Sci-Fi September: Galaxina (1980)

As has happened so many times before, and undoubtedly will again, I found myself smiling as a movie ended, yet also worried by the fact that I knew I was overlooking a lot of major flaws. But sometimes movies grab you like that. Critics can write all the words they like about what they view as good or bad in various movies, and I tend to stick to that approach whenever possible, but sometimes you react to things in a more basic, slightly irrational, way.

The basic story concerns a spaceship charged with keeping peace and order in a section of space. It's basically a big, floating police station, complete with prisoners being held in cells, and things look set to get more dangerous for the crew when they're charged with recovering a mysterious gem, known as the Blue Star. Thankfully, they can use the lifelike robot, Galaxina (Dorothy Stratten), for some of the more perilous obstacles that might be in their way.

Written and directed by William Sachs, this is a sci-fi comedy that feels very much like a mix of Dark Star and Red Dwarf. It's a low budget film, and does very little to hide that fact. In fact, it almost revels in its cheapness, without ever seeming lazy or completely inept. And I know that people will be rushing to tell me that I'm wrong, that the film is almost completely inept, but I'll still refute that charge. It works. It works for me, and that's all that I need sometimes.

Dorothy Stratten is the real star here, although her character seems to start off as a very minor player in the grand scheme of things, and she does fine with her role. She's not asked to stretch herself too far, no innuendo intended, but she does end up in most of the scenes that make up the second half of the movie. Stephen Macht is the secondary character, a man who may or may not fall for Galaxina's charms. J.D. Hinton and Avery Schreiber play other main characters, and both make a good impression, more thanks to the material than their performances.

There are also crude, cheap, alien creatures, some sexual tension and innuendo that wouldn't be out of place in any Carry On . . .  movie, and some weird interludes that feel like they've been spliced in from Hair outtakes. Am I selling this to you yet? Probably not. But this is not the type of movie that I'm going to try to sell. It is, instead, the type of movie that I simply love without reason. Any sci-fi comedy that's cheeky enough to include "Also Sprach Zarathustra" while having a budget that wouldn't cover the catering budget for 2001: A Space Odyssey at least deserves a few brownie points. The fact that it then goes on to reference so many other works that it really shouldn't be reminding you of just made it all the more endearing to me.

Do not take my word for it. Seriously. This is a film that most people will probably end up hating. But I liked it. I REALLY liked it. At this point, a better writer might be able to make the case for this movie in a more convincing manner. I am not that writer. But give it a watch anyway. At least you'll have someone to blame if you end up feeling like you just completely wasted 90 minutes.

7/10

Galaxina is one of many sci-fi delights in this great boxset - http://www.amazon.com/Sci-Fi-Invasion-50-Movie-Set/dp/B004ZJ9VXY/ref=sr_1_5?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1409932059&sr=1-5&keywords=galaxina

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The UK version can be bought here - http://www.amazon.co.uk/TJs-Ramshackle-Movie-Guide-Reviews-ebook/dp/B00J9PLT6Q/ref=sr_1_3?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395945647&sr=1-3&keywords=movie+guide

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The Monster Squad (1987)

Fred Dekker has, to date, only directed three movies. One of those movies was the very poor Robocop 3. Thankfully, his other two movies were two classic horrors that fans still hold dear almost 30 years after their initial release, Night Of The Creeps (this Bluray plays on all players) and The Monster Squad. While the former was a fantastic call back to the best of the '50s sci-fi horrors, The Monster Squad was a love letter to the big icons of horror, the monsters that Universal made into movie icons in the 1930s and '40s (and one from 1954).

Written by Dekker and Shane Black, The Monster Squad is all about a bunch of kids who make up the titular gang. They spend their time chatting about monsters and having fun but it's nothing serious, of course. That all changes when Dracula (Duncan Regehr) comes into town, bringing with him a monster (Tom Noonan) that was made by a certain mister Frankenstein, a mummy, a werewolf (Jon Gries) and The Creature From The Black Lagoon a gillman. He's in town because he's desperate to get his hands on an amulet that he only has a chance to destroy once every hundred years in an attempt to tip the balance of power in favour of all things evil. It's up to The Monster Squad to get the amulet and keep it safe.

