When you hear a title like Battle in Space: The Armada Attacks! certain expectations are set up. You expect, oh, I don’t know, perhaps a battle in space? Maybe an armada attacking? Perchance some cardboard characters delivering over-blown dialog and enacting some insane plot?
You certainly wouldn’t expect what you get in Battle in Space: The Armada Attacks!.
"Battle in Space" (2020) Review | C-Squared
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[three_fourth] Though promoted and sold as a fun, cheesy sci-fi action flick, Battle in Space is actually a low-budget “indie” anthology of dark, serious science-fiction short features.
The first concerns a cynical, down-at-his-heels ex-cop turned private eye, who searches for a kidnapped child and redeems himself in battle with alien invaders; the second, “The Hermes,” involves two psychic warriors infiltrating an enemy base and stealing a powerful crystal; “The Agamemnon” details a manned mission to Mars, and one man’s descent into madness; “The Persis” is a battle of wills between a cyborg soldier and his fully-organic co-pilot, one of whom has been brainwashed – but which?; and “The Caronte” is a young woman’s race against time and enemy aliens as she seeks to justify her kid brother’s faith in her.
While each vignette is well-written and fairly well-acted, audiences are strongly cautioned: this film is NOT the fun action-packed space opera its publicity and trailers imply. Caveat emptor.
Released on January 12, 2021, this film was written and directed by Andrew Jaksch, Lukas Kendall, Sanjay F. Sharma, and Luis Tinoco, with additional writing by Josh Guttman and additional direction by Toby Rawal and Scott Robson. It stars Doug Jones (Hellboy, The Shape of Water, Pan’s Labyrinth), Eric Palladino (Watchmen mini-series, Arrow, 666 Park Avenue), and Douglas Tait (Annabelle Comes Home, Hellboy [2019], Star Trek: Picard).
Battle in Space: The Armada Attacks is available for purchase or download on YouTube.
What would you do if you found a portal to myriad alternate realities? Would you plunder those other-worlds for money, ideas, a piece of ass? Parallel follows a group of friends as they navigate the numerous opportunities presented by having such a portal in their attic…and the consequences of their actions.
Parallel (2018) Review | C-Squared
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[three_fourth] Noel, Devin, Josh, and Leena are a group of 20-somethings who have created their own app development company. But when their latest creation is pulled out from under them by an acquaintance, they start to fall apart. In anger, one of them throws something at the wall in the laundry room. Through the whole in the wall, they see a secret stairway and tear down the rest of the wall to explore. The stairway leads to the attic, and in the attic is a stand-up mirror bolted to the floor. Soon they discover that the mirror serves as a portal to a “multiverse” and that time moves more quickly there than here.
At first, they use the time differential to out-fox their acquaintance and win back the contract. But they don’t stop there, and soon discover that importing knowledge from the other side in order to better their lives brings increasingly dangerous consequences.
Parallel will be available in select theaters and on demand December 11, 2020.
I’ve Seen that Person Before: Past Work of Parallel‘s Cast
Kathleen Quinlan, who appears in the opening scenes of the film, appeared in Apollo 13 (1995), Stargate Universe (2011), and The Hills Have Eyes (2006).
Georgia King (Leena) appeared in Merlin (2010), Sinbad (2012), and Space Ark (2015).
Martin Wallström (Noel) appeared in Mr. Robot (2019) as Tyrell Wellick.
Mark O’Brien (Josh) played Jerry Hoffler in the Warehouse 13 episode “Don’t Hate the Player” (2011).
Aml Ameen (Devin) appeared inn The Maze Runner (2014) and Sense8 (2015).
Anthony Mackie and Justin Benson play paramedics responding to bizarre deaths and injuries and all are related to a new designer drug Synchronic. But this drug doesn’t give you an ordinary high, as Mackie’s character soon finds out.
Synchronic (2019) Review | C-Squared
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[three_fourth] In theaters and drive-ins October 23, this film was directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, written by Benson, and stars Anthony Mackie and Benson, with Jamie Dornan, Katie Aselton, and Ally Ioannides.
In addition to this movie, clips in this video include:
Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Marvel Studies
Carma received a pre-release screener for this upcoming film.
