Horror I Missed: Scanners

Welcome back to the week boys and girls. Today in Horror I Missed I felt it was appropriate we tackle a Chronenberg film. Who is David Cronenberg? Writer/director of the following: The Brood, Scanners, Videodrome, The Fly, Dead Ringers, Naked Lunch, Scanner Cop, eXistenZ, Spider, Eastern Promises and A Dangerous Method so expect warped, depraved and out where the buses don't roam. Psionics are possible. People with mental abilities far superior to that of average folks giving them a license to dominate so to police the police or the psionics, a high ranking telepath is sent to track down others like him. This is Scanners.

There is no Dana. Only Zuul.

The private security firm ConSec shows off their new conceivable living weapons known as scanners. During the presentation, one of the corporate scanners attempts to read the mind of a volunteer from the audience and when it appears the volunteer whips the psionic whammy on him causing his whole to burst like a water balloon. The officers to acquire said audience member when he smashes these men attempting to guard him and runs like he is on fire.

With a serious black eye to the corporation, head of security Braedon Keller (Lawrence Dane of Street Legal, Twin Sisters, The Good Fight, Amy Fisher: My Story, The Red Green Show, Darkman II: The Return of Durant, Black Fox, Black Fox: Good Men and Bad and Senior Trip) wants scanners taken off the table as they are too unpredictable but head of scanner research and programming Dr. Ruth (Patrick McGoohan of Secret Agent, The Prisoner, Ice Station Zebra, Escape from Alcatraz, The Hard Way, The Phantom and Treasure Planet) feels this very presence proves there is good and evil. The assassination attempts shows the great potential of how impressive these abilities can truly be. Ruth points out that the evils in question can be lain at the feet of one powerful scanner Darryl Revok (Michael Ironside of V: The Final Battle, V, Top Gun, Total Recall, Highlander II: The Quickening, McBain, Night Trap, SeaQuest 2032, Starship Troopers, Superman: The Animated Series and Splinter Cell). He is far too powerful to ignore so with Ruth's contacts with the underground (Yup a psionic railroad) that can sneak a fellow scanner into Revok's ranks.

Is this a model shoot?

As if from a plot device, a homeless man Cameron Vale (Stephen Lack of Montreal Main, The Rubber Gun, Head On, Scanners, A 20^th Century Chocolate Cake, Prefect Strangers, Dead Ringers, All the Vermeers in New York and Ernstfall in Havana) driven mad by his own telepathy and countless people's thoughts bombarding him and leaving him crazed until Ruth can give him an inhibitor drug allowing Vale a few minutes of sanity. Ruth explains to Vale that being a scanner, Revok is out looking for any scanner that does not join his ranks is a threat to him. Ruth will help Vale perfect his telepathic skills.

Someone is having dirty thoughts.  It is quite graphic.

A drug known as Ephemerol helps ease the power of extrasensory sensitives and Revok is convinced this wonder drug will become the edge for his people in dominating the norms. This bleak future ranges some thriller and espionage with car chases, conspiracy theories and even some gun fights.

Will the regulars be held sway over?? Will the telepaths run the show?? Will Revok rule the world??

The amazing SFX work from a cross between practical effects, special latex, squibs, prosthetics bringing a gruesome realism to the effects is brought to us by veteran and Academy Award winning make-up artist Dick Smith for Amadeus and nomination for Dad.

Dick Smith (Way Out, Hunch of Notre-Dame, Dark Shadows, Little Big Man, The Godfather, The Exorcist, Death Becomes Her, Forever Young and House on Haunted Hill) is also mentor to Rick Baker showing him effects to create swelling to Linda Blair's stomach in The Exorcist and the bladder effect with bleeding effect with a small controlled explosion with a squib that spatters in the direction it is needed for.

Not sure if this bit of trivia helps anyone but probably the only film that Cronenberg wrote that didn't have some level of sexual content in it and cost of filming in Montreal and Toronto was 4.1 million CAD. I believe the conversion to "ACTUAL MONEY" is a little over 3 million managing to gross over $14 million. Loved it was filmed in Panavision with 35 mm Spherical giving it the fish eyed lens.

Okay that wasn't nice to Canada. I don't know what it was all aboot.

President Trump!?!  BLARGGGGHHHH!!!!!

Larson 80s Week: Buck Rogers in the 25th Century

Howdy doodly doo!!! Back again for more Larson 80s TV Week and  what better way for Larson to be on top of his game I believe given its collection of action figures, vehicle and playsets that this particular marketable show got almost as much love as Battlestar Galactica.  Based on comic strip artist Philip Francis Nowlan’s work which became novellas, radio shows and even serials starring Buster Crabbe; this phenomenon swept the nation is a big rush. So strap your blaster, prep your starfighter and get ready to defend Earth in the future.  This is Buck Rogers in the 25^th Century.

Thanks to Head and Shoulders I'm not afraid of flakes.

Twiki: Put me down, you big spoiler.

