Dr. Strangelove

Stanley Kubrick created a masterpiece of Cold War satire in 1964 with Dr. Strangelove (Dr.S). The full title includes the line "…or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb." It stars some big-name actors who live up to their reputations. Peter Sellers, especially, plays three important roles as Colonel Mandrake, President Muffley and Dr. Strangelove. George C. Scott plays General Turgidson. Sterling Hayden plays the unbalanced General Ripper. Dr.S is another Atomic Angst movie to fret openly about the imminence of destruction of all life on earth, but it does so in the rare style of satire and dark humor. Gallows humor? Much has been written about this movie already, so this review won't be exhaustive.

Quick Plot Synopsis
The commander of a Strategic Air Command base in Texas issues an attack order to his 34 B-52 bombers who are on routine air-readiness stations aloft. General Jack D. Ripper (Hayden) also orders the base closed with shoot-to-kill orders for anyone approaching. The commies will disguise themselves as American troops. The bombers open their Attack Plan R envelopes and proceed to targets. The rest of the government are aware of the bombers heading for Russia, but they cannot be contacted. Plan R ordered radio silence and allowed only one secret recall code, known only to Ripper. The president (Sellers) and other advisors debate what to do. General Turgidson (Scott) urges for full scale attack with missiles too. Might as well do the job right and prevent retaliation. Meanwhile, Colonel Mandrake (Sellers) is holed up with Ripper, who is clearly a paranoid psychotic. It unfolds that he sees fluoridation as a communist plot to weaken the American male's "bodily fluids." The president orders nearby troops to storm the closed base and get Ripper for the codes. A protracted fire fight ensues. When it is apparent that the bombers will reach their targets before the code is obtained, the president contacts the Russian premier, giving them the data necessary to shoot down the bombers. The SAC base is stormed, but Ripper commits suicide before being captured. Mandrake deduces the secret code from Ripper's desk doodles. He eventually contacts the president and all the planes are recalled -- except one. Major "King" Kong's (Slim Pickens) plane suffered radio damage in a near miss from a soviet missile, so did not get the recall. Suffering other damage too, Kong opts for a target of convenience, an ICBM base. The bomb bay doors are also damaged. He splices the wires while sitting atop one of the bombs. The doors open. He rides it down like a bronco. Back in the Pentagon war room, they find out that the Soviets have a Doomsday Device, which will automatically launch missiles with extra deadly radiation that will wipe out all life on earth -- if anyone bombs Russia with nukes. Realizing that doom is coming, the men in the wareroom listen to Dr. Strangelove's notion that they find 100,000 people to hide deep in mine shafts and wait the 100 years until it's safe to come out. He paints a male fantasy scenario of 10 women (all eager to breed) to each man, who has little else to do down in the mine shafts, so… Turgidson worries that the Russians have their babes in mine shafts already and that there is a "Mine Shaft Gap." The film ends with a montage of many different nuclear test explosions, with Vera Lynn singing her famous song, "We'll Meet Again." The End.

Armageddon
Dr.S shares with others in its doom genre that total global destruction is not averted. It shares this pessimistic view with On The Beach ('59) and The Last War ('61). It has more in common with the latter, in that it plays out in detail just how the nuclear powder keg gets touched off. Unlike The Last War in which errors eventually result in Armageddon, Dr.S makes it the willful act of a single deranged man. Interestingly, Columbia pictures felt they needed to include a scrolling-text disclaimer at the start, saying how the Air Force's safeguards would prevent anything like this from happening. Many classic era sci-fi took the presumption of events in Dr. Strangelove occuring, then spun out the tales of what happened to the scant survivors. 1000 Years From Now ('52), World Without End ('56), Planet of the Apes ('68) to mention just three of them.

Cold War Spotlight
Peter George's original novel was a cautionary tale of how the best laid plans for security in the Cold War could backfire and actually cause the cataclysm they sought to prevent. Kubrick's adaptation added the mythical Doomsday Device as a single focal point for all of the nuclear arms dangers. Just one bomb dropped would launch the end of the world. Mutually Assured Destruction.

Notes
Based on the Book -- Dr.S's primary story came from the 1958 novel by Peter George: "Red Alert". George's story is essentially the same as the primary plot in the movie, except for the ending. In the book, the president offers to let the soviets bomb one American city (Atlantic City, NJ) as compensation for the one bomb that the unreachable bomber will drop. It turns out that the lone bomber fails to drop its bomb, so all ends well. Kubrick changed that 180 degrees. George later sued the writers of the story "Fail Safe" (also made into a movie) for plagiarism.

Sex and Violence -- Kubrick's screenplay and directing interweave sex into just about every aspect of the plot. From the opening scene of a B-52 and air tanker "coupled" with lounge music in the background, to the names of characters and many visuals and scenes, Kubrick makes the story almost more about sex than nukes. Examples:
General Jack D. Ripper ( a killer of women) is paranoid about communist plots to weaken his "bodily fluids". We later learn that he means sperm, specifically. When besieged, Ripper wields the huge machine gun in particularly phallic fashion (actually impossible for the real gun).
Colonel Mandrake: The mandrake was a root plant thought to be an aphrodisiac or would enhance fertility. It's even mentioned in the Old Testament in a spat between Rachel and Leah.
President Merkin Muffley: A merkin is a pubic wig. A "muff" is the natural hair in the same role. The president is cast as a sort of feminine-side leader who is too easily side-tracked into quibbles over feelings.
General "Buck" Turgidson: is the hyper-male counterpart to Muffley. Turgid means swollen. Buck is all for getting in there and getting the job done. Very macho. He is shown in a hotel room with his secretary in a bikini. He is also keen on Dr. Strangelove's scenario of 1 man per 10 women secluded in mine shafts. There are more, too numerous to list here.