If you haven’t seen the film yet, be aware that there are major spoilers in this episode. Carma and Christopher share the plot outlines and some of the plot points that may spoil the suspense of the film. That said, much of that is also spoiled in the trailer.
Synchronic builds slowly, showing you the results of the new designer drug, but leaving you not quite sure what you’re actually seeing. Time within the film is not chronological with several flashbacks. It opens with a couple taking Synchronic together. The boyfriend leaves to get ice, as he enters the elevator, the drug takes effect and he finds himself falling in a vast desert. His girlfriend, who remains in the bed, is transported to a bayou where a strange woman looks upon her and a snake winds its way toward her leg. It just gets weirder from there.
Carma was fascinated by the time-travel aspects of the film and Christopher enjoyed the suspense. Both were impressed with Anthony Mackie’s action chops as displayed in this film.
Parental Advisory: The film includes foul language and there are a few graphic scenes of injuries. That said, this film does a good job of not showing actual gory violence. Much of the violence is implied, which is enough.
“It was a mistake to abandon our world for this dream world. My greatest mistake. A mistake we must correct.”
– Kym Minamoto (Zoe Doyle), EXT
“Around five years ago I had a thought,” said director Adrian Bobb. “What would the next stage of evolution be? Followed by another thought, What would their problems be?” says director Adrian Bobb. From those thoughts came the 9-minute proof-of-concept short film EXT.
The film most recently screened at the San Antonio Film Festival, held October 11-15.
Basic Information
[one_third] Title: EXT
Main Cast:
Cara Gee (Aegis Minamoto, the interigator)
Zoe Doyle (Kym Minamoto, the rebel/terrorist)
Screenplay: Adrian Bobb [/one_third]
[one_third] Director of Photography: Bob Gundu
Set in a future world in which humanity had abandoned the real world for a digital one, the creator of the virtual world, Kym Minamoto, has rebelled against it. She and others have become The Vitruvian Men and they are bent on returning “reality to its true form.”
The film goes back and forth between Minamoto’s interrogation by her code-spawn daughter in the virtual world and a battle between humanoid robots and mechanized robots in the snow-covered real world.
Analysis and Evaluation of EXT
As a proof-of-concept, this short film leaves you wanting more.
The visuals are stylized and beautiful.
The real world is stark, the blue-black of the robots contrasting with the white of the snow-covered landscape.
Alternately, the virtual world is warm with browns and golds.
I loved the costumes and make-up, as well. Kym wears a kimono with Japanese style hair and make-up. Her daughter, Aegis, is dressed in black with blue accents uniform and has an asymmetrical haircut that covers one of her eyes.
On IMDB, Bobb’s has worked primarily in effects. He’s worked on several SyFy Channel projects, including The Expanse and Killjoys. EXT is his second short.
“While all of my biggest influences in sci-fi dwell in the 80’s and 90’s,” said Bobb, “I find that the conversations about technology haven’t quite kept up to where we are in the present. I feel we are ill-equipped in conversing about modern technological issues because it’s not reflected as being ‘real’ in our pop-culture.”
He said that EXT was, in part, inspired by The Seven Samurai. And you can see it hinted within this short film
Conclusion
I hope this short does well and that Bobb will expand it into a full-length feature. Some of the story’s points — which I learned from reading the press material and IMDB — don’t come through in the film.
That said, I enjoyed watching it multiple times. It is intriguing and draws you in. My fingers are crossed for a longer version.
“Men give flowers. I give magic amulets.”
– Sinbad (Shahin (Sean) Solimon) Sinbad The Fifth Voyage Ultimate Director’s Cut
Inspired by the classic Ray Harryhausen film The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973), and often a loving homage to it, Sinbad The Fifth Voyage The Ultimate Director’s Cut (2020) tells yet another tale of Sinbad the Sailer.
The original film was released n 2014 and is currently available on Amazon Prime Video. This release came out last month and is also available on Prime Video.
Basic Information
[one_third] Title: Sinbad The Fifth Voyage – Ultimate Director’s Cut
Budget: Less than $25,000 (estimate) [/one_third]
[one_third_last] [/one_third_last]
Summary of Sinbad The Fifth Voyage
An evil sorcerer has abducted the Sultan’s only child and Sinbad, who is in love with her and wishes to marry her, must save her from the evil Deev who wishes to consume her soul. Along the way, Sinbad and his crew fight a Rock, giant bugs, and other creatures on their way to save the princess.
