apparently, kill them (it’s kind of unclear).

They escape by…well, just running, since the apes are really bad shots.

The apes finally speak…to say “don’t let them get away.”

Joel: “Good plan.”

So they run through a forest…

Reach a bridge…

They cross hand-over-hand under the bridge.

Joel randomly comments that “It’s good to have thumbs,” much to the bots’ confusion.

By the way, do guards really check up on every small splash when patrolling a bridge?

Katherine: “Come on, this way.”

Crow: “Oh, like you know where you’re going!”

They come to a house and sneak inside since they don’t see anyone.

Crow: “Hey, let’s hide in the refrigerator and freeze ourselves back.

The owner comes in and runs off screaming, then a child ape shows up and welcomes them.

First Host Segment: ‘Why doesn’t Johnny Care’? Servo narrates, Crow provides the projector noises. It’s very amusing and kind of bizarre. Ends with the classic line “A mind like Johnny’s is a terrible thing to unleash.”

Ape kid helps them escape (we later learn her name is Pepe).

Ape mob (there’s an ape mob chasing them for some reason) stops at the boundary to some forest which the apes are scared to enter.

We meet two ape villains we have not seen before then cut back to the humans.

By the way, the ape masks are immobile: their lips don’t move at all when they speak. This lends a rather surreal quality to the movie.

The humans cross a barbed-wire fence and Johnny narrowly survives a trap.

Crow: “Betcha care now, don’t you?”

The girl (Caroline) panics and gets caught in a net.

Crow: “Hey, I got a great, kooky idea: let’s pretend she’s a piñata…”

Guy with a gun shows up.

Servo: “Stephen Segal in ‘Shoot the monkey.’”

They all are pretty happy to find another human and immediately assume he’s on their side.

Katherine: “We came here in a very strange way…”

Joel: “By refrigerator.”

After a brief cut to the apes, the guy (Godot) leads them to his cave.

Johnny: “Is this where you live?”

Crow: “No this is my summer home, what d’you think?”

Katherine: “Do you live here with your parents?”

Joel: “No they’re dead, DEAD, DEAD!”

Servo: “That Johnny is a walking faux-pas.”

Katherine deduces that, since Godot is here, there must be other humans.

Godot (to Katherine): “Those clothes are very torn.”

Servo: “They’re going to have to come off.”

The apes are passing the barbed wire, reluctantly.

And Pepe returns (randomly).

And Pepe arrives in the cave to warn Godot and friends.

The apes are burning the mountain.

Ape leader (waving a gun): “Kill him! Kill him!”

Crow: “Hey, you could kill him with that gun!”

Johnny: “Godot help!”

Crow: “Go to hell? Hey, he feeds you, he takes you into his home and this is your thanks!?”

On Pepe in the forest fire…

Crow: “He’s a crispy critter, kid.”

And the apes capture them again.

Ape: “Godot, are you ready to die?”

Servo: “Uh, frankly no.”

The execution is interrupted by the arrival of the ape leader, whom Crow immediately identifies as Colonel Sanders.

Leader orders humans released (no idea why). Godot immediately attacks him and gets beat down.

And a flying saucer shows up…

Now the leader orders the humans taken to headquarters…no, it makes no sense.

Gebar (ape police chief): “I request your permission to kill him!”

(Leader glares at him)

Joel: “On the other hand you’re right, of course, can I have a new desk?”

Leader: “I do not hurt innocent people.”

Servo: “I have assistants for that.”

Servo: “The king of the apes rides in style in the new Buick Skylark.”

Second host segment: Their version for the Scopes Monkey Trial. It’s surreally hilarious.

(On the electric fence in Godot’s cell)

Joel: “Ah, a bug zapper! I checked in but I can’t check out!”

And Pepe to the rescue! She breaks them out using the air-vents.

Pepe apparently always carries a screwdriver.

Servo: “Great, welcome to plot contrivance play-house.”

Crow: “Bye, keep in touch, scream if you get killed!”

And Gebar walks in to kill Godot.

Gebar: “At last I have lived to see the day when I will kill you.”

Crow: “Well, it’s nice to have goals.”

And he just stands there gloating for about a minute…

Then there is a series of VERY fast cuts between Godot and Gebar.

Crow: “Ah! Suddenly the editor goes for an Oscar!”

Leader: “If you had not disobeyed things would be different!”

Servo: “Not better, just different.”

And Godot, Johnny, and Pepe hide in an army truck.

Oh, come on, clear riot masks disguise them?

Ape: “Didn’t they run away and leave you here to die?”

Crow: “Hey, you’re right! Give me a banana, I’m joining you!”

Another inexplicable shot of the saucer.

Guard: “What are you doing here?”

Servo (as Pepe): “I’m a traitor to my species.”

Anyway, Pepe, Godot, and Johnny plan to rescue Caroline and Katherine. They use the old “Straw cart” trick. In a futuristic society.

Servo: “Huh, kid talking to hay, nothing wrong with that…”

And they find the girls, much tears.

Servo: “Hey, how about a little sugar for Godot.”

They argue about leaving or not. Katherine likes the commander…

They drag her out.

And cut to a shoot out on an old-west lot. Yes, just like that.

The saucer shows up again.

Wacky comic music starts as the ape’s weapons are disabled by the saucers.

Crow: “McKale’s Navy goes to the Planet of the Apes!”

And cut again to them sneaking by a road.