Subtle Humor -- The excellence of Kubrick's humor lies in its understatement. It also plays on absurdity set against the backdrop of the terrible and serious topic of global nuclear war. Some examples include: when Turgidson and the soviet ambassador are scuffling, the president tells them, "You can't fight in here, this the war room." When Colonel "Bat" Guano (Keenan Wynn) allows Mandrake to call the president on a payphone, he doesn't have enough change for the call. He tells Guano to break into the nearby Coke machine. With armageddon near, he refuses (deadpan), because it's private property. Also, with armageddon looming, the president and the soviet premier continue to get into protracted telephone spats over their feelings. Or, when they all discover that the soviets had a doomsday device, Dr. Strangelove points out that a deterrent is pointless if you don't tell people, the ambassador says sheepishly, "We were going to announce it on Monday?" As with the sexual references, the dark deadpan humor moments are too numerous to list here.

Military Machine -- As an interesting counterfoil to the bumblings and ineptitude of the politicians and the generals, the men aboard the B-52 carry out their roles with machine-like rhythm. Even when their plane is damaged by the soviet missile, they go about their emergency operations with cool dispatch. In Kubrick's hands, they become a human metaphor for the fabled Doomsday Device which will operate automatically -- free from meddling by fallible men.

Ghost Plane -- Admittedly a small thing, but when Kong's B-52 is flying low over the snowy Russian landscape, there is one spot, about 1 hour 35 minutes in, where the shadow can be seen. It is the shadow of a WWII bomber, the B-17. Just plane trivia.

Bottom line? Dr.S is a must-see as a cultural icon alone. Slim Pickens riding the bomb bronco style has been repeated and parodied many times. Aside from its value as an insight into Cold War mentalities (sane and insane), the acting from the stars is not to be missed. Peter Sellers plays all three of his roles amazingly well. Yet, he is almost upstaged by George C. Scott's comedic talent. Also look for an early film appearance of James Earl Jones as the bombardier on the B-52. While Kubrick gave the world a cathartic black humor look at the topic, another 1964 film, Fail Safe would examine a similar scenario, but from a totally serious point of view. The two make a great double-feature.

The Illustrated Man

1969's sci-fi season started off with a film adaptation of Ray Bradury's 1951 book The Illustrated Man (TIM). The book was more of a collection of short stories with vaguely common theme. Warner Brothers' movie used just three of the stories. The three chosen and developed by writer Harold Kreitsek have a dystopic air in common, which fits neatly into the psyche of many 50s and 60s sci-fi. Kreitsek also developed more of a "glue" story for the illustrated man himself, to better bind the three separate tales. Rod Steiger stars as Carl. Claire Bloom plays Felicia. Robert Drivas plays Willie.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Willie is a young man hitchhiking and working odd jobs to get to California where the thinks he'll find a job. He stops for the night beside a rural lake. Carl comes upon Willie's modest camp. Carl has tattoos all over his entire body, from the neck down, except for his left shoulder blade. Carl is testy about them being called tattoos. "They're skin illustrations. Don't you ever call them tattoos." He says he's looking for a particular house and woman who lives in it. She gave him the skin illustrations. He wants to kill her for it. Carl has been an outcast ever since. When people look too long at one of the illustrations, they start to move. They see things. They get angry at Carl. Willie stares at the lion tattoo. The first story begins. Carl and Felicia are a worried mom and dad in the moderne future. Their kids are using the "play room" simulator (like Star Trek NG's holodeck) for grim games with lions eating things. They tell the defiant kids that they're going to remove the play room. The kids protest. That night, mom and dad are awakened to calls from their kids. They go into the play room and are eaten by the lions. Back to hobo Carl and Willie for some banter. Story two takes place on Venus. Four astronauts crashed and are looking for one of the many "sun domes" to take shelter from the incessant rain. They wander around behind Carl's authoritarian leadership. Two end up committing suicide to escape the rain. One is killed. Finally, Carl makes it to a sun dome where a virtual Felicia greets him. Back to hobo Carl and Willie and a bit more back story about Carl getting tattooed. Finally, Willie (unable to resist looking) stares into a tattoo of lips. Story three takes place in an idyllic future. Husband Carl returns to wife Felicia with news that everyone in the world council had the same dream that this would be the last night of earth. Nothing could be done about it, except to give all the children of earth pills so they die in their sleep. This is to spare them any possible agony, should the world end in fire or something. Felicia can't do it. She and Carl have a romantic evening, then fall asleep. Felicia wakes up. The world didn't end. She finds Carl at the children's beds. He wakes up, but the kids are dead. Scream! Back to hobo Carl and Willie. Willie is horrified that Carl would kill his children. Carl dismisses his horror and lies down for sleep. He tells how the lady and the house disappeared after he was all tattooed. "She went back to the future." Willie stares at the blank patch on Carl's should and sees Carl strangling him. So, Willie picks up a big rock and pounds Carl's head. He runs away, but Carl isn't dead, just bloody. He chases Willie. Felcia's voiceover says "Each person who tries to see beyond his own time, must face questions to which there cannot be absolute answers." The End.

Why is this movie fun?
TIM isn't so much "fun" as thought provoking. Ray Bradbury penned some great stories. His imagination shines through even a major studio's adaptation of his work.

Cold War Angle
The undercurrent of dystopia and doom in Bradbury's three short stories are of that Cold War angst mood.

Notes
Prophetess of Doom -- As written by Kreitsek, the tattoo artist Felicia becomes a prophetess from the future who traveled back to the 1930s to leave a sort of message in a bottle (all over Carl's skin) about the bad things that mankind will experience in the future. Were they hints and warnings so mankind would (maybe) avoid the missteps? Some viewers criticize Steiger's portrayal of hobo Carl as being too gruff and hard to sympathize with. Yet, this fits too. He did not much like being the message in a bottle about how bad the future could be. People blame the messenger.

Pictures Without Pain? -- The tattoos on Carl seems quick and painless. No bleeding, no weeks of bandages, etc. While it could be a concession to keeping the plot moving, (no time for distracting details) it could also be that Felicia, from the future, had techniques beyond 20th century methods. She was able to imbue them with prophetic message ability. Thus, they're not your average 1930s tattoo.

Forever Carl -- It seems odd, at first, that all three of the visions Willie sees in Carl's tattoos feature Carl as the primary male character and Felicia as the woman. Rather than just being a shortcut on casting costs, it could represent the vision as Willie sees it. Carl and Felicia are the two people most intimately involved in the prophetic visions, so it's not that far fetched that Willie would use their likenesses in his seeing of the visions.