Analysis and Evaluation of Sinbad The Fifth Voyage
Based on the Arabian Nights stories and inspired by the classic Sinbad movies of the 1960s and 1970, Sinbad The Fifth Voyage is at times a love song to Ray Harryhausen who did the stop motion animation of those films, as well as Jason and the Argonauts (1963).
Unfortunately, the editing of this film makes the story hard to follow. The movie cuts back and forth between the present (shot in dull, dark tones) and the past (usually shot in brilliant color). Sometimes I found it hard to know that I was washing a flashback until the princess shows up.
In addition, the dialog is clunky and thee acting leaves a bit to be desired. However, there are some nice moments that made it worth watching.
The original film was released in 2014 and I believe I may have tried to watch it, but it was so bad I didn’t complete the movie. I can’t be 100% sure that is the case, but many of the beats of the first 20-30 minutes of the Ultimate Director’s Cut felt so familiar, I think that may have been the case.
If so, then I’m glad Solimon did a re-cut of the film. I watched this version through to the end and found in somewhat entertaining. This is what I really enjoyed about the film:
Real belly dancers! I was a belly dancer for about three years in my 20s and find it so annoying to see fake ones in films. I appreciated the authentic middle eastern music and choreography.
Homages to Ray Harryhausen. I’ve all the Sinbad fills that Harryhausen did and loved them. Apparently, Solimon did, too — and it shows. I enjoyed seeing the recreations of several scenes from The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (the Roc, fighting with a skeleton, the cyclops, etc.).
David Light. I enjoyed his performance as both the Sultan and the Genie. He was fun to watch. You can catch him in other genre films such as The Devil Within (2010) and Soundwave (2018), as well as an episode of Space Command (2020).
The special effects were pretty good for the budget, a cut above your typical Asylum film. I liked the creature design, especially of the statue of Durga and the giant beetle creature. The dragons were pretty good, too.
There are some loose threads left unfinished — in a flashback, Sinbad is given an ultimatum by the Sultan that he can either leave never to return or marry the princess and immediately have his head cut off. So how did that change? When the princess was abducted, it was clear it was the day before her wedding, and yet Sinbad was off on an adventure to find an amulet she dreamed about. Also, when Sinbad won, what happened to the souls of his crew? They were dead, but it wasn’t clear from his wager if when he won they went off to Arabian Heaven or regained life.
Conclusion
Although not as good as its inspiration, Sinbad The Fifth Voyage Ultimate Director’s Cut is worth a watch if your expectations aren’t so high. I was entertained, even though I kept losing my way. If you are a Patrick Stewart (ST:TNG) fan, then you might also enjoy his voice over as Sinbad.
“Can we truly call this a monster club if we do not boast amongst our membership a single member of the human race?”
~ Eramus (Vincent Price) The Monster Club
Based on stories by Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes [The Curse of the Snake God (1989) and The King’s Ghost (1985, also known as The Grange)], The Monster Club is a British anthology horror film directed by Roy Ward Baker [Quatermass and the Pit (1967) and Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde (1971)].
Three tales of horror are framed by a series of conversations between the vampire Eramus (Vincent Price) and a fictionalized Chetwynd-Hayes (John Carradine), as well as musical numbers performed by a variety of actual bands.
Basic Information
[one_third] Title: The Monster Club Main Cast:
Vincent Price (Eramus)
John Carradine
(R. Chetwynd-Hayes)
Support Cast:
James Laurenson
(Raven – “The Shadmock”)
Barbara Kellerman
(Angela – “The Shadmock”)
Donald Pleasence
(Pickering – “The Vampires”)
Britt Ekland
(Mother – “The Vampires”)
Stuart Whitman
(Sam – “The Ghouls”)
Lesley Dunlop
(Luna – “The Ghouls”)
[/one_third]
[one_third] Director: Roy Ward Baker Producer: Milton Subotsky Screenplay: Edward Abraham and Valerie Abraham Cinematography: Peter Jessop Music: Performances between stories include B. A. Robertson, The Viewers, The Pretty Things and Night. Runtime: 97 min. Original Release Date: May 27, 1981 Budget: $1.7 million [/one_third]
[one_third_last] [/one_third_last]
Summary of The Monster Club
The film opens with Chetwynd-Hayes walking at night near a bookstore featuring his works. He sees a man, obviously in distress, and offers assistance. The man is Eramus, a very hungry vampire. After Eramus has had his snack, he thanks Chetwynd-Hayes, complimenting him on his very tasty blood. Upon learning that his victim is an author, he offers to take him to The Monster Club and tell him some tales that may inspire his work. Befuddled, yet unharmed, Chetwynd-Hayes agrees.