They steal a jeep…apes chase them…I CAN’T BELIEVE THEY DRAGGED THIS THING OUT TO A WHOLE SERIES!

And they park to discuss the saucer…

You know what? I’m not even going to try to describe the plot anymore: just role with it.

Commander shows up at a base amid protests…

Pepe: “Where are we going?”

Servo: “Do the words ‘shallow grave’ mean anything to you?”

Godot: “I’m taking you home.”

Joel: “Home? Where my thoughts escape me? Home? Where I comb my facey?”

Pepe arrives back home, blah blah blah…

Everyone seems really happy about leaving Pepe and Pepe seems really eager to dump her mom minutes after reuniting.

Really funny/dark bit where slow-motion Pepe running is accompanied by gun-shots.

(They’re driving, talking about Pepe)

Crow: “*Bumpbump* Oh, Pepe!”

Anyway, they now run into Gebar one last time.

Third Host Segment: Ape Fashion show. Crow is great here: it’s bizarrely hilarious.

Anyway, the flying saucer shows up and shows Gebar that Godot didn’t actually kill his family.

Saucer: “UCOM has ordered that there shall be a stop to all further killing.”

Servo: “Or you will be killed.”

Crow: “He’s an ape and he can’t hang on to a rope?!”

Gebar: “I killed my own son?!”

Joel (as the saucer flies off): “Hurts don’t it? Bye!”

And the commander shows up, offers for them to live together in peace, they turn him down because they’re different. Commander gives a half-hearted message.

Servo: “Message. This is the message, people!”

Godot: “The entrance must be somewhere behind the mountain.”

Servo: “Oh, that narrows it down.”

And they go into a big door in the mountainside, then…there’s some stuff (honestly, that’s the only way I can describe it).

Turns out they’re back in the human world.

The doctors are pretty cheerful about the fact that “they won’t get over it for some time.”

Godot turns out to be lost forever in a desert wasteland while the others have ice cream and talk about him. Happy ending!

Final host segment: the Sandy Frank song. Rather harsh in retrospect, considering how much Sandy Frank himself disliked it. Then they read a letter. The baby pushes the button.

Stinger: Johnny: “I don’t care.” Just right! A truly odd little moment (and probably the attitude of the filmmakers as well).

Movie Quality Rating:

1.       Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

2.       The Crawling Eye

3.       The Black Scorpion

4.       Gamera vs. Barugon

5.       Mad Monster

6.        Lost Continent

7.       Gamera

8.       First Spaceship to Venus

9.       Stranded in Space

10.   Rocketship XM

11.    Moon Zero Two

12.   Godzilla vs. Megalon

13.   The Crawling Hand

14.   Catalina Caper

15.   King Dinosaur

16.   Jungle Goddess

17.   Wild Rebels

18.   The Corpse Vanishes

19.   Ring of Terror

20.   Untamed Youth

21.   The Slime People

22.   Project Moonbase

23.   The Sidehackers

24.   Women of the Prehistoric Planet

25.   Robot vs. The Aztec Mummy

26.   Cave Dwellers

27.   Tim of the Apes

28.   Pod People

29.   Hellcats

30.   Rocket Attack USA

31.   Robot Holocaust

32.   Robot Monster

Conclusion: Awful movie and good riffing and host-segments make for a solid entry.

Final Rating: 7/10.

Mst3k – 305: Stranded in Space

                Sorry for the obscenely long delay in the MST3K Project, but expect more regular updates from now on.

                Stranded in Space is a very middle-of-the-road episode: it’s amusing enough, but the movie is dull and seems to drag and the riffing rarely rises above being merely amusing. Forgettable is probably the best way to describe it: I couldn’t remember much about the episode even a couple days later, let alone several months. 

                The story is that an astronaut crash lands on a mirror Earth called Terra, which is run by a totalitarian government. He escapes, joins up with the resistance, and then some stuff happens and he ends up on the run. Like I said, it’s pretty forgettable.

                The best thing about the movie was easily Cameron Mitchell as the chief bag-guy. Mitchell actually managed to inject some life into the character so that he was something other than just one-note-evil. Actually, the best scenes in the film all involve the bad guys, who are generally decent characters professionally acted, while the heroes are all boring and generic.

                The riffing is only so-so, with only a few laugh out loud moments. Most of the best riffs come towards the end. The Host segments are generally decent, with one or two great bits. The best one is probably Joel and the Bots as villains with Tibby as Joel’s evil pet.

                So, all in all, a very average episode, and since it’s been so long since I’ve seen it, there’s not a lot to say. Sorry.

Opening: Joel has fashioned the bots into an at-home shooting gallery. He also gives the premise and explains that the Mads made the opening and are selling the results of the show to public cable. Incidentally, Joel’s being kind of mean here, even though the bots don’t seem to be aware.

Invention: The bots are still in the shooting gallery, but now in “Apple Dumpling Gang” mode. Wow, that takes me back…anyway, Joel has an update on the ‘bang gun.’ The Mads also have variants on the theme. Amusing.

Film ventures credits again: the credits done over scenes of a completely different movie (don’t know which one this time). Actually, the clips over the credits looked more interesting than the film.

After the credits we cut to three astronauts in a space ship.

Ground control: “You should be close-enough in about seven days for us to skin-paint you on our radar.”