The Veldt -- The first tale is from one of Bradbury's short stories. He was amazingly percent about technology (in the future) being able to serve up virtual realities. It was even a fitting analogy for the battle between children and parents over television. Bradbury also casts an indictment against the modern "enlightenment" in childrearing. Expression, like any other tool in the hands of humans, can have a sinister dark side.

The Long Rain -- The second tale is similarly dark. All four of the astronauts are stressed to the breaking point by the unrelenting rain of Venus. Three of the four reach their limit and die. One exposes himself to lethal radiation. The second drowns himself in the rain. The third shoots himself with his laser to end it all. Only Commander Carl presses on to find the haven of a sun dome. Inside is yet another play on virtual reality -- a projected Felicia to welcome him.

The Last Night of the World -- The third tale is very much akin to atomic angst movies about the end of the world. This was a prevalent theme in Cold War era writing. Here, the story is focused down onto just one family. The means of the end is never explained, but Cold War audiences didn't need it explained. Similar to On The Beach ('59) people are given poison pills to avoid the actual (and terrible?) end. Similar to The Last War ('61), the family quietly awaits their fate. After all the prior movies about doom, the twist ending is excellent. The prophets of doom were wrong about the end of the world. There was a morning after. They killed their own hope (symbolized by the children) for naught.

Bottom line? TIM is not an easy movie to watch. In a distracting environment it could easily seem like it made no sense whatsoever. This quality it shares with Kubrik's 2001. People who prefer a simple action plot with clear good guys and villains will probably not like TIM. Yet, for 50s sci-fi fans, the three Bradbury vignettes are worth the tangle.

The Last War

In 1961, the same year as Beast of Yucca Flats,Toho Studios put out a blatantly preachy anti-nuke film titled Sekai daisensô. It was their rendition of On The Beach but with the anti-nukes message unencumbered by subtlety or allegory as in Gorath. Toho Studios president M. Shimisa said, "We of the Toho Company are employing every vestige of our technical skill to present as realistically and appealingly as possible exactly what will happen if this colossal horro befalls us. It is our sincere hope that by producing and exhibiting this film we can serve the cause of peace."Sekai daisensô was later edited and dubbed into english, released as The Last War (TLW) in early 1967. This review is for the dubbed version, but comparisons are drawn to the original as well.

Quick Plot Synopsis
The sailors on a Japanese merchant ship say they wish to return to Tokyo, even though they'll die of radiation. The main character, Takano, narrates the story as flashback.Tokyo was a busy, bustling city. It was also the home of the Tamura family whose eldest daughter, Saeko, was his girlfriend. Takano returns from a voyage. He and Saeko deal with how to best ask for her father's blessing for getting married. Intermixed with the family story are news reports of worsening international tensions between two super power alliances (thinly disguised America/Nato and Russia/Communist Block). Military maneuvers with live nuclear weapons increase tensions. A spy sub is captured. Things get more jittery. Both sides experience accidental almost-pushed-the-button moments that were narrowly averted. Other human interest characters are introduced. Takano's ship's cook recovers from surgery (kidney?), so is helping his daughter who is a kindergarten teacher. Lots of cute kids. One of them, Suzuo, is sick and her single mom works far away. Opposing air patrols start firing at each other over the arctic. Nuclear air-to-air weapons are used. The vaguely communist block cross the 38th parallel in Korea but their tanks are stopped. There are appeals for peace by the Japanese government, but summits break down. Takano must ship out again. Saeko goes to Yokohama to see him off, but they get married and enjoy their one night before he does. He ships out. The communist block decide to push their buttons. Missiles are launched -- some to Japanese cities. Panic in the streets as millions flee. Suzuo's mother dies of exhaustion trying to get to her girl. Saeko returns home. There is no defense, so everyone just sits and waits. Tokyo is blown up and consumed by fire storms. Other missiles are launched. Models of Washington DC, London, Paris, and Moscow are blown up too. Everything everywhere is destroyed. Takano finishes his contemplative flashback. Excerpt recordings of JFK's UN speech talk of need for disarmament. Fade to black. The end.

Apocalypse Suffered
Like On The Beach ('59), TLW is a tale in which total global nuclear war is not averted and everyone on earth dies. Like OTB, the intent is to preach disarmament by shocking audiences with the utter horror of global nuclear war. TLW provides a graphic look at how the war started, which OTB left as unseen and unexplained prior events.

Cold War Spotlight
TLW depicts the Cold War scenario with two super power alliances (The Federation and the Alliance, in the original movie), both of which have amble nuclear weapons to annihilate each other. TLW focuses on the hair-trigger dangers in a tense international arena. There is nothing allegorical. Only the names America and Russia are thinly disguised.

Notes
Original vs. Remix -- The original movie ran 125 minutes and told the story in chronological order. About 15 minutes of non-essential footage was edited out of the english-dubbed version. The major re-edit involved starting at the ending (the sailors deciding to return to destroyed Tokyo), and telling the story via flashback and narration. The dubbed dialogue is fairly faithful to the original, though no less awkward as most dubbed foreign films are. A few other peculiar variations exist too, which will be covered below.

No Kaiju -- TLW feels like a typical kaiju movie. It has model landscapes and cities which get destroyed. It has model tanks and planes which fire their little missiles. All it lacks is the monster. Both the special effects men, Eiji Tsuburaya and Akira Watanabe, worked on many of Toho's popular kaiju films: Godzilla, Rodan, The Mysterians, Mothra, Gorath, etc. Their work has a distinctive look and feel, even if there isn't a monster. I suppose the nuclear explosion is their kaiju in this case.

Heart Strings -- The story centers around the Tamura family. Father Moichi, mother Oyoshi, beautiful adult daughter Saeko, and her two young siblings, Hanu and Ichiro. Moichi is the good father, working hard to provide his family with prosperity. Oyoshi is the kindly but sickly mother and family peacemaker. Saeko is in love with merchant seaman Takano (who is also a boarder at the Tamura household, no doubt how he and Saeko got to know each other). Hanu and Ichiro are stereotypic kids. All of the character development is crafted to make the viewer care about the Tamura family. Thus, the viewer's heart strings are supposed to be pulled when at the end, they sit together silently in their living room, waiting for the missile to hit Tokyo.