Once in the club, Eramus talks about monster lineage — the three prime monsters (vampires, ghouls, and werewolves), as well as their hybrid offspring. This leads to the three stories within the larger frame story.
The Shadmock
A shadmock is a hybrid of werewolf, vampire, and ghoul. It’s “superpower” is that it whistles, which results in whatever the whistle is directed at melting. In this tale, a shy shadmock named Raven is targeted by a couple of con artists, George and Angela, who want to steal the antiquities he collects. George is the “mastermind” and sends his girlfriend, Angela, out to befriend Raven and figure out how to gain access to is best treasures.
Raven falls for Angela, who is nice to him and actually feels sorry for him and his lonely life and asks for her hand in marriage. She goes along at first, but when he catches her breaking into his safe, he whistles at her.
The Vampires
A young boy wants to spend time with his father, however, his father sleeps all day and works all night. A strange man with a violin case befriends the boy and convinces him to let him into the house when his mother is out shopping. The man bursts into the house with his fellow violin-carrying companions on a quest to steak the father. Things don’t entirely go as planned, but all is well in the end for the vampire family.
The Ghouls
A movie director is looking for the perfect place to shoot his next film. He finds a strange off-the-road village that, as it turns out, is inhabited by ghouls … and one humgoo. He befriends the humgoo in his effort to escape the village. But, things don’t entirely go as planned — what did you expect? This is a horror story!
NOTE: The trailer below has spoilers!
Analysis & Evaluation of The Monster Club
Christopher and I found this on Amazon Prime one evening while looking for something different to watch. Seeing that the cast included Vincent Price, known for such so-bad-they’re-great classics as The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) and Theater of Blood (1972), John Carradine [The Mummy’s Ghost (1944) and The Unearthly (1957)], as well as some other recognized faces, we couldn’t resist checking it out. I believe Christopher fell asleep through much of it, but I soldiered on.
The Frame
The Monster Club proves that Price can say about any lines with panache. The drivel he had to spew about the various hybrids made me cringe. But, Price is still riveting. That said, before I saw this film, I thought that there was pretty much nothing that Price and Carradine could not do. I was wrong. They can’t look comfortable dancing in a night club surrounded by people in very bad monster masks.
Although I could find some interest in the story part of the frame, I really could have done without the musical performances. They seemed to last forever.
The Shadmock
This was my favorite story of the three. James Laurenson, who has mostly done television work, portrays Raven with such empathy. I felt sorry for him. He is lonely and afraid of getting angry because of the results of his whistle.
The Vampires
It was fun seeing two actors I know from James Bond films playing different roles in this tale. Donald Pleasence (Blofeld from You Only Live Twice) is quite funny in his role as Pickering, the lead vampire hunter. And Britt Ekland (Goodnight from The Man with the Golden Gun) makes a great wife and mother who can be loving, scared and even snarky.
The Ghouls
I liked this one the least. It was slow-paced and, frankly, I really didn’t care about the characters. Stuart Whitman (Jonathan Kent in the 1988-1992 TV show Superboy) plays an arrogant, although, at times, heroic director. Despite his desire to help out the humgoo, I still think he was too much of an ass for me to really care if he escaped or not.
Lesley Dunlop [Norna in the Doctor Who story “Frontios” (Peter Davison) and Susan Q. in the Doctor Who story “The Happiness Patrol” (Sylvester McCoy)] plays the humgoo with pathos but is so innocent and ignorant, I couldn’t figure out whether she was an innocent bystander or a potential villain.
Conclusion
If you’ve got nothing better to do, this could be an interesting romp. It was fun to see Price, Carradine, and Pleasence chew up the screen.
