Movie Reviews of the Old, Odd, and Obscure (Part 2)

The evil robot, Maximilian

One of the better action sequences

Beautiful set piece combined with matte painting

The ship lights and star field are breathtaking

The Black Hole (1979) Walt Disney Productions

In the year 2130, an exploratory spaceship encounters a huge black hole along with a long lost ship, the USS Cygnus. They discover that the USS Cygnus is run by a maniacal genius who keeps his previous crew as brain-dead slaves along with an army of robots to run the huge ship while he plans to take the ship into the black hole.

I saw this movie when it was first released at the theater back in 1979 while I was in 9th or 10th grade. I remember thinking back then that the movie was a bit slow and clunky with a mixture of good and bad special effects. I didn't give it much thought after that until recently when I decided to buy the DVD for nostalgia if nothing else. However, my 2nd viewing at the ripe old age of 45 revealed a few things I missed as a teenager. First of all, Disney spent a ton of money on the sets and matte paintings. The star fields have a beautiful blue hue to them, rather than the usual stark black, giving the space scenes a dreamy quality. Secondly, the sets and matte paintings used to portray the interior of the USS Cygnus are absolutely breathtaking when viewed purely on an artistic level. The interior of the main control room did not have the usual interior space ship lights and buttons I was used to seeing in movies at that time. These lights were more elongated and numerous, set in patterns that were probably not very practical but were certainly pleasing to the eye. What still doesn't work in the movie (and probably the reason the movie bombed at the box office) is the silly dialog and awkward pacing. Most of the dialog is downright cringe worthy. Also, the special effects used in the live action sequences were very old fashioned. In most of the scenes of people floating in zero gravity as well as many of the hovering robot sequences, wires were clearly visible - blatantly and embarrassingly visible.

The DVD itself was created in 2004 and still looks decent. The colors of the gorgeous set pieces pop, and the site of the black hole itself is nice to look at. The print of the film could have been cleaned up a bit more as spots and minor scratches were visible throughout. All in all, The Black Hole is fun movie to watch as long as one tunes out the dialog and just takes in the beautiful set pieces.

Movie Reviews of the Old, Odd, and Obscure

The creature oozing up the street

The creature flowing over a stone wall

When one gets too close to the creature

Glowing and ready to explode

X - The Unknown (1956) Hammer Studios

The British Army stumbles upon a radioactive creature that resembles glowing mud. Surviving miles beneath the earth's crust, the creature escapes through a crack in the earth and relentlessly seeks out radioactive facilities in order to absorb the radiation, killing anyone in it's path as it creeps across the countryside.

Rarely broadcast on television (at least in the Winona area), few people have seen this movie that I'm aware of. A few years ago, I happened to catch this movie on AMC and was pleasantly surprised. The movie was well directed by Leslie Norman who later went on to direct a long list of British television series through the 60's and 70's (including some episodes of "The Saint" and "The Avengers"). Wonderfully eerie black and white photography adds to a number of well constructed scenes of suspense and terror - including two shockingly graphic scenes depicting people melting when the creature gets too close to them. The acting and dialog are extremely well done for a low budget movie made in 1956 (which was typical of British cinema at the time).

I found this movie on DVD and bought it earlier this year. The sound and picture quality are top notch for a movie of this age. The print shows very few spots or scratches while the light, shadow, and contrasts in each scene look beautiful. All in all, "X - The Unknown" turned out to be one of the best in my science fiction movie collection.