Blasted Landmarks -- As has become traditional for apocalyptic movies, many familiar landmarks get destroyed. Among them are the US Capitol building, the Manhattan skyline and the Statue of Liberty, London's Tower Bridge, the Arc d'Triumphe, the Kremlin and Japan's National Diet building. The pyramidal top of the latter gets show several times at the end, the only recognizable bit amid the rubble and flames of Tokyo. How to show the destruction of Paris? Blow up the Eiffel Tower or Arc de Triomphe. Must faster on screen. This pattern of destroying symbolic landmarks would become an almost-required element for later doom films.

Bad English -- In the original, the two super powers both spoke English (and were played by caucasian actors). Japanese subtitles translated. But, the english spoken by these actors was mumbled or inarticulate, or just badly delivered. To Japanese ears, it probably sounded fine -- a bunch of "foreign" blather anyhow. Interestingly, in the english dubbed version, TLW, the caucasian actors' english was dubbed in too, by better voice talent. Listen for the distinctive voice of Paul Frees.

Random Act of Disney? -- In the original, the old cook's daughter has her kindergarteners sing him a farewell song. It is a traditional New Year's song (though the lyrics were not subtitled). In the english-dubbed version, the kids are dubbed to be singing "It's a small world (after all)." As unrelated as a Disney tune seems to an anti-war film, it actually does have a connection. Disney's songwriters Robert B. Sherman and Richard M. Sherman wrote the tune in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis -- which occurred only a year after the original film was released. The song debuted at the '64 New York World's Fair, and later became a Disneyland hallmark.

Biblical Variants -- In the original, Saeko sees that the sweet potato street vendor has a Bible at his cart. She picks it up and reads from it James 4:1-3. These are the verses that say "why are there wars among you? Because you lust and have not." On the one hand, it's clear that Toho was using western tradition (the Bible) as an indictment. On the other hand, it's interesting that a bible in Japanese is included at all. The old street vendor took it with him everywhere, and Saeko was familiar enough with it to flip it open and read from James. In the english version, Saeko reads from the Bible too, but the writers started with Psalm 140, verse 1 and 2, " Deliver me, O LORD, from the evil man: preserve me from the violent man". Then they added excerpts from Jeremiah 49:2,3 about alarms of war and daughters burned with fire. After that, they resumed the original verses out of James.

JFK Epilogue -- TLW wraps up with an extended quote from JFK's speech to the UN assembly in September 1961. The occasion was a memorial for the death of the Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold. He died when his plane crashed in Rhodesia (later Zambia) while on a peace-brokering mission. The loss of such a capable peace-maker at a time when US/Soviet tenses were flaring, was troubling. JFK used the occasion to denounce nuclear proliferation. The writers/editors remixed parts of JFK's 3rd and 13th paragraphs, including the famous quote that mankind must end war, or war will end mankind.

Bottom line? TLW is interesting as a snapshot of Cold War mood. Told from the Japanese point of view (not one of the warring sides), it captures some of that helpless feeling most people had. The message is delivered with little subtlety, but even this conveys some of the sense of urgency people felt. The model work has its interest, but it's not the focal point. For a personal (if depressing) double-feature, watch TLW to get the war, then On the Beach for doom of survivors, such as the sailors on Takano's ship -- A double dose of doom.

The Beast of Yucca Flats

This is another movie which is often called "the worst movie ever," and perhaps not unrightfully so. The Beast of Yucca Flats (BYF) was Coleman Francis's first screenplay, and his first attempt at directing. The result is too odd to be dismissed as mere amateurish errors. Francis may have tried too hard to put too much "art" into his first film, but lacked the filmmaking experience to succeed. Or, it may be like an un-hip square attempting beatnik poetry. BYF may be yet another example of where being both writer AND director is NOT an advantage.
On the surface, BYF is (or tries to be) in the atomic-monster sub-genre. In that, it's the usual cautionary tale of the dangers of nuclear testing. Yet, there are so many non-sequetors elements, that Francis is trying to say much more. For the vast majority of viewers, he's not successful. It's hard to cast BYF as sci-fi, as there is nothing beyond radiation as the link. It's more of an obtuse "art" movie which requires pondering. It's no quick invasion romp, or monster bash.

Quick Plot Synopsis
Joseph Javorsky (Tor Johnson), a defecting Soviet scientist, lands via a small plane in the Nevada desert. He escapes 2 KGB agents by running into the Yucca Flats nuclear testing range. A test blast transforms Javorsky into The Beast (Tor with radiation burn make up). The Beast strangles a man trying fix his car. He chokes the wife into unconsciousness and carries her to his desert cave. A sheriff is alerted to the crime scene. They find the almost dead woman and decide to mount an aerial search for the killer. Meanwhile, the Radcliff family on vacation has a flat tire while crossing that same desert. The boys wander off. The airborne sheriff spots the father in the desert, searching for his boys, mistakes him for the killer and starts shooting at him. The boys encounter the Beast, elude him and hide, ironically in the Beast's cave. They sneak out while he sleeps, but the Beast awakens and chases them. The two sheriffs catch up and shoot the Beast dead, eventually. Before he dies, the Beast kisses a rabbit. The end.

Beware Radiation!
The basic plot message (not the moral) is the tried-and-true theme of The Dangers of Radiation. Bombs, or being irradiated causes otherwise peaceable swedish wrestlers to become murderous beasts. This plot trope had been around a long time before Francis wrote BYF, so it seems unlikely he was all that invested in the message. The Quatermass Xperiment ('55) featured a man turned into a monster-blob by cosmic radiation. Amazing Colossal Man ('57) and its tribe, all spun off the same notion of a man exposed during a nuclear test. There are many others too, suggesting that Francis just re-used the notion as a framework for his other 'art' messages.