“Life is temporary, why should death be any different.”
~ Frankenstein Victor Frankenstein
One of many interpretations of Mary Shelly’s novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, Victor Frankenstein was directed by Paul McGuigan and written by Max Landis. Released in 2015, it starred James McAvoy (Children of Dune, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Charles Xavier from the latest X-Men series of films) as Victor Frankenstein and Daniel Radcliffe (Harry from the Harry Potter films, The Woman in Black, and Swiss Army Man) as Igor.
This time, the classic tale is told from Igor’s point of view. It starts off as an Igor origin story and evolves into the evolution of Victor into the character we know from the novel. Of course, this is a fable of how science — and hubris — can go astoundingly wrong.
Basic Information:
[two_fifth] Title: Victor Frankenstein Main Cast:
Daniel Radcliffe (Igor)
James McAvoy (Victor Frankenstein)
Supporting Cast:
Jessica Brown Findlay (Lorelei)
Andrew Scott (Inspector Turpin)
Freddie Fox (Finnegan)
[/two_fifth]
[two_fifth] Director: Paul McGuigan Screenplay: Max Landis Cinematography: Fabian Wagner Music: Craig Armstrong Special Effects: Millennium FX Runtime: 1 hr 50 mins Budget: $40 M [/two_fifth]
[one_fifth_last] [/one_fifth_last]
Summary of Victor Frankenstein:
When the movie opens, Igor is an abused hunchback at a circus. He is smitten by Lorelei, the trapeze artist, and also is brilliant in his knowledge of medicine, having studied books on his own. Victor has come to the circus to scout for animal parts and after witnessing Igor save Lorelei’s life when she falls, decides to rescue him from the clutches of his abusers.
As it turns out, Igor is not a hunchback after all — he just has an abscess that has been untreated for years. Victor fixes it, laying the groundwork for Igor’s devotion.
Victor is driven to prove that his theories of bringing back life to the dead via electricity are sound and uses Igor’s insights to perfect his techniques. They successfully bring a pieced-together chimpanzee back to life, but it escapes and kills someone during its rampage. Now the police are involved.
Victor’s success catches the eye of one of his fellow students (Finnegan), who now offers to fund the research, albeit for his own hidden agenda. As Victor and Igor begin to apply what they’ve learned from the chimpanzee experiment to the task of bringing a pieced-together man back to life the stakes are raised by all the intrigue, conspiracies, a murder investigation, and (now that he’s no longer a hunchback) Igor’s budding romance with Lorelei.
Analysis & Evaluation of Victor Frankenstein
Director
Like so many films today, this movie is dark and gritty. With an almost steampunk aesthetic, you can see the influences of earlier Frankenstein films such as Kenneth Branagh’s Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Stephen Sommers’ Van Helsing, and yet McGuigan is able to make it his own. His experience spans both television and film, including The Reckoning (2002), Push (2009), and four episodes of Sherlock (2010, 2012). Other than that, I wasn’t abel to find much information about him.
Radcliffe
Daniel Radcliffe brings poignancy to the role of Igor. Here is a man who, as he says in the film, “It’s hard to judge cruelty when you’ve never known kindness.” And yet, you see him struggle with his loyalty to Victor and his own set of values. At the beginning of the film, he is a retch with no hope of ever having a decent life. But after having his “hump” removed he realizes that he can have a normal life. In addition, Victor’s dependence on him and his growing romance with Lorelei give him confidence. Radcliffe brought this character to three-dimensional life, making him an excellent avatar for the audience.
McAvoy
James McAvoy also puts in a good performance. His Victor is brilliant, crazy, frenetic and self-absorbed. You truly believe that he looks past the ethics of what he is doing simply to prove his own genius. Added to this particular story, is Victor’s history with his father and older brother. McAvoy sells this internal struggle well.
Overall
I really enjoyed the character development and the efforts made to make the tale believable. Supporting characters that were given sufficient screen time, such as the Inspector, Lorelei, and Finnegan, were also given enough substance to be believable people. The visuals and dialogue made the “science” seem plausible. I was sucked into the film from the beginning through to the end. I only wish I had seen this on the big screen, rather than a small one on the back of the chair in front of me on an airplane.