Servo: “Skin paint? Well, I guess I’ll try anything once…”

Astronaut: “Aside from the fact we’re not a hundred percent sure we’re on the right trajectory, everything’s great.”

Crow: “And we ran out of Oxygen two days ago.”

(astronauts sign off)

Servo: “So, whose turn was it?”

One of the astronauts mentions a new wife, thus sealing his fate.

Astronaut: “I’d like a nice, thick, juicy…”

(ship starts rocking)

Crow: “Seizure!”

The ship tumbles over and over while they thrash around.

Crow: “We’re having Ray Bolger practice.”

And cut to a hospital, where the chief astronaut is laid up.

Nurse: “Meanwhile you have these beautiful flowers: they keep coming in by the truck-load.”

Servo: “They’re all poppies.”

Doctor comes in to talk to astronaut. Turns out he’s been there for two weeks with no outside knowledge.

Doctor: “Emotionally…”

Crow: “You’re a little girl.”

Astronaut (named Neil) notes that he doesn’t recognize anyone.

Neil: “What about our flight surgeon?”

Servo: “Uh, we had to shoot him. He had a broken leg.”

And we pan out to see that he’s being secretly monitored through his wall…by Cameron Mitchell!

Doctor reveals something’s up by not knowing who Paul Revere was.

Cameron: “I have some doubts too Doctor, mostly about how you’re handling this.”

Servo: “You think you’re the only one who hurts?”

Cameron: “I can’t devote my whole life to this man, this one man.”

Servo: “Oh, he wants to play the field, eh?”

Neil wakes up and clonks the guy trying to drug him, then makes his escape.

Servo: “Well, I think he’s getting better.”

Joel: “Oh, I’ve had dreams like this, I’m gunshot, I’m really late for class, and I don’t have a hall pass!”

Anyway, Neil gets a change of clothes and makes his escape.

Cameron has his men shoot what he thinks is Neil:

Joel: “Now we make him talk.”

Turns out it was a pile of laundry.

Joel: “Oh, they shot my other turtlenecks.”

Servo: “Oh, no, they killed Snuggles!”

First Host Segment: Servo and Crow have their TV trading cards. Servo has a complete “Love Boat” set he wants to trade for Crow’s “Columbo” villains collection. It’s amusing more than funny.

We rejoin our hero in a phone-booth.

Servo: “Hey, no coin-slot, this is a better world!”

Phone operator hasn’t heard of Cape Kennedy…or Orlando…or Florida.

Operator: “Would you like to speak to my supervisor?”

Servo: “Your supervisor, Mr. Stalin?”

Neil picks up a ride, then notices there are three moons.

Truck-driver: “So where’re you headed?”

Joel: “Well, I was headed for Florida, but I guess you ain’t got one of those!”

Neil finally discovers he’s not on Earth.

Cameron gives a public-service announcement about our hero to a board of directors, noting that he must be eradicated.

Servo: “Boy, you know how many TV series would be wiped out if this room were blown up?”

Doctor: “He’s one man, alone!”

Cameron: “One. Man. Alone.”

Crow: “Go shoot yourself.”

Cameron gives one of those ‘perfect order’ talks, about how everyone thinks alike, feels alike, etc.

Cameron: “Then someone comes along…”

Joel: “And doesn’t pay Union dues!”

Cameron: “Then we have no quarrel, have we doctor?”

Servo: “No, but I’m gonna whip your butt at racket-ball later.”

Joel pulls himself up to Doctor’s lips and kisses him.

Servo: “He needed that.”

Cameron puts his hand on a bookcase.

Servo: “You know, this bookcase used to slide.”

An actually nice detail that Cameron supports the oppressive government because he genuinely believes it prevents suffering like the kind he’s experienced.

Cameron sends the doctor to “Ward-E.”

Cut back to Neil.

Crow: “Funny how space looks a lot like Sacramento.”

Turns out everyone’s left-handed except Neil.

And bombastic martial music comes out of the radio, followed by propaganda. Neil suspiciously bails as the radio starts warning about him.

He wanders into a book shop.

Crow: “Well, at least they’ve got a Barnes and Nobel.”

He finds a history book, which starts about thirty-years ago: the beginning of “the Perfect Order.”

Old Man reminisces about the time before the perfect order, when people seemed to laugh more…

Servo: “Children pulled apart like fresh bread…”

Old Man notes Neil is injured, lets him rest in his room upstairs.

Crow: “His name isn’t Yoda, is it?”

Joel: “Oh, if this is ever great! I’ve got a place to live and a brand-new Dad!”

Old Guy goes down stairs suspiciously.

Crow: “Well, he’ll be perfect for my experiment.”

He calls the hospital on him.

Crow: “Oh, great, a planet full of tattletales!”

Old Man comes it to announce to Neil he’s called a doctor over.

Crow: “Oh, uh, do you got a straight-razor? I want to shave my wrists…”

Neil pawns some scissors.

Turns out the doctor is the woman who betrayed him back at the hospital.

Joel: “Well, if it isn’t little miss ‘I-wont-tell-a-soul!”

Girl: “If I needed to know more they would have told me.”

Crow (sarcastically): “Because they’re perfect.”

Girl: “When you’ve recovered you’ll be treated as an honored guest.”

Crow: “With savage beatings.”

Neil agrees to go back with her and to turn himself into Dr. Revere.

Crow: “Yes, it worked! I’m going to score on an interplanetary scale!”