Due to the popularity of Star Wars dominating the big screen and Empire Strikes Back carving itself a slice out of the box office, Larson felt now was the time to hit the Sci-Fi market and hit it hard to squeeze as much material out of it as possible.  Revamping the old serial formula and putting a handsome and built guy in the lead role was a sure fire bet to win over America’s youth and possibly entertain the adults as well.  

Damn you, space vortex!!!

Captain William “Buck” Rogers (Gil Gerard of Man on a Swing, Not Another Affair, Johnny Blue, Sidekicks, The Stepdaughter and Ghost Town) is a 20^th century astronaut caught is a freak accident blown out of orbit of the planet and causing his return trip to lapse him 500 years into the future.  By this time the planet has recovered from nuclear fallout but is under constant attack by the Draconian Empire (D&D nerds are giggling).    The Earth Defense Directorate in need of combat pilots and hand to hand combatants (because apparently since we are done blowing each other up, we all forgot how to fight) Buck is drafted in.   Somehow his superior officer Colonel Wilma Deering (Erin Gray of The Fall Guy, Six Pack Born Beautiful, Code of Vengeance, Silver Spoons and Friday the 13^th Part 9: Jason Goes to Hell) adheres to most of Rogers’s make it up as you go plans leading them into fire fights, starfighter dog fights and more of Buck trying to outdo Kirk in the making out with aliens category.   Personally, I think Kirk’s record is safe. 

I had a few fun facts about the show.   The production managed to recycled a buttload of props from Battlestar Galactica from scale model effects, costumes, blasters and even more than a few of the cockpits of the Viper starships.   Universal studios were so thrilled to receive a good Neilsen run that it opted to release the Buck Rogers TV movie.

With the rising popularity amongst kids, two sets of action figures were produced by main toy distributor Mego for a 12 inch high line as well as a series of 3 ¾ figures and scaled starships.  Milton Bradley released a board game and several jigsaw puzzles while model kits were created by Monogram.  A few die cast space and land vessels were created by Corgi, Topps has a hand in a series of trading cards and of course a Buck Rogers lunch box to follow.  

Even Gold Key Comics produced comics of the very same stories from the pilot and the second episode but there after followed the old comic strips and novellas.

Colgate: Earth's official toothpaste for 500 years.

Sci-Fi Week: The Ice Pirates

Hey kids I’m baaaaaack.   And what could be more than searching all of Dune for spice, oh wait that we aren’t watching anything as near as classy as Dune.  Thank God too.  If you are not a Frank Herbert fan you can barely follow the original Dune anyway.  No instead I thought we go with something campy, goofy and entirely too much blue screen.  So grab your vibroblades, hoist the pirate colors and beware of space herpes.   This is The Ice Pirates.

Never bother an alien on the crapper

Spoilers are the source of ultimate power!!!

Well folks starting this off I want to point out this is not meant to be taken serious…at all.  Scifi/Comedy here.  Writer Stanford Sherman (The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Batman, Shalimar, Krull and The Man Who Wasn’t There) and writer/director Stewart Raffill (Across the Great Divide, High Risk, The Sea Gypsies, Mac and Me and Passenger 57) comes a tale in the far away future where the galaxy is apparently drying up.  The main gold mine these days is water. Yes H2O worth more than all the spice the Atreides clan can muster.   Now when pirate is used in a sentence you normally think a scarred, scurvy ridden rapist and pillager.  Well not so much is the case here.   They are outfitted with rapier and cutlass still but it is more blasters and not so much burning down townships or colonies.    

Space models away!!

The film follows the course of Jason (Robert Urich of Magnum Force, Vega$, SWAT, Spenser: For Hire, She Knows Too Much and Lonesome Dove) leader of his nefarious…water thieves and fairly nice guy, his right hand man Roscoe (Michael D. Roberts of Manimal, Double Trouble, Manhunter, Rain Man and The First Family) head technician and primary robot builder, Zeno(Ron Perlman of Beauty and the Beast, Chronos, Enemy at the Gates,  Fallout 3, Blade II, Hellboy and Hellboy II: The Golden Army) the cutthroat, Maida (Anjelica Huston of This Is Spinal Tap, Prizzi’s Honor,  The Dead, The Addams Family, Buffalo Girls and The Perez Family) the swordsmaster…mistress (whatever) and Killjoy (John Matuszak former  Oakland Raiders  defensive end and of Caveman, The Dukes of Hazzard, The Goonies, Command 5 and Hollywood Beat) these ragtag rebels survive by stealing ice from this empiric orders known as the Templars of the planet Mithra. 

Oh god not again.   They’ll rip the hearts out of women’s chests and…oh never mind.  Not the Blind Dead series after all.  Maybe they hail from Middle Earth.  Uh getting back to the film at hand Jason and several of his crew were captured after a botched attempt at an ice run where they are to be castrated, lobotomized and put into indentured servitude.   Seriously folks this cannot be an option over death.  Personally I would be picking fights with Killjoy just so he would snap my neck and that would be it.  Just as it would look the boys are going to get the snip, a one Princess Karina (Mary Crosby of Dallas, Tapeheads, The Legend of Zorro, Queen of the Lot and The M Word) buys the lot of them to find the legendary planet, the 7^th world.  An Earth like planet encompassed in 75% of water.  I thought it had no texture.   Downside is no one truly knows where this planet is and the stories go that in has a time warp jump around it that can significantly age a man or woman to death and if they are off my a fraction of a margin they could be lost in a void forever.