Cold War Angle
A defecting Russian scientist, nuclear tests and an radiation-created beast seem like components of a Cold War parable, but the connection is elusive. Soviet man-of-science Javorsky becoming the nuclear killer beast, may be the analogy, but this seems obtuse.

Notes
Tor the Terrible -- Tor Johnson, former swedish wrestler, starred in Ed Wood Jr.'s Plan 9 from Outer Space as a hulking zombie. His role here is virtually the same, just with radiation instead of aliens as the catalyst. Tor seems to have been chosen for such films for his mouth-agape, arms-outstretched hulking walk.

Faceless Words -- You never see anyone's lips move in this film. Clearly, Francis did so intentionally. Voices and effects were dubbed in later. Some say he was worried about synching the voices, but by 1961, synching was routine. It may have been to save money, or as an "art" feature. The voices seem to lay over the images, rather like a comic book's word balloons exist on a different plane than the characters. An attempt at surrealism? The narrator (Francis himself) explains things, or people "speak" when turned away from the camera or their faces not seen. Watch BYF for this. It is a filmography oddity.

They ARE After Our Women -- The Beast gives us the typical abduction scene. He kills the 4CV's husband, then chokes the wife to unconsciousness and carries her off. He pets her hair and once he has her at his cave, enacts some caveman kissing gestures towards her, definitely intended to push those tribal fear buttons. Beasts want our women!

Pointless Cheesecake? -- The longer version of BoYF opens with a young woman coming out of a shower. She appears topless for a brief moment. She is later strangled in her bed. This is all before Javorsky becomes The Beast, so her nude scenes seem a complete non-sequetor. Is it a flash-forward? One of The Beasts victims we preview? Or is it Javorsky's wife back in Russia -- killed because he defected? Francis doesn't tie this one up. A second scene, when Sheriff Joe gets sharpshooter Jim out of bed, we're given long camera glances at his wife's bosom barely contained in a deep cut nightie. She obligingly bends over slowly (twice) to expose maximum cleavage. She then tucks her long legs back into bed. Again, a total non-sequetor. In fact, she's the largest figure on the (cheap) theatrical poster, even though she plays no role in the plot. Since a re-issue title for the movie was "Girl Madness", one has to wonder if Francis intended more than just a cheap use of boobs to boost interest in his audiences.

Alternate Narrative Agenda -- Nothing in the visual story is all that moving. A nuclear blast creates a beast. The beast kills, is hunted and eventually killed himself. It's in the narration that you get the idea Francis is trying to tell a much bigger story that is not coming off terribly well. Below are some narration snippets.
"Jim Archer, another man caught up in the frantic race for the betterment of mankind." Jim is the sharpshooter who hunts down Mr. Radcliff, not the Beast. "Shoot first, ask questions later." What sort of fascist law enforcement is this? Quite the ranger department out there.
About Hank Radcliff (the boys' father), "An innocent victim, caught in the wheels of justice. A man runs. Somebody shoots at him." Perhaps this is a commentary on the plight of the average man in the witch-hunt environment of the Cold War?
About the Radcliff boys, "Boys from the city, not yet caught up in the whirlwind of progress, feed soda pop to thirsty pigs.." Setting up the boys' innocence? A commentary on the frivolity of modern life?
About the gas station attendant napping in the shade, "Nothing bothers some people, not even flying saucers." The apathy of the masses? One can only guess. No one said anything about flying saucers. It's a radiated Beast movie.
Francis has something he wants to say, but it's not all that clear what it is.

Dangling Non-Sequetors -- There are so many loose ends in BYF that it's like a bad shag rug. Spotting them all can take several viewings. For example, Hank Radcliff was searching for his lost boys, but is shot at repeatedly by men in a plane. (echos of Hitchcock's North by Northwest) When Hank gets back to the road, he leaves his wife there "in case the boys return." Does he dislike his wife? He was just being shot at by men in a plane? Wouldn't she be in danger there? But that's not all. Hank does not go to the police, he summons total strangers to help him look for his boys. What? There are still men with guns in a plane. Does Hank know something about the local police that we don't? He was passing through on vacation. How could he know Jim and Joe were neo-fascist rangers? Why did he think the neighbors wouldn't want to shoot him too? There are many other such non-sequtors which will leave your mouth hanging open, a "what?" on your lips. Like a Rubik's Cube, they take a lot of effort to resolve.

Apocryphal Bunny -- It's been said that the jackrabbit which hops up to the fallen Beast at the end, was a wild one that just happened on the set. Tor, ad-libbed and kissed the bunny before "dying." Francis decided to keep it in the film. This smacks of fabricated urban legend. That bunny acts far too tame around Tor (who was himself surrounded by camera crew, etc.) for it to be a wild bunny. It doesn't struggle at all when Tor grabs it in his huge hand. Nor does it seem likely that Francis had no ending in mind for his movie so a random rabbit would suffice. For my money, Francis planned it all along. Just another random beatnik feature.

Car Nut Moment -- A tidbit only a car nut could love, is that the young couple (of whom the Beast kills the husband and carries off the wife) were driving a Renault 4CV! Here is an obscure little car. Designed in the 40s, while France was occupied by the Nazis, the 4CV was to be the French equivalent to the Volkswagen "Beetle," Manufactured between 1946 and '61, it also had a rear engine like the Beetle, but unlike the Beetle, had a reputation for being particularly unreliable. Not that many made it to the USA for that reason. Perhaps that is why Francis chose it for the hapless couple. If they'd bought American, they might have lived! That's a stretch, but a car nut might think this.

Bottom line? BYF is not an entertainment movie. It's a cryptic sci-fi "art" film by an artist who isn't especially gifted. Still, like a stroke victim mumbling at you, there is an urge to try to understand -- on the assumption they are trying to say something rational. Francis went to too much work on BYF to dismiss it as mere dementia.