They start fighting over the wheel (he lied, of course).

She flips on a radio secretly and transmits their conversation to the authorities.

He makes her stop.

Crow: “Now pucker-up, buttercup!”

She tries to signal an approaching car, he kisses her to cover.

Servo (as passing drivers): “Heh, heh, they’re gettin’ some action! Pull over, Earl.”

And she slaps him and runs off.

Servo: “So, does he get to keep the car?”

He keeps asking her where he can get help, despite the fact that he has absolutely no reason to trust her.

And she lets something slip about her brother, turns out he’s disappeared. This convinces her to help him.

Second Host Segment: Servo is cooking, Crow had a nightmare (it’s disturbing), and they discuss what ‘Ward-E’ might be. It’s all disturbing. Humorously disturbing (especially Crow’s nightmare).

We return, and now he’s driving (why? It’s her car, and he doesn’t know the way).

Neil: “I don’t even know your name.”

Servo: “I’m THX-1138”

Crow: “That’s pretty, that’s my mother’s name.”

Cut back to Cameron. He gets a call from some superior of his.

And back to our heroes, where we meet a pig-farmer feeding his pigs.

Crow: “’Cops’ is filmed on location in this guy’s yard.”

Joel (as girl): “Oscar! I brought another infidel to see you!”

Girl: “He says he’s an astronaut from a planet called Earth.”

Crow (as farmer): “Oh, that’s great! I’ll get the sedative.”

Farmer jokes about the pigs being spies.

And back to Cameron, where he enters a large, empty throne room (which I’m pretty sure is a reused ‘Twilight-Zone’ set) with a tribunal.

Crow: “You’re late, Number 2.”

Crow: “Do you have a two-minute song prepared?”

Tribunal guy compliments Cameron, then expresses concern about the escape of Neil.

(This is actually a rather well-done scene, with the pseudo-friendly attitude of the tribunal guy genuinely coming across as pretty threatening).

Farmer (actually a Professor) gives the scientific background (it’s typically ridiculous). Basically, the planet’s developed simultaneously and the exact same way in mirror image. Sure.

Cut to some video screens.

Servo: “Hey, it’s the Ms. Alternate Universe pageant!”

Back to Farmer etc.

They discuss the Perfect Order, opposition, etc.

We finally get some info on “Ward-E.”

Servo: “Lobotomy means never having to say you’re sorry.”

Cameron interrogates Doctor.

Doctor doesn’t respond.

Servo: “He’s been like this ever since he started watching MTV.”

Back to our heroes.

Farmer: “You can’t deny an old man the only pleasure he has left in his life. Outwitting the perfect order.”

Crow: “Oh, I’m glad you said that!”

Farmer has heart-flutter, injects himself with medicine.

Joel: “Oh, great. He drinks, he does drugs, and he’s gonna get me off this planet. Right.”

They start planning to get Neil off the planet…then we cut to Neil and girl saying good-bye. They kiss…

Then she drives off.

Crow: “Spooky chick, huh doc? Doc? Hey, doc!”

She arrives home to meet Cameron. He drives off with her.

Crow: “She’s history.”

Cut to farmer and Neil bluffing their way into the launch facility.

Farmer: “Here, his credentials.”

Servo: “Let’s see…uh, this is a pamphlet on colon cancer, sir.”

Crow: “Oh, I, uh, put it through the wash…and…uh…”

Farmer (bluffing): “Isn’t anything of first quality anymore?”

Joel: “Yeah, our security is, pops.”

Servo: “This is really strict security for getting your film out of a photo-mat.”

Amazingly, it works.

Crow: “Lot of Chryslers on their planet.”

Farmer and hero are going over their plan, farmer has another attack, has to run home to get medicine.

Crow: “Note to myself: pack more life-saving liquid.”

Joel: “Always someone at the door when I’m about to shoot-up.”

Girl shows up at farmer’s door. She’s beaten up, but she says she didn’t talk.

She wants to see Neil, but when she can’t she drives off.

Back to launch facility.

Neil runs into a guy who apparently recognizes him (no idea who), pulls a letter-opener on him.

Crow: “No! I’m not a letter!”

Neil knocks him out and tosses him in a dumpster.

Third Host Segment: They’re all dressed up as Cameron Mitchell and are playing villains. Joel has Tibby as his villainous pet and is ordering the bots to kill various TV heroes. Crow and Servo don’t quite get the euphemisms. It’s great!

Girl is actually leading Farmer into a trap. She’s been turned, you see.

Meanwhile, Neil’s still sneaking around the place.

He knocks out a guard and steals his gun. He then uses it to take the astronaut’s uniform.

Girl again tries to get Farmer to tell her where Neil is.

Rather nice scene where Cameron and his underling discuss the possibility of underling getting Cameron’s job if Neil escapes, underling reaffirms his loyalty to Cameron.

Crow: “Uh, get your hand off my leg, sir.”

Neil is about to suit up when Farmer and Girl show up.

And Cameron and goons are right behind them.

Girl slips up and reveals her new allegiance. Farmer gets gunned down by goons.

(by the way, shouldn’t the resistance have some sort of code-phrase to weed out spies?)

Neil makes a break for it down the tunnel to the launch pad.

Neil shoots a guy

Joel: “That one’s for Florida!”

He’s a preternaturally good shot, by the way.

And he seems to have an infinite number of bullets.