The special effects were good when you could see them. Sometimes the “dark and gritty” look of the film made it difficult to see what was going on, especially with the reanimated chimpanzee (although that might have been on purpose). The costume and set design really sold the time and place.
Conclusion
I had been waiting a while to see this film and I believe it was worth the wait. I definitely want to see it again with fewer distractions. The film is rated PG-13 for macabre images, violence and a sequence of destruction, but I think it might be a bit too gory for some audiences, especially younger ones. If you are a fan of Shelly’s monster, this film is probably worth seeing and could make an excellent addition to your horror icon collection.
“I’m behind every calamity that’s ever happened to you. But to accuse me of stealing something about mystical-magical, now that really takes the biscuit.”
~ Morgan Sinclair to Danny Fremont The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb
The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb was a made for TV three-part mini-series that originally aired on the Hallmark and Sci-Fi Channels in 2006. Caspar Van Dien, known for Starship Troopers (1997) and Sleepy Hollow (1999), plays Danny Fremont, a renegade archeologist in search of ancient treasures. Fremont is searching for the lost pieces of an emerald tablet that is believed to wield ultimate occult power. His nemesis, Morgan Sinclair, played by Jonathan Hyde (Jumanji, 1995; Anaconda, 1997; The Mummy, 1999), consistently snatches each piece from him and now Danny must prevent him from taking the final piece, or the world as we know it will come to an end.
Basic Information:
[two_fifth] Title: The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb Main Cast:
Caspar Van Dien (Danny Fremont)
Jonathan Hyde (Morgan Sinclair)
Leonor Varela (Dr. Azelia Barakat)
Supporting Cast:
Steven Waddington (Jason McGreevy)
Nico Nicotera (Andrew Walker)
Malcolm McDowell (Nathan Cairns)
[/two_fifth]
[two_fifth] Director: Russell Mulcahy Screenplay: David N. Titcher (as David Titcher) Cinematography: Chris Manley Music: Nathan Furst Special Effects: Matt Vogel (special effects supervisor) Runtime: 2 hrs 50 mins (split across three episodes) Budget: $14 M [/two_fifth]
[one_fifth_last] [/one_fifth_last]
Summary of The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb:
The movie opens with Danny Fremont in an ice cave, just as he’s discovered the second emerald stone. But, Morgan Sinclair shows up and snatches the tablet away. Through dialog, we learn that this is a recurring scenario. Sinclair is always thwarting Fremont, whose reputation is now shot not only because he never gets to keep his finds, but also because of his belief in the occult nature of his archeological research.
The backstory is that King Tutankhamen was really an incarnation of the sun god Ra, who protects the Earth from the evil demon Set. In his last battle with Set, both are trapped in the Underworld, the portal to which lies within King Tut’s tomb, where the final emerald tablet is hidden.
Fremont, assisted by the lovely Dr. Azelia Barakat (Leonor Varela, Blade II, 2002) and his two long-time buddies Jason McGreevy (Steven Waddington) and Andrew Walker (Nico Nicotera), must keep the tablet from the evil clutches of Sinclair and the Hellfire Council, lead by Nathan Cairns (Malcolm McDowell, A Clockwork Orange, 1971; Time After Time, 1979; Star Trek Generations, 1994; Tank Girl, 1995).
Of course, Sinclair does get ahold of the tablet and proceeds to unleash its power and the demon Set, killing all members of the Hellfire Council, and several others in the process. The only way to stop him is to find King Tut in the Underworld. But will the Boy King be strong enough to help them after centuries of imprisonment?
Analysis & Evaluation of The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb
According to IMBD, Jonathan Hyde once described the film as “an absolutely ghastly pile of tosh” and claimed that he only took the role because he had never been to India before. (India doubles as Egypt.) I didn’t think it was that bad.
The director of The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb has some pretty good films in his portfolio, including the cult hit Highlander (1986), as well as Highlander II: The Quickening (1991) and The Shadow (1994). Hailing from Australia, he is known for his action films with quick cuts. Before working on this movie, he directed the television movie Mysterious Island (2005) starring Kyle MacLachlan (Dune, 1984), Gabrielle Anwar (Body Snatchers, 1993) and Patrick Stewart (Star Trek: The Next Generation).