Mission Stardust

This German-Italian co-production was originally released with the title 4...3...2...1...Morte! in Italy and Germany in late '67 . The English-dubbed version played in American as Mission Stardust (MS) in November of '68. Based loosely on the Perry Rhodan stories popular in Europe, MS shares the fate of most books (or TV shows) turned into movies. They're too different for hard-core fans to love, and too unusual for the non-initiate to love. MS did make good drive-in fodder, however. There were enough sexual innuendos and hints of voyeurism to appeal to the teenaged drive-in crowd.

Quick Plot Synopsis
A secretive mission to the moon is planned, to check out some unusual metal readings. Major. Perry Rhodan will command, aided by Capt. Mike Bull, Captain Flipper and Dr. Manoli. When they're about to land on the moon, something goes awry and they land far off course. Communications are jammed, so Perry and Mike explore in the Rover. Eventually, they discover a spherical alien craft. A robot ushers them in. They meet two aliens from the planet Arkon -- an old scientist named Crest and the beautiful platinum blonde, Thora. They were on a mission to find a new, young race to interbreed with when they had mechanical trouble. Perry and Thora exchange insults and boasts over superior and inferior beings. Crest is sick with Leukemia. Perry knows an earth doctor with a cure for it. They travel to earth in a miniature version of the sphere ship. They land in east Africa to find Dr. Haggard, but all this is known to a crime boss named Arkin who is arranging to steal the alien ship. Perry and Mike make their way through shady characters to Dr. Haggard and bring him back to the ship. Perry stays behind to stop Arkin's men, but gets captured. All the while, a bombastic army general is obsessed with arresting the aliens, but is prevented by Thora's force field. It turns out that Captain Flipper is one of Arkin's men, so Arkin knows all. Dr. Haggard and his nurses (blonde and shapely, naturally) turn out to be fakes employed by Arkin too. They try to hijack the ship, but Thora releases her robots who zap all the baddies into oblivion. Flipper escapes with Thora as hostage. She is taken to Larkin's secret island base. He threatens her menacingly. Flipper plays with her gadgets, turning on her locator beacon. Perry, Mike and Crest arrive in the pod ship. Mike and Perry burst into Arkin's lair. They free Thora and the real Dr. Haggard. Arkin escapes. Thora blows up the whole island out of angry spite. Arkin, however, somehow followed them aboard and hold them at gunpoint. Perry and Mike move in slowly on Arkin, saying that he can get them all. Arkin gets cowardly in final moments, then falls out an air lock into the cold void of space. The pod is en route to the moon. Back aboard the mother ship, Crest feels all better since the real Dr. Haggard cured his leukemia. Crest would like a treaty between their races, for interbreeding. Mike is keen on being a stud, but Perry and Thora are already making out heavily in the next room. The 'experiment' has already begun. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
Spaghetti sci-fi has an off-beat earnestness that is appealing. The special effects and models are classic B sci-fi of the late 50s and early 60s. The plot and action could easily have fit into a secret-agent film, or a western, so it's simple fun. The alien ship models and sets are amusing too.

Cold War Angle
There is little of the Cold War in MS. The plot amounts to a spy-crime-western set in space, with a couple of human "aliens" in the mix.

Notes
Based on the Books -- Elements of the plot were borrowed from the Perry Rhodan sci-fi series of novellas popular in Europe in the early and mid-60s. The books ran through thousands of installments, so Rhodan fans had an enormous story base they lived in. No single movie could live up to that. As often happens in feature film versions of much longer sagas, much had to be condensed or left out. New material (such as the stereotype villain) are added to spice up the action. (Cerebral musing over dark matter and parallel universes works in books, but dies on the screen)

Tough Babe -- The character of Thora is about the only one with any depth. The rest are predictably two-dimensional. Thora is, on the one hand, the feminist ideal of the tough-talking, independent, modern woman. On the other hand, she is pretty easily subdued by various men, knocked out with one punch, and most importantly, melts into love-butter in the arms of the "primative" earthly hunk hero, Rhodan. These latter traits are decidedly old-school "woman" and tend to override her tough feminist portrayals.

Kirk's Ilk -- Later, more "enlightened" cultures would prefer their fictional leaders to have less libido. Compare Star Trek's stoic Picard to babe-magnet Kirk. Yet, Kirk was a man of his times -- square jawed, tough, ready with his fists and equally ready to smooch up the pretty space princesses. Perry Rhodan is a commander in the same zeitgeist. Though his character in MS was fairly flat, all the hallmarks of the archetype were there.

Babe Watch -- Also apparent, and goes hand in hand with the Hunk Captain character, is the woman-as-sexiness character. Even the tough-babe Thora is a platinum blonde, young and curvaceous. She does a shadow striptease just to reinforce the point. (side note: If the Arkons had advanced beyond primitive physicality, why did she bother to dress behind a screen?) The fake doctor's two assistants were tall, young, very blond and curvaceous. Of course, movie makers knew that young men were the larger market for movie tickets, so a bit of pandering is not surprising.

Bottom line? MS is not a particularly "deep" movie. All of its characters are predictable standards. The models, sets and special effects are adequate, but not impressive. The visual style has an italian flavor, reminiscent of the Gamma One films. Yet, at it's heart, MS is a crime drama. The alpha-villain schemes to steal the MacGuffin. Hunky hero stops him and melts the heart of icy leading lady. Rhodan fans may be turned off by the trite. Fans of B sci-fi may simply entertained.

Barbarella

Dino De Laurentis' adaptation of Jean-Claude Forest's comic book heroine, Barbarella, makes for bizarre and conflicted sci-fi movie. The film is not especially funny for a comedy, and takes itself too seriously as camp or parody. As a sci-fi, yes, there are space ships, a distant planet and some ray guns. But, as in the original graphic novels, they are mere trappings to what is essentially a sex-crazed fantasy. A cluster of script writers adapted Forest's basic story elements (such as they were), into a marginally coherent screenplay. They kept the basic premise of having the main character have sex with one character after another. This campy, surreal quality has made the film a cult favorite for some.