Crow: “The most dramatic confrontation since Rommel met J.C.”

Neil shoots Cameron in the arm.

Joel: “That’s for Paul Revere! The real one!”

Underling: “Are you alright.”

Crow: “Oh, sure. OF COURSE I’M NOT ALRGIHT! I got a slug in the arm!”

And he emerges somehow between two groups of goons.

Crow: “Lot of sexual tension, though.”

He jumps into the ocean and blows up an oxygen tank as he goes (actually kind of cool).

Cameron: “Thanks to the Perfect Order we have one great family on Terra.”

Servo: “A dysfunctional family, sure, but…”

(on Neil’s dog-tags)

Servo: “Oh, he dropped the thing that’s gonna drive the whole series!”

Oh, and I don’t mean to shock you, but it turns out Neil survived.

Servo: “He’s his own From Here to Eternity.”

He meets a beach-guy

Beach-Guy: “What happened?”

Servo: “*cough* from other planet…thing crashed…have girlfriend….blew stuff up…”

Servo makes a reference to Mike Nelson!

Joel: “Does that guy realize that he’s gonna get a lobotomy for fraternizing with that guy?”

And with a final voice-over, we get the credits with the footage from the other movie.

Final Segment: Servo’s a TV exec. He doesn’t see much potential in “Stranded in Space” for a series. It’s great. Servo does a tour-de-force and even makes a letter funny! The Mads do the ‘you might replace me’ scene from the film.

Stinger: Girl slaps hero after a pregnant pause. Not bad. I might have gone with “people seemed to laugh more then.” But this is perfectly acceptable.

Movie Quality Rating:

1.       Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

2.       The Crawling Eye

3.       The Black Scorpion

4.       Gamera vs. Barugon

5.       Mad Monster

6.        Lost Continent

7.       Gamera

8.       First Spaceship to Venus

9.       Stranded in Space

10.   Rocketship XM

11.    Moon Zero Two

12.   Godzilla vs. Megalon

13.   The Crawling Hand

14.   Catalina Caper

15.   King Dinosaur

16.   Jungle Goddess

17.   Wild Rebels

18.   The Corpse Vanishes

19.   Ring of Terror

20.   Untamed Youth

21.   The Slime People

22.   Project Moonbase

23.   The Sidehackers

24.   Women of the Prehistoric Planet

25.   Robot vs. The Aztec Mummy

26.   Cave Dwellers

27.   Pod People

28.   Hellcats

29.   Rocket Attack USA

30.   Robot Holocaust

31.   Robot Monster

Conclusion: A lame, though not-awful made-for-TV flick coupled with so-so riffing makes for a very average episode. 

Final Rating: 6/10.

My Rating System

5/5 Highly Recommended to everyone!

-This is a work that everyone should check out if they have the chance

4/5 Recommended unless you really don’t like this type of thing

-This is a work most people will enjoy, but a few with specific tastes might just not get it

3/5 Recommended if you’re the right kind of person

-This is more specified: it's not a bad work, but it's probably going to put some people off and not everyone will enjoy it. It may have some serious flaws which some people might not be able to get past.

2/5 Not recommended unless you're really into that sort of thing

-It's really not a good work by any objective standard. It's deeply flawed and general audiences won't like it. Those who have a real, serious interest in some element of the work, however, might find it worthwhile.

1/5 Not Recommended at all

-This is just bad and pretty much no one will get anything worthwhile out of it. Just ignore it.

0/5 Recommended that you destroy any copy you find

-This work is not just bad and flawed but actively hurtful and poisonous. It's the kind of work that censorship was invented for. Avoid at all costs.

Reviews: Back to the Future

What better film to welcome the New Year with than Back to the Future, that perennial charmer from the late, great eighties? The very best of time travel movies, as well as a thoroughly entertaining, satisfying, and rich story, Back to the Future is always good for another viewing.

            The story goes it’s 1985 and teenager Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) is having a bad day. He’s late for school for the fourth time in a row, his big band audition is a failure for being ‘too darn loud,’ and his long-planned excursion with his girlfriend Jennifer (Claudia Wells) has to be cancelled because his dad’s bullying supervisor took their car and wrecked it. As a matter of fact, his life as a whole leaves a lot to be desired. His dad, George McFly (Crispin Glover) is a nervous, weak shell of a man with a laugh that sounds more like he’s choking and who is such a thorough coward that he doesn’t even say a word when his supervisor Biff (Thomas F. Wilson) comes into his house and insults his, George’s, own son right in front of him. His mom, Loraine (Lea Thompson) meanwhile, guzzles vodka while trying (and failing) to maintain uptight standards among her children and constantly looking as though she wonders where her life went wrong (“we all make mistakes in life children,” she says, glaring at her husband). Marty’s only real sources of comfort are his girlfriend and, perhaps even more so, his friendship with the eccentric Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd in a career defining performance), the local mad scientist.

            One night Doc calls him out for his most important experiment yet and shows him a fully functional time machine built out of a DeLorean. Through a series of unfortunate circumstances, however, the experiment leaves Marty stranded in 1955, without the plutonium necessary to power the Time Machine. From there he has to figure out a way to get back to 1985…while also ensuring that his parents get together before he’s erased from existence.

            See, in trying to find something familiar in the past, Marty runs into his teenage father and accidentally prevents him from having the chance meeting that led to his marriage. Instead, he, Marty, has it…and discovers that his teenage mother is not only disturbingly beautiful (“But you’re haah…you’re so haa…you’re so…thin!”), but also that she’s now infatuated with him.

