Okay, I did indeed watch yet another Cheesy Sci-Fi Movie from my four pack, and this one really was cheesy, extra cheesy in fact, like a special order at Del Taco. It was called "The Time Travelers" (1964) and was directed by the same guy who made "The Angry Red Planet" which we saw last night. His name is Ib Melchior, and not only is that an awesome name, but I think it would have been great if he could have made a film with the legendary Disney animator Ub Iwerks, because then you could have had Ib and Ub in the same movie. How amazing would that have been, and could you imagine their first meeting?
"Hello Ub, I'm Ib".
"Nice to meet you Ib, I'm Ub".
If Ib Melchior and Ub Iwerks had made a movie together, they could have put that meeting in the bonus material of the dvd, and it would have ruled.
But alas, they never met, so we have to console ourselves now with two of the flicks that Mr. Melchior did leave us with, one that was Pretty Doggone Good ("Angry Red Planet") and one that was Pretty Doggone Bad But Still Had Redeeming Qualities ("The Time Travelers").
Once again, some scientists (three this time, two men and a woman) are on a mission. They are again operating in a roomy laboratory with plenty of reel-to-reel computers, floor space, and circuitry. They are powering up their system to dangerous voltage levels in order to open up a Time Portal, 48 hours in the past. Suddenly a rectangular opening appears on the wall - a window to the recent past! But something is wrong. The entire onscreen panorama looks like dead ground, barren like Mars or the Alabama Hills.
During these proceedings, a clerk has entered the lab. He is there by the order of the unspecified company's president, who has tasked him with telling the scientists that they are using too much electricity. The company cannot afford it (must be a fly-by-night time portal enterprise), but while he is waiting for the scientists to wrap up their experiment and turn the machines off, he instead witnesses the Opening Of The Portal, which in true Ib Melchior fashion actually looks pretty cool, like a 46" flat screen tv.
Ib isn't the best with scripts, but he's pretty good with special effects, especially for the early 1960s.
Well anyway, this nitwit clerk, played by a guy named Steven Franken, whose face you have seen a thousand times, does something really dumb; he jumps through the Time Portal into the Barren World, which as it turns out has been obliterated by nuclear war. We learn this through some oft-seen but still shocking stock footage from Bikini Atoll.
How did this happen, and how could it have happened 48 hours ago, in the past? Well, as it turns out, the scientists are not looking at the past. What they are seeing on the giant flat screen is the future, about 107 years worth (give or take). What happened is similar to the mistake that was made the other night in "Beyond The Time Barrier". Remember when the rocket pilot made a slight wrong turn and went Beyond The Time Barrier? Well tonight, the scientists cranked the voltage too high and instead of opening a Time Portal to the past, they opened one into the future, and they saw that the Earth had been destroyed.
But that's not important for now, because the nitwit clerk has jumped through the portal! He can't get back, and so first one scientist also jumps through to try and rescue him. Then another scientist jumps through to save those two. Finally, the last scientist jumps through the Time Portal to save all the others, and now all four of them are trapped in the mountains outside Barstow (um....I mean "in the future"), and the Time Portal is collapsing. Now they cannot get back.
Things happen fast once the Portal closes. Mutants quickly appear at the crest of the ridge and haul ass over the side. They are tall and skinny and have bald heads, and are very hyper, just like the Mutants in "Beyond The Time Barrier", which was directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. Maybe director Melchior saw that film and copied Ulmer's Mutants, or maybe Mutants have a universally recognized standard, where if you've seen one Mutant, you've seen 'em all. Anyhow, they sure seem to be aggressive, perpetually upset about something.
I am not gonna tell you too much more about "The Time Travelers" because I am falling asleep - it is Sunday night after all - but I will finish by saying that instead of making a really scary time travel movie, Ib Melchior turns around and places the scientists underground, where the last survivors of the human race are ensconced. They include an eccentric European scientist with a blonde comb over, an a-hole captain in a Ziggy Stardust suit, and a Playboy babe. With the help of some SAG extras they are constructing androids to help them build a rocket to get the hell out of Dodge, because the Earth is toast. A conflict arises because all The Time Travelers want is to get back home to their own time, but the Undergrounders won't help them, and the Mutants are about to break through the walls and can't be stopped as always.
"The Time Travelers" was not easy to sit through, but it wasn't that hard, either. I've seen worse low-budget sci-fi, and this one had a lot of charm, some comic relief, some 1960s style sexy romance, and some very colorful sets in the underground control rooms, colors that looked like technological jewels.
An interesting credit was listed at the beginning of the film : Cinematography by William Zsigmond.
I thought, "It's gotta be him", and so after the movie ended I checked him on IMDB. Sure enough, it was Vilmos Zsigmond, who early in his career was still using the Americanized version of his name.
Vilmos Zsigmond went on thirteen years later to shoot one of the greatest science-fiction films ever made, "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind" by Steven Spielberg. That film was also known for it's colorful special effects. Maybe Spielberg saw "The Time Travelers", too.
Zsigmond went on to be known as one of the greatest cinematographers in the history of motion pictures.
I will give "The Time Travelers" one single, but very strong, Thumb Up for the positive qualities I have mentioned above. It's super cheesy, the story is unfocused, and yet if you are an old time sci-fi fan you must see it because of it's value as an artifact. ////
Elizabeth, if you still read this thing, I was glad to see you back on FB today, even in just a "memory" post. You mentioned Myspace, and you know, it's funny because Myspace is now considered something long gone and forgotten, and decidedly uncool, a word you used in the opposite way to describe not having had a Myspace page. Not many people would describe Myspace now as having once been cool, but I think it was. I liked Myspace, and I wrote a ton of stuff there, and the reason I liked it was because it was one-on-one. There wasn't a newsfeed with a ton of spam, and there wasn't a multitude of people posting their emotions all day long. Myspace was set up so that you had your own page, which you could customise, and if you wanted to interact, you could look at another person's page - one page at a time. It was one on one, Facebook without the chaos.
Of course, FB took over quickly for exactly that reason, because it allowed social chaos. And you can alleviate it somewhat by blocking stuff, etc. And we have had a lot of fun on FB over the years, no doubt. But Myspace was the original, and I think it was pretty cool, too, despite the uncool reputation it has unfairly been labeled with in recent years.
I am glad you posted and hope all is well. :):)
We had good singing in church this morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
No comments:
Post a Comment