Hmm hot girl in cryogenics...handy.

A few amusing aspects of this film I noticed and wanted to point them out.  During one of the big swordfights I noticed the place they are filming in was the Anheuser-Busch brewery in Van Nuys California.  I went on a tour many moons ago but I swear to you those winding metal staircases are them.   Raiding parties seem to consist of humans and droids.  I presume for heavy lifting or just faster attack speeds but most of the crew’s droids look a bit battered and worn.  Several bits of footage of the movie are clipped from Logan’s Run and Rollerball and Kevin Costner turned down the role of Jason.    It’s crass, politically incorrect and Tylenol still remains in the far, far away future.   Watch this for the pimp bots alone.  Yes droids talking late 70’s jive and pimping girls out.  Damn, I want a pimp bot.

Ridley Scott Week: Blade Runner

The Ridley Scott week chugs on through with what I believe to this date still are an amazing hybrid of Film Noir and Cyberpunk standings.  A utopia for some and desuetude for others, the colonization of the other worlds of our solar system and the problems back home.    So get a packet of Twizzlers, maybe some nachos and an oversized drink (Take that New York!) and settle in a nice easy chair.  This is Blade Runner.

I’ve seen spoilers in glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate…

In 1982 capturing the writing of critically acclaimed science fiction writer Phillip K. Dick’s story Do Androids Dream of Electronic Sheep, a notion that machine could never be as emotional as man, have a series of moral decisions that were taught nor could they develop ideas of their own came writers Hampton Fancher (Of Men and Women, Survival, Police Story and The Other Side of the Mountain) and David Webb Peoples (Ladyhawke, Unforgiven, Hero, Twelve Monkeys and Solider) adapted the novel of question and create a world of robotics, human angst and distrust of corporation.   While this being truly a product of the 1980’s trend this film will stand the test of time due to this solid writing not relying solely on the day’s lingo, attitude, strives and failures.   

Our story unfolds with a credits sequence explaining the dangers of a of androids called Replicants that have a tendency to feel like nothing more than slaves to their human masters.  Being 3 times as strong, fast and intelligent they rebelled and were deemed faulty for such.  Earth passes a law creating a separate police force to contain, detain and execute them.  They are the Blade Runners.   During a routine background on a sanitation worker named Leon (Brion James of 48 Hours, Nemesis, Time Runner, Tango and Cash, The Dark and The Player) from a detective Holden (Morgan Paull of Patton, Norma Rae and Fade to Black) and the interview ends with Holden being put in the hospital and cut to Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford of Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Patriot Games, Regarding Henry and Cowboys and Aliens) having his sushi only to be interrupted by a detective Gaff (Edward James Olmos of Miami Vice, Stand and Deliever,Roosters, Mirage, 500 Nations and Battlestar Galatica) and leads him back to his former Lieutenant Bryant (Veteran character actor M. Emmet Walsh of Blood Simple, Critters, The Flash, A Time to Kill, Albino Alligator and Retroactive) an old fashioned cop in the worst way telling Deckard he needs to come out of retirement because he is the best Blade Runner that ever was to take out 4 of the Nexus 6 Replicants, a few combat models and pleasure droid.   Reluctantly Deckard is back in harness and on the case.   Stopping at the Tyrell Corporation, the creators of Replicants he does a pre-cursory examination and fact finding check with the head honcho Dr. Eldon Tyrell (Joe Turkel of The Killing, Path to Glory, The Shining, The Commitment and Miami Vice) to get some insight to the mind of the Nexus 6 series.   A computer program reliable to detect human from replicant is administered to Dr. Tyrell’s assistant Rachel (Sean Young of Stripes, No Way Out, Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Fatal Instinct and Mirage) to verify a positive before a negative as the doctor says.

The tinny and melodic number of this film captures the essence of the film.  The overall mood and life of it comes from the narrative of Ford’s character like a shamus of old telling the tale through his eyes and once again Scott develops the film with the mood lighting, smoke ridden sets and suffocating amounts of humanity representing overcrowding, the need for colonization to expand the human race elsewhere due to the Earth filling up with people.  Most animals are artificial and real ones are deemed a luxury item for only the well do to or wealthy.

During this time the replicants’ leader Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer of Nighthawks,  LadyHawke, The Hitcher, Wanted: Dead or Alive, Blind Fury, Past Midnight, Split Second, Salem’s Lot and Batman Begins) is attempting to gain access to Tyrell as well for a longer life span than the allotted four year lifespan.  He is the true survivor of this crew.  The epitome of Nietzsche with a smattering of Descartes, the others will follow him into the gates of Hell itself because this being made know a way through. Through numerous re-releases the 2007 director’s cut adds additional footage that was cut out due to it being too lengthy but I personally enjoy the theatrical release for its purity in it was the first version I saw.

   So if you are watching this film for the 50^th time or the first time, just let it wash over you in whatever version you see.