            Revisiting the movie, the thing that struck me particularly this time is just how well structured it is. The very first shot, a long, almost unbroken tracking close up of a wall of clocks and gadgets, sets the scene. It’s patient, unhurried, assured, like a man telling a long, intricate joke who knows that his punch-line will absolutely floor his audience and so feels no need to rush it. In the long, almost wordless shot we see that we are dealing with an eccentric inventor, a man intelligent enough to invent automatic breakfast machines and absent-minded enough to leave them on unattended for an extended time. It sets up future conflict (the plutonium) and establishes the ‘clock’ motif that pervades the film. The first five minutes of this movie are an exemplary bit of perfectly done exposition.

            The story is remarkably lean. Running just under two hours, practically everything sets up or relates to something else. Almost every word in the first act pays off in some way at some point, usually in an unexpected and satisfying way. For instance, it’s briefly mentioned that one of Marty’s uncle is perpetually in jail. Back in 1955, Marty meets said uncle as a baby in his playpen. “Better get used to these bars, kid,” he mutters.

            Then there’s the ingenuity and honesty the film shows towards the whole time-travel concept. Marty’s reactions to being stranded in the past are all entirely believable: from numb disbelief, to frantic assessment, to desperately reaching out for something familiar. It’s entirely credible, for instance, that upon realizing that his father is sitting next to him in a diner Marty would immediately try to make contact, and that, in his slightly panicked state, he wouldn’t stop to consider the consequences of such action. I also like his nervous non-reaction to the café owner’s questioning of his apparel (“What’s with the life-preserver?” he asks, eyeing Marty’s down jacket), realizing too late that eighties-style clothes don’t exactly blend in the fifties but unable to come up with an excuse on the fly. The movie is smart enough to show Marty’s clumsiness in the unfamiliar world of three decades past, but also smart enough not to take it too far. He’s able to interact with the people he meets, but misunderstandings and faux-pas abound, such as when he struggles to open a coke bottle before George seizes it and simply uses the opener on the machine, or when he identifies a street as “John F. Kennedy Drive” and gets asked “who the hell is John F. Kennedy?” It’s also smart the way these incidents become rarer as Marty gets used to the fifties, but never quite disappear.

            There’s a lot of clever invention as Marty uses the gadgets and knowledge he has from the eighties to give himself an edge on his fifties-based opponents (most notably Biff, who turns out to have been bullying his father since high school and proves himself an even nastier piece of work than we had thought). One thrilling sequence has him inventing the skateboard to escape from Biff: a scene that makes me weep for the days when filmmakers could craft an exciting and believable action sequence featuring a few teenagers over the course of maybe a city block. Another very funny bit has him putting his walkman, radiation suit, and pop-culture knowledge to an unexpected use.

            Meanwhile, Marty and the thirty-year younger Doc craft a plan to return him to the future by harnessing a lightning-bolt that will strike the local clock tower at precisely 10:04 PM the next Saturday, a lightning-bolt being the only source of power in the fifties capable of generating enough energy to power the Time-Machine. This gives Marty a strict deadline to ensure his parents wind up together, which involves forcing the painfully weak and shy George to ask out the lovely and energetic Lorraine and having her say yes when she has eyes only for Marty.

            The way these plot threads pay off is both believable and very clever, and I won’t spoil them here. Suffice to say, while Marty has his work cut out for him (“Jesus, George, it’s a wonder I was even born!”), things pan out in such a way that he winds up doing more than he had intended and sets George on the path to becoming a real man.

            In the meantime he also gains a new-found perspective on his parents. He discovers that George actually was a lot like him in High School, something his overbearing principal has been telling him for years, but which he never quite believed (hilariously, the same principal has apparently been running this school for at least thirty years without changing a bit in appearance or temperament. “Didn’t that guy ever have hair?” Marty wonders upon seeing him in 1955). He also discovers that his mother was much wilder in her youth than he would have ever believed: a fact that frankly horrifies him, slyly suggesting that, for all their complaints kids really do expect higher standards from their parents (however, the fact that the film seems to assume teenagers in the fifties were just as unchaste and aggressive as those of the eighties is one of the few parts that ring false).

            In general the movie is very persuasive in its depiction of the fifties, both the good (it’s a lot cleaner, small businesses abound, and the town seems a whole lot friendlier) and the bad (casual racism, judgmental locals). A number of amusing gags come from how the town has and has not changed over the years (a theater that housed an assembly of Christ in the 1980s is showing a Ronald Reagan movie in the 1950s, the diner will eventually be turned into an aerobics studio, etc.). I particularly like how the mayors of 1985 and 1955 have identical campaigns, right down to the exact same cheesy slogan.

            The heart of the film, however, is the friendship between Marty and Doc. Theirs is one of the better and more effective cinematic depictions of what the ancients considered the greatest of the four loves. The two of them are very different people: rebellious, cool teenager, eccentric, old scientist, but they clearly share a great trust and affection for one another. They understand each other, care about each other, and either would do anything for the other. In both the first and third acts Doc in particular makes great sacrifices for Marty’s sake, while Marty for his part spends his time in 1955 trying to figure out a way to save Doc from a tragic fate thirty years down the line and even risks his chance to return to the future in one final attempt to warn his friend. We see a lot of romantic love in the movies and the trials and sacrifices made for it, but not so much of friendship. In Doc and Marty, we have a beautiful depiction of how strong and admirable a friendship can be.