Quick Plot Synopsis
After a pointless striptease under the credits, Barbarella (Jane Fonda) is given an assignment by the President of the Earth. She must find the evil scientist Durand-Durand, who has created a super-weapon and threatens to reintroduce war to the flaccidly love-obsessed universe. A magnetic storm causes Barb to crash on the planet. She is quickly captured by feral children with biting dolls. She is rescued by Mark Hand. He takes her to Professor Ping who can fix her ship, but it will take weeks. Barb's new friend is the "angel" Pygar, who lost his will to fly until he's "enjoyed" Barb. Pygar flies her to the evil city of Sogo, battling leather guards in flying pods. Inside the city of sin, they meet several characters including The Concierge, the Black Queen and Dildano. The city of Sogo derives its power from the blob-like energy being beneath the city: The Mathmos. It feeds on evil, so the citizens commit sins and crimes continually so as to feed The Mathmos, and thereby power their city. Barb loses Pygar. She is captured and sentenced to death by birds. She is rescued by Dildano, a semi-inept revolutionary. He gives her the invisible key to the black queen's dream chamber. Durand-Durand captures Barb. He tries to kill her his extreme pleasure machine with an overdose of orgasm, but she overloads his machine. Plan B, he locks her into the queen's chamber, so he can take over. He is then free to conquer Sogo, and then the universe with his positronic ray. Just as Durand is crowning himself, Dildano and the Labyrinth people stage their attack. To thwart all, the queen releases the Mathmos. The energy blob rises up and destroys the city. The Mathmos can't touch Barb, or Pygar, as they're pure innocence. Pygar flies off carrying Barb and the queen, to find Barb's ship. Roll credits. The End.

Why is this movie fun?
Actually, I found the movie annoying in general. Yet, there were a few scenes and tropes which held some deeper thoughtfulness. For example, the people wandering the labyrinth, slowly being absorbed into its walls. But, it's too easy to lose these moments in the juvenile preoccupation with Barbarella in post-orgasm glow. Who cares?

Cold War Angle
This has to be read between the sex-obsessed lines, but we do have an evil power and a doomsday weapon threatening to unleash war upon a peaceful universe. However, no one will think that this metaphor is the prime plot motivator.

Notes
Graphic Beginnings -- Barbarella started out as a French graphic novel (comic book) by Jean-Claude Forest, in the early 60s. She was introduced to American audiences in 1966. Her various scantily-clad adventures managed to somehow always be sex-obsessed. Even as a comic book, they were clearly adult entertainment (not your childhood Superman comics). De Laurentis' film version used some of the comic series characters and situations, but with very little explanation. An example would be Stomoxys and Glossina, the evil twin sisters. They get a few minutes on screen, but only those who know of the comics would know who they were.

Waiting for Bardot -- Forest's original drawings of Barbarella strongly resembled Brigitte Bardot -- Vadim's wife from '52 to '57, and favorite of France. Bardot starred as the sex-kitten in some films written or directed by Vadim while they were married. By the time Barbarella was in the works, Bardot would hardly have taken the role. Vadim's new wife since 1965 was Jane Fonda. Jane was dolled up as a big-hair blonde (ala Bardot) and put into costumes befitting a sex-kitten, though Fonda was less amply endowed than Bardot, or Forest's drawings.

Expensive Hobby -- Where the graphic novels (inexpensive to produce) had some popularity, the movie version was a tough sell. Imdb cites a production cost of 9 million dollars. Shot entirely on sound stages, with vast sets, elaborate props and scads of costumes, this figure seems plausible. Financially, Barbarella was a huge loser. Panned at the box office, and by critics, it had an income of only 6 hundred thousand dollars.

Confilct of Interests The film suddenly created Fonda as a sex-kitten actress. The role and costumes virtually guaranteed that whoever played it would be the new sex-kitten. Fonda played the role well. But she quickly shunned the role in favor of feminism and political activism. She was not yet embroiled in her Hanoi Jane morass. Fonda got fussier about her movie roles and went on to higher dramatic acclaim -- perhaps narrowly avoiding the typecasting that befell other screen sex-kittens.

Bottom line? Barbarella has the vast complexity of a better sci-fi dystopia film, but is constantly deflated by obsession over implied sex scenes and efforts to expose Fonda's breasts. As porn, it fails. As comedy, it fails. As fantasy, it's too confused, or ill-explained. Fans of serious sci-fi can save the annoyance. Fans of Jane's young breasts will probably stay interested. As an example of 60s "Free Love" hippy thinking, it's a massive dose -- shag carpet, lava lamps and all.

Panic In The Year Zero!

American International Pictures was not famous for great movies, but Panic In The Year Zero (PYZ) was a pretty good movie. It was highly topical, given that it was released at the frightening height of the Cold War. It starred, and was directed by Ray Milland -- an actor past his peak, but still solid. Frankie Avalon -- before becoming mired in the whole beach party genre, plays his son Rick. PYZ is classic Atomic Angst, playing out the "what if..." following an all-out nuclear war. The film is sometimes categorized as sci-fi, but this may be because nuclear apocalypse films often were. There is no science in PYZ. There is a tangental connection to sci-fi via the writer Jay Simms. He did pen several B sci-fi movies, however. He brought us The Killer Shrews, The Giant Gila Monster (both '59) and Creation of the Humanoids ('62)

