Rating: 12/20
Plot: Scientists get stuck in a bleak future where a limited number of humans are trying to solve their mutant problem.
This movie is exactly 9 years older than I am. We share a birth date. We're both Scorpios.
This was written and directed by Ib Melchior, the guy who did The Angry Red Planet and wrote Death Race 2000, Robinson Crusoe on Mars, Journey to the Seventh Planet, Reptilicus, and Planet of the Vampires, all movies that I enjoyed in some capacity. I have a thing for these 60's sci-fi movies, the ones that brag about being in color on their posters. I think it's the color that makes the scientific ideas seem even more quaint.
Things start slowly with a lot of talking in a laboratory with our actors pretending to be doctors. The opening scene in the lab was so lengthy that I actually started to wonder if the entire movie was going to take place in the lab, like Rear Window. Eventually, they venture into the future--Buster Keaton style--and things get more interesting with some futuristic cannibalistic mutants who look a little like dirty orange-tinted Hare Krishnas. There's some of that 60's sci-fi fun (in color!) with a musical score that is often too chipper, a look at an android factory with all these dopey rubber masks, and a woman running her hands over a colorful theremin-like instrument which I think they called a Loomycord. The ending is befuddling enough but just challenging enough to be interesting. I think my favorite thing is how antiquated some of the effects seem. This has a couple scenes, including one that features the removal of a head, that seem almost like magic tricks, special effects that likely could have been pulled off in the 1920s. And, of course, I love how the earth was destroyed with stock footage. I've always assumed that stock footage would be our downfall as a species.
For a B-movie, the acting isn't really all that bad. It's not all that good either though. The exception would be Steve Franken who plays Danny, an electrician who winds up time traveling with the doctors accidentally because the writers of this decided they wanted both some comic relief and romance. Franken's performance isn't terrible, but the character is obnoxious, screaming out "It isn't just a pictha!" and dancing around like a kid as he stumbles into the futuristic wasteland. He gets other great lines, too ("Now I know how a roasting chicken feels."), and says "Holy McKee"--apparently McKee was his last name--at least three times. Who uses his own last name as an interjection?
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