            Doc and Marty spend most of the film together, and Lloyd and Fox have great chemistry. The two of them get some of the funniest moments of the movie, such as when Marty is trying to convince Doc of his story and Doc sarcastically asks who’s president in 1985. When Marty immediately answers with Ronald Reagan, Doc retorts “So who’s vice president? Jerry Lewis?” (incidentally, Reagan himself apparently loved that scene). Or when Doc’s model of their plan accidentally sets the garage on fire (“you’re not filling me with a lot of confidence, Doc.”)

              The film is pretty much ideally cast. Michael J. Fox nearly missed out on the role due to his commitment to Family Ties and Eric Stoltz actually shot several weeks worth as Marty before they realized he was miscast (Stoltz himself apparently agreed) and Fox fortunately worked out his schedule to allow for both. Fox is the perfect Marty: he’s believable as an ordinary teenager (something few actors can claim) and expertly sells Marty’s fear, bewilderment, and shock upon arriving back in time. He also has great comic timing and is wonderfully physical in his role, particularly in a scene where he plays ‘Johnny B. Good’ for a crowd of fifties teenagers (I also like the moment where he’s talking to Jennifer and absentmindedly allows his gaze to follow two work-out-clothed beauties passing by before she pushes his gaze back on her). Fox just oozes likeability from his pores, the way some people ooze oil or sweat and he’s a large part of why the movie is as fun as it is.

            Christopher Lloyd, meanwhile, has the role of his career as Dr. Emmett Brown. His unique voice and odd facial expressions suit the character perfectly, so that what would have seemed incredibly overdone in any other role seems perfectly natural. But Lloyd is also good in the quieter moments, such as the heartfelt embrace he and Marty share before attempting their desperate plan. As noted he and Fox play off each other well, able to communicate effectively with nothing but a few meaningful looks, such as the moment during the first time test where Marty slowly edges out of the car’s way until Doc gives him a confused glance and Marty reluctantly gets back into position.

            Crispin Glover also gives a physically deft performance, with his choking laugh, breathless voice, and lanky movements, creating the impression of a marionette with an overzealous puppeteer (underscoring the way he lets other people control him). Lea Thompson has a lot of fun as Lorraine; fawning all over Marty as though purposefully trying to disturb him, while also occasionally showing that she really is a nice girl at heart (such as when she’s clearly touched by George’s first abortive attempt to ask her out). She could have done with one or two more ‘nice girl’ moments, just to underscore how worthy an object of affection she is, but Thompson does well in the role. She also is startlingly convincing as the elder Lorraine in 1985, with her baggy eyes and constantly wearied expressions effectively selling her disappointment with the way her life wound up (the make-up which transforms the 23-year-old beauty into a plain, overweight 47-year-old, meanwhile, is almost frighteningly good).

            Thomas F. Wilson, who by all accounts is a supremely pleasant man in real life, is thoroughly despicable as Biff, swaggering around both the 1985 house and the 1955 town as though he owns the place, effortlessly dominating poor George, threatening Marty, and harassing Lorraine. Biff may be only a bullying teenager, but Wilson credibly creates the alarming impression that he is entirely capable of truly evil behavior. The tension is thus ramped up as we wonder what Biff might do any time he’s on screen, and when he threatens George or Marty with serious bodily harm we don’t doubt for a moment that he would make good on his threats. Biff’s power is effectively portrayed in two separate scenes where Marty stands up to him, only to remember too late that Biff towers over him by about a foot (the first of these, incidentally, is actually a rather touching moment; a teenage boy reacting automatically and unthinkingly to seeing his mother being mistreated).

            Good as Fox, Lloyd, and the rest are, the real star of the show is the Time Machine itself, which is a beautiful work of filmmaking art (as Doc says, “If you’re going to build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style!”). The sleek, silver DeLorean is impressive on its own, but outfitted with huge, sail-like exhaust ports, wires, and pipes it becomes a formidable machine with its own unique outline and structure. The Time Machine has a lot of personality to it, particularly once it arrives back in 1955, where even alone on an open road it somehow feels alien to its environment: a displaced object, the only one of its kind on Earth. You can’t blame some of the people of the fifties for assuming it’s an alien spacecraft. From its grand, smoke-filled entrance to the final shot of the film, the Time Machine is a supreme presence in the story; its shadow falls over everything else that happens. It’s one of the most memorable cars ever to hit the silver screen.

            One of the most interesting aspects about the movie is how it deals with the topic of time itself. Time is a running theme in the movie: it is the real antagonist of the story, represented by the almost omnipresent clocks that appear throughout. The very first thing we hear, before the first shot even appears on screen, is the inexorable ticking of a clock: endless, unceasing, and vaguely sinister in its constant repetition. Then we open on a whole wall of different clocks surrounding Doc’s gadgets…all of which, we discover, are exactly twenty-five minutes slow, resulting in Marty being late for school for the fourth time in a row. Even before he encounters the Time Machine, therefore, Time is Marty’s enemy. The Time Machine itself is Doc’s answer to the previously unanswerable power of Time. “I’ve always dreamt of looking beyond my years,” Doc gushes about his invention, reveling in the chance to outwit the clock (ironically, Doc claims he first got the idea for the Time Machine when he slipped while hanging a clock). After the Time Machine is stranded, Time again gains the upper hand, with Marty having a strict deadline to save his own existence and return to the future, both of which depend on timing: George and Lorraine must get together by a specific time and Marty’s one chance will require split-second timing. Significantly, Marty’s opportunity to return home features a clock as its instrument; a clock that will be stopped forever during the event. It is, therefore, as though Time itself is vanquished in that final cataclysmic race. During the climax, indeed, Doc has to almost literally battle the great clock as it ticks unceasingly towards that all-important instant.