Quick Plot Synopsis
The Baldwin family set out for a fishing vacation in the hills. A few hours outside of Los Angeles they see bright flashes from behind them. Massive mushroom clouds rise of LA. Ann, Harry's wife, wants to return to see if her mother is okay, but reckless refugee traffic eventually turns them back. Harry decides that civilization is about to crumble so he turns off to an out-of-the-way small town to buy supplies. They stock up on groceries and hardware like axes and rope. When Ed Johnson, the hardware store owner refuses Harry's check and promise to return and pay, Harry decks him and leaves (with the goods). A gas station operator tries to gouge $3 a gallon (sakes!) where his sign says 34 cents per gallon. Harry decks him and leaves the ten dollars (regular price.) The Baldwins eventually escape the traffic, but are beset by a convertible carrying three hoodlums. The three plan to rob and kill Harry, but Rick (Avalon) shoots from within the trailer, wounding Andy slightly. The hoodlums depart. Once at the remote campsite, Harry and Rick wreck the rickety bridge, limiting access. Rick knows of a cave in the rocky hills big enough to live in. The family set up home in the cave. Scattered radio reports tell of other major cities being destroyed by nuclear attack, and American counter attacks on enemy cities. Law and order difficult to maintain. The UN declares this to be the year zero. Harry encounters Ed Johnson in the woods. He and his wife set up home in the Baldwin's abandoned trailer. Harry's cool to the idea of socializing, worried that it would expose their cave hideout. Smoke from a distant farmhouse belies someone else living in the area too. While hunting a buck, Rick hears two shots fired. Later, he and Harry find Mr and Mrs. Johnson shot dead at the trailer. The three hoodlums have set up home in the farmhouse. One day, Ann does laundry in the river, but one of her slips floats away. Andy and Mickey find it, follow upriver, and come across Karen (the Baldwin's teen daughter). There is an off-camera suggestion that Mickey sexually abuses Karen. Her screams bring Ann running. She takes a distant shot at the men, frightening them off. Harry finds out and is outraged at the hoodlums. He and Rick sneak up to the farmhouse while the leader, Carl, is away. Harry overhears Mickey and Andy talking about attacking Karen. He and Rick burst in. Mickey makes a move for a gun, so Harry shoots him. Andy looks contrite, but Harry shoots him anyway. They search the house and find the hoodlums' sex slave, Marilyn locked in a bedroom. She's wary, but agrees to come with them. They hide the bodies in the barn. Back at the cave, Karen is recovering and Marilyn is softening to Rick's 50s cuteness. Carl, prowling for who killed his buddies, comes upon Marilyn and Rick out gathering firewood. Carl shoots Rick in the thigh. Marilyn shoots Carl dead. The first aid kit isn't enough for Rick's wound, so they uncover the car and drive to the nearest town looking for a doctor. They find one, but he says Rick needs blood. The nearest hospital with blood is 60 miles away. The Baldwins drive on into the night, but encounter another vehicle. Instead of hoodlums, it turns out to be an advanced Army patrol. They direct Harry to an aid station just 10 miles down the road. As they drive off, the two soldiers reflect on the hopeful future of America. The End.

Apocalypse Survived
Like many dramas of the Cold War era, PYZ plays out the scenario of the collapse of civilization after a massive nuclear war. Instead of focusing on radiation (mutants or sickness or death), the story stays confined to lawlessness and survival. The off-screen devastation and chaos leave survivors in the hinterlands on their own. Some become greedy, some become rapists and killers. That background of fallen man is what Harry Baldwin is headstrong determined to have his family survive. They do, but not unscathed. The moral of the story is: as bad as nuclear war can be, it can be survived. This is quite the opposite message from the movie On The Beach ('59) in which no one survives.

Cold War Spotlight
One of the nagging fears of the Cold War era was that doom could rain at any moment -- without warning. The Baldwin family blithely start a vacation with no hint from current events that a nuclear attack was at hand. The radio announcer provides the larger off-screen view that most major western cities were destroyed and that American had retaliated. Several of the "enemy's" cities were destroyed too. A subtle hint of patriotic confidence is written in, such that we hear the enemy sues for peace terms. America "won."

Notes
Man's Dark Side -- The real story within PYZ is not the more familiar atomic mutants that result from a nuclear war. It is the emergence of mankind's own "dark side" from within. The various institutions of civilization corral and leash fallen man's tendency towards evil, but it is never truly tamed, or eliminated. In the Cold War ethos, global nuclear war would break down civilization's fences, snap the leash. This is shown in small stages -- price gouging, etc. -- but most clearly in the three hoodlums: Carl, Mickey and Andy. They represent ruthless, black-hearted man, amused at theft, killing and rape. But note too, how Harry, Ann and Rick discover their own hint of dark side. Each comes to accept killing too, albeit for more noble reasons.

Panic's Two Faces -- It can seem, at first, that the characters of Harry and Ann are written shallow. She is all denial. He becomes authoritarian, with total bunker-vision. Yet, with a bit deeper look, Harry and Ann each portray two polar responses to the nuclear apocalypse -- go into survival mode and try to remain civilized. Both of these would be present in most people. Indeed, the two responses are present in both Harry and Ann. He chides her for clinging too hard to the old ways of civility, yet acts honorably. He decks the price-gouging gas station man, but still pays (advertised price) for his gas. Ann, still expecting mutual civility, balks at the killing of hoodlum Andy at first encounter. Yet, later, she is quick to shoot at him as they ravage her daughter. By the end of the film, the two faces have become more blended in both Harry and Ann. Both live in bunkerism with hope for civility's return.

Army? Thank God! -- A background current within the story is that American society and institutions are essentially "good." There are just some very bad apples in the bunch. Store owner Ed Johnson turns out to be just a regular guy, then hapless victim of evil. Dr. Strong (aptly named) is a noble remnant. The America-is-okay sentiment is most evident when the Baldwins encounter the army patrol near the very end of the film. "Oh Harry, the ARMY. Thank God!" Darker, most pessimistic (modern) films would have cast the doctor as just another guy on the make, and the army patrol is little better than uniformed hoodlums.

Familiar Ground -- The boulder-strewn landscape of "the hills" in which Harry hides is family, could look very familiar to people who watched a lot of westerns on television or Republic serials shot in the 40s and 50s. It looks familiar because it's the same land. TV series like Bonanza, Gunsmoke,The Virginian, and The Rifleman were shot there. In the sci-fi realm, the Commando Cody serials and Captain Video series were shot there too.

Car Nuts -- Fans of 50s (and early 60s) cars will find a candy store on parade. All the traffic scenes feature dozens of 40s, 50s and 60s iron. The Baldwin's '62 Mercury Monterey gets a lot of camera time, but there are glimpses of many less-famous models, too numerous to list here.

Bottom line? PYZ is well paced, with enough action and events to keep the average viewer engaged. The film's low budget prevent more lavish treatment of a nuclear holocaust, but Milland navigates this well enough by focusing on the human drama rather than topics requiring special effects, sets or extensive makeup. The result is a focused drama about the thinness of civilization's veneer. PYZ is a good peek into the Cold War citizen's heart.