Aztec flying serpent god Quetzlcoatl is summoned to Manhattan by a modern-day high priest expert in the art of flaying human beings. Small-time crook and barroom pianist wanna-be Michael Moriarty stumbles across the beast's nest and becomes the unwilling teammate of copper David Carradine, trying both to stop the eating habits of the aforementioned, and at the same time not give up some rec…
“Declare war on bacteria!” is one of the slogans during an ill-defined plague epidemic, during which a power-mad senator (Jerry Wasserman, a look alike for Roy Cohn) seizes control of the government and holds HUAC-style hearings to determine which citizens are “healthy” and which get forcibly ejected into the lawless quarantine zones.
Second film based on Nigel Kneale's critically acclaimed 1953 BBC series Quatermass. British egghead Professor Quatermass is sent to investigate some abnormalities in a rural area. Soldiers and government officials in the area are behaving like brainwashed zombies. Meteorites are far too plentiful and tend to erupt and injure when approached. A large “food” processing plant ha…
While constructing a new subway, British workers unearth a Martian spaceship and insect-like alien remains.
Elderly and eccentric, Professor Bernard Quatermass is called out of retirement when a death ray from outer space begins to zap youths around the world.
Preceding The Blob by two years, this excellent British production (from the Hammer Studio) is the story of an astronaut who returns to earth unknowingly carrying an alien infestation that causes him to mutate into a ever-growing giant-tentacled blob-like creature. The film features the first big-screen appearance of Dr. Bernard Quatermass (played with pushy perfection by Bria…
Notorious male-chauvinist sci-fi cheapie set in the far-future year of 1985. Space cadet guys crash on Venus, find it ruled by “dolls,” like a masked queen who has wicked plans in store for mankind. Starts out slow, but then the unintentional laughs keep coming as the cast plays the hyperdumb material straight – famed scribe Ben Hecht allegedly intended his script outline �…
“Oh, come off it.
An interesting attempt to create a serious film set in prehistoric times. During the Ice Age, a small group of proto-men lose their carefully guarded fire during an attack from an enemy tribe, and are forced to wander the land searching for a way to renew the flames. The fire is serious business; without it, they are dangerously vulnerable to the elements. During their journey, they encounter and …
Quirky sci-fi story of a man who passes through a time warp and finds himself able to maintain two parallel lives.
Swashbuckling fantasy about a kingdom suffering under an evil ruler and his equally sinister queen.
For scientist Zac Hobson (Bruno Lawrence, the Gerard Depardieu of New Zealand films), it really is the day the Earth stood still as he awakens one morning to find himself seemingly alone in the world.
Many consider this atypical Robert Altman sf effort one of the unpredictable director's worst films, but the Hound thinks it has…something.