The squad members are as follows: Sean (Andre Gower) the leader, Patrick (Robby Kiger) is Sean's best friend, Horace (Brent Chalem) is a bullied, overweight lad who finds acceptance in the club, Eugene (Michael Faustino) is the youngest member and Rudy (Ryan Lambert) COULD be the oldest and coolest member if he passes the entrance test and then stays interested in the activities of the group. While The Monster Squad is about the monsters, and while it has a number of great one-liners throughout the script, it's also very much about the kids and how they grow with the help of one another. Whether it's tackling bullies, learning methods of killing monsters or just spending time away from weary adults, the squad is always much more important than the childish escapade that outsiders choose to label it and it becomes, of course, an essential defence when evil forces invade suburban America.

Funnily enough, the movie actually holds up even better today than it did when released in 1987 because back then it seemed to me to be nothing more than an attempt to ride on the coat-tails of the great success of Ghostbusters. There was even the tagline that said "you know who to call when you have ghosts but who do you call when you have monsters?"

Perhaps others felt the same way. That would explain the relatively poor performance at the box office although there's also the fact that people might not have realised just who it was aimed at. While there isn't too much here to traumatise hardy children, it's not really one to stick on while babysitting some pre-teens (a fantastic sequence involving the werewolf holds up as a nice selection of grisly practical FX work). The reputation of, and love for, the movie may have grown over the years and it may be completely obvious now that it's aimed at true horror fans but it wasn't quite so obvious 25 years ago. Such is the way of marketing, I guess.

It certainly looks great throughout, making the most of that modest budget, and the performances are all wonderful. Regehr is superb as Dracula, Noonan is wonderful as Frankenstein's monster, all of the kids are great fun, Jon Gries is highly entertaining and Leonardo Cimino is excellent despite not being onscreen for all that long. I could mention so many others - Ashley Bank as little Phoebe, Mary Ellen Trainor and Stephen Macht as Sean's parents and everyone else who bagged a credit -but I'd just be boring you and taking up time that could be spent actually (re)watching the movie.

Suffice it to say, I'm sure that Messrs Dekker and Black will be pleased to know that fans of the film STILL grin from ear to ear whenever they hear or see a reference to the line "wolfman's got nards".

9/10

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Amitville: It's About Time (1992)

AKA Amityville 1992: It's About Time.

Well, brace yourself for some very surprising news because this Amityville sequel is almost, ALMOST, an entertaining movie. Compared to the two crap movies that preceded it, it's a veritable masterpiece.

It's based on the same source material as the earlier, horrible movie about the evil escaping the famous Amityville home in the guise of a lamp but this time evil escapes the famous Amityville home in the guise of a clock. Not much better, you might be thinking, and it's a fair assumption. However, this time around there is no attempt to show the demonic force physically inhabitng the household object. Instead, we have a mixture of evil taking over a household while some time trickery is used to keep people on their toes.

Stephen Macht plays Jacob Sterling, a man who unwittingly brings a piece of Amityville horror into his home when he brings a large clock back from one of his many work trips. Things quickly start to become quite strange for Jacob, as well as for his son, Rusty (Damon Martin), and his daughter, Lisa (Megan Ward). When Jacob is savagely attacked by a neighbourhood dog he has to rest up at home and enlists the help of his ex-girlfriend, Andrea (Shawn Weatherly), which adds further tension.

I'm not going to try and tell anyone that this is a great movie. Because it's not. But I will try to tell people that this is a good movie. It has lots going against it, the actors aren't the best in the world and the script by Christopher DeFaria and Antonio Toro isn't that interesting, but director Tony Randel also paces everything perfectly and includes that savage dog attack, a transition from plain Jane to sexy siren for Megan Ward and one or two decent moments of gory fun.

None of the leads - Macht, Martin, Ward, Weatherly - are unbearably bad, it's just that they're not all that great either. Jonathan Penner and Nita Talbot do a bit worse because they're given some more outrageous moments but this is compensated for by a very brief cameo from the great Dick Miller.

So, basically, this is far from the worst movie with the Amityville name attached to it. Which isn't saying a lot, I know, but it's not a bad little chiller.

5/10

http://www.amazon.com/Amityville-About-Time-Stephen-Macht/dp/B000ARTMSO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1347550535&sr=8-1&keywords=amityville+its+about+time