Of course, the main star is Caspar Van Dien, an actor I’ve never much liked. However, I have noticed that his acting has become less wooden and a bit more nuanced as he’s gotten older. He wasn’t half bad in this movie. He embodied the wide-eyed dreamer as well as swashbuckling hero quite well.
Like other movies of the archeological adventure genre, such as Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), The Mummy (1999), Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001), The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb has supernatural elements, lots of action and ancient treasures. Since I have enjoyed this type of film since I was a kid, I was not disappointed. Is it art? No. But it is fun.
I enjoyed the homages made to Raiders of the Lost Ark — Fremont has a similar costume as Harrison Ford, is an archeological professor and even mentions the Ark of the Covenant.
At first, the context threw me because Fremont discovers King Tut’s tomb, which was, in reality, discovered by British archaeologist and Egyptologist Howard Carter in 1922. However, in a clever plot twist at the very end of the movie, this is explained.
The special effects are what you would expect from a low-budget, made for TV film, however, they didn’t push me out of the story. And some of them were pretty good.
Character development was average and was at its strongest in showing the character arch of the villain Sinclair. Hyde played him brilliantly as arrogant and power-hungry.
Conclusion
Is this “must-see TV”? No, but it can be a fun romp if you’ve got nothing better to do or are, for some reason, a Casper Van Dien fan. The set and costumes feel appropriate for the timeline, there are sufficient action and intrigue — wait until you see the scene where Sinclair chases Andrew Walker! I was on the edge of my seat! And the humor adds a nice balance to the action.
The movie is not rated, but due to some violence and scary imagery, I wouldn’t recommend it for young audiences.
Christopher and Carma attended WorldCon 76 in San Jose, Calif. It was Christopher’s first and Carma’s second WorldCon (World Science Fiction Convention). Here are their reactions.
Event Overview: WorldCon 76, San Jose, Calif. | C-Squared
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Schedule of Events C-Squared Attended
Registration opened on Wednesday, Aug. 15, at 2pm.
Events began on Thursday, Aug. 16, at 9 am.
Opening Ceremony began Thursday, 5 pm.
We arrived at the convention at the tail end of the Opening Ceremony.
There were numerous panels, events, and activities each hour. Here is what we went to:
Thursday, Aug. 16, 2018:
8 pm, Retro Hugos Party
This event awarded the 1943 Hugos for work released in 1942.
Friday, Aug. 17, 2018:
10 am, “If This, Then What?” Panel on alternate histories
11 am, Tour of the convention
1 pm, “Un-Pulping the Pulp Heroes”, Panel on the Pulps
3 pm, Birds of a Feather meeting with fellow Christians
5 pm,”The Bob Wilkins Creature Feature Show”
Saturday, Aug. 18, 2018:
12 pm, “25 Years of Babylon 5” – Carma
12 pm, “The ‘Perry Rhodan’ Phenomenon: 57 Years of Ongoing SF Adventures”
4 pm, “Special Preview: Space Command” – Stay tuned for our commentary on potential future TV Show in a future episode of C-Squared
Then we toured the art show, checked out the various exhibits of past Hugos, costumes, and photographic portraits of well-known SF writers and artists.
Sunday, Aug. 19, 2018:
10 am, “Christian Worship Service” – a tag-team Catholic mass and Methodist service
11:30 am, Watched a demo of Archivos, a cool online app that lets you map all sorts of elements of a story
Then off to the dealers’ room for some shopping
2 pm, – “Spy-Fi: Science Fiction Thrillers”
Back to the dealers’ room!
Monday, Aug. 20, 2018:
10 am, More shopping in the Dealer’s room
12 pm, “Chesley Bonestell: A Brush with the Future” – a viewing of this documentary about the first space artist. Stay tuned for our review in a future episode of C-Squared
An overview and appreciation of season one of the now-forgotten supernatural anthology TV program.
[three_fourth] Originally aired on ABC from 1959-1961, this program was created and produced by Merwin Gerard and Collier Young, written by Larry Magnus, and directed and hosted by John Newland, “our guide to the world of the unknown.”
One Step Beyond Season 1 is available on Amazon Prime Video. You can also find episodes on YouTube.
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Registration opened on Wednesday, Aug. 15, at 2pm.