            Time travel stories are usually all about this desire to overcome time, that terrible, all consuming master of our lives. God gave us time, I think, to ensure that we would never be satisfied on Earth and to drive us constantly to seek to better ourselves and the world around us, and time is frequently a burden for us; either it is too fast or too slow and it brings all that we make to ruin. Most good time travel stories deal with the consequences of trying to extend our ability to influence the world outside of those confines of date and hour. Often the results are disastrous, and always the consequences are mixed. The stories speak to both a great fear and a great hope: the fear is of that great unknown question ‘what would have happened if things had only been slightly different?’ What if Hitler had never come to power? Might we not then perhaps have faced a possibly even worse battle against, say, the power of the Soviet Union? Might we have lost that battle? The events that led to the current day suddenly seem so tenuous, so vulnerable to even the slightest variation that we shudder to think of how even the slightest change might affect the future (i.e. squashing a mosquito in the Mesozoic era might result in your geeky neighbor becoming the unquestioned despotic ruler of the world).

            On the other hand, there is the great hope: the chance to set right what went wrong. Who doesn’t have something in their past they wish with all their heart they could change or do away with? With time travel, that suddenly becomes possible, and the things accepted as simply part of the struggle of life become open to change, improvement, even salvation. If the events that led to the present are so vulnerable to change for the bad, might they not also be open to change for the good? Isn’t there frequently one life-changing moment that makes all the difference? What if you could go back and give someone that moment? How might their life – and yours – be different?

            The practical lesson gleaned from all this is how malleable our lives can be. If George McFly can suddenly find reserves of courage he never knew he had, perhaps we can look inside ourselves and find something similar. If so many lives were changed for the better on just one night in November 1955 before 10:04 PM, perhaps we can change our lives for the better in our present.

            C.S. Lewis wisely noted that the Present is the only time we ever really experience: the Past is dead and the Future doesn’t exist. The Present is when ‘the soul touches eternity.’ Though time travel may never become a reality (for which we might have cause to be grateful), movies like Back to the Future serve to remind us that we all have at least control over the time given to us, and that if we want to have a good future, we need to start with a good present.

            Is it perfect? Well, no. Amusing as the set ups and pay offs are, sometimes they’re a little too perfect: such as when the 1955 Biff and the 1985 Biff bully George with the exact same conversation. The plot device of Marty’s family slowly vanishing from the photo doesn’t really make much sense, though it’s a necessary element to illustrate the urgency of the situation. A few of the effects, particularly the streams of fire following the first time warp, don’t hold up very well (since Marty is clearly standing with his foot right in them without noticing). Also, while most of the plot threads pay off believably, one key point is dealt with in a clumsy and unconvincing manner.

            But these are all minor quibbles. Back to the Future is one of the classic films of the eighties. It’s thrilling, heartfelt, funny, and, appropriately enough, never seems to get old.

Rating: 5/5

Highly Recommended!

Some Quotes:

Doc: “If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits eighty-eight miles-per-hour…you’re gonna see some serious shit.”

George (asking Lorraine out): “I’m George McFly. I’m your density.”

George: “Lou. Give me a milk…”

(Dramatic pause, slams his money on the counter)

“Chocolate.”

Marty: “Sounds pretty heavy.”

Doc: “Weight has nothing to do with it!”

Doc (running from the room): “1.21 GIGAWATTS! 1.21 gigawatts? Great scott!”

Marty (following): “Wait, what the hell is a gigawatt?”

Lorraine: “Marty, you’re beginning to sound just like my mother.”

George: “Hey you! Get your damn hands off her!”

Biff: “Why don’t you make like a tree…and get out of here.”

Doc (on Reagan being president): “And I suppose Jack Benny is Secretary of the Treasury!”

Doc: “Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads.”

(A line so awesome that both Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr. used it in their speeches)

New Year, New Post

Hello, true believers.

As those who may have been following might note, I've been very neglectful of my blog "Bob's Life." Well, as part of my New Year's reformations (a little different than resolutions), I'm reviving it and giving it new purpose. Now it will be my outlet for reviews of film, books, television, and any other medium that tells a story I want to examine more closely. The MST3K Project will continue on this site, hopefully more regularly.

The title of the blog comes from the idea that a good story, like a good man, can come from any source: whether film, book, television series, or video game, whether drama, romance, horror, science fiction, fantasy, adventure, or comedy, a good story is a good story. No matter what the content, any story can show beauty and truth, and often times I find the keenest truths and most piercing beauties can be found in the most unlikely of places.

This blog is designed to seek for gold where others see only coal mines, diamonds where others see slate, and silk where others see cobwebs. In short, its a reviewing site that looks for the honest 'goodness' in whatever it explores.

"Omnia autem probate, quod bonem est tenete."
"Examine all things and hold fast to what is good."
-1 Thess. 5:21