Classic Ross Amico

Tag: Sci-Fi

Dimension 5 A Christmas Movie Sci-Fi Oddity?

Is “Dimension 5” (1966) actually a Christmas movie?

Unless the United States withdraws all its troops from Southeast Asia, a foreign crime ring is set to detonate a hydrogen bomb in Los Angeles on December 25.

Justin Power (Jeffrey Hunter), of Espionage Inc., is teamed with Chinese agent Ki Ti “Kitty” Tso (France Nuyen) to take on the nefarious Big Buddha (Harold “Oddjob” Sakata, the closest to James Bond this film is ever going to get).

Oh yeah, there’s also a little matter of time travel. Very little, it turns out, since “Dimension 5” has probably the most bafflingly underutilized piece of advantageous gadgetry in sci-fi history.

Made on a TV budget and with rudimentary technique, the film is of principal interest for providing employment for a veritable farm team of future “Star Trek” guest stars. No less than five cast members appeared on the original, classic “Trek” – one of them was in three different episodes! – and a sixth appeared on “Star Trek: The Next Generation.”

To be perfectly honest, I kind of wish I could time-hop out of this one. Sadly, that kind of technology is unavailable. I’ll risk dementia in our discussion of “Dimension 5,” on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner. Leave your marbles in the comments section, as we livestream on Facebook, this Friday evening at 7:00 EDT!

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

PLEASE NOTE: If you plan to subject yourself to the film in preparation for Friday’s show, it appears currently to be available for streaming in the U.S. only on YouTube. It’s your call. The film may be free, but it’s also 90 minutes of your life you’ll never see again, without a time-belt.

June 24, 2021
Damnation Alley Cult Classic or Sci-Fi Flop?

I’m happy to report that after having had all of my matter rearranged by my second Covid shot on Wednesday, I have been feeling tip-top all weekend. So I will arise, phoenix-like, to assume the co-pilot’s chair for tonight’s rescheduled conversation about “Damnation Alley” (1977).

20th Century Fox put all its chips on this post-apocalyptic sci-fi thriller, starring a mustachioed George Peppard (clearly a long way from “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” but getting a lot closer to “The A-Team”) and bad boy Jan Michael Vincent (inordinately proud of his dirt bike skills).

They’re joined by lifetime Actors Studio member Paul Winfield, and young Jackie Earle Haley, trading rocks for baseballs, right in the middle of his hot streak of “Bad News Bears” movies. Winfield and Haley were past and future Academy Award nominees (Winfield for “Sounder” in 1972, and Haley for “Little Children” in 2006). Bertolucci favorite Dominique Sanda lends some cosmopolitan “je ne sais quoi” to the “gonna say cray-cray.”

Director Jack Smight delivered his cut of the film in time for a projected December 1976 release. Unfortunately, that’s when the serious meddling began. Thanks to studio intervention, corner-cutting, and some rather unfortunate decisions made in post-production, “Damnation Alley” did not open until October of 1977 – five months after Fox’s other, generally-dismissed, sci-fi kid’s picture, a little film called “Star Wars.” And we all know how that turned out. Over the years, “Damnation Alley” may have developed a cult following, but “Star Wars” changed the course of the entire industry. But what’s a little egg on your face, when you wind up sitting on a mountain of gold?

I hope you’ll join us, in our all-terrain armored Landmaster, on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner. Giant scorpions and flesh-eating cockroaches can’t keep me away. From Vaccination Valley to “Damnation Alley,” we’ll be following your signal in the comments section, as we livestream on Facebook this Sunday evening at 7:00 EDT!

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

May 16, 2021
This Island Earth Shaggy Dog Story Sci-Fi

Did this revered Technicolor sci-fi classic – distinguished by Eisenhower Era pulp magazine production design, Oompa Loompa-haired extraterrestrial intelligence, interplanetary conflict, and bug-eyed monsters – really turn out to be just one long shaggy dog story? Find out tomorrow, when we discuss “This Island Earth” (1955).

Two world-renowned atomic scientists, Dr. Carl Meacham (resonant Rex Reason, looking all the world like Stewart Granger) – referred to as “Doctor,” or by his surname – and Dr. Ruth Adams (Faith Domergue) – invariably addressed as “Ruth” – are enlisted by the high-browed Exeter (Jeff Morrow) for a hush-hush project shrouded in mysterious off-world implication. At least the title of the book Meacham is handed isn’t translated as “To Serve Man!”

Along the way, there are also some lighthearted shenanigans with the Professor from “Gilligan’s Island” and perhaps three minutes of screen time for the much-trumpeted Metaluna Mutant.

It’s telling that the film was originally released as a double-feature with “Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy.” That which reaches us when we are young is most fondly-remembered.

Share your senility in the comments section, on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner. Step back from your interocitor, as we livestream on Facebook! All will be consumed by flame, this Friday evening at 7:00 EDT.

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

May 6, 2021
Sci-Fi Tie-Dye Corner Anniversary

All fashion concerns aside, sci-fi has been the tie that binds us.

Join Roy and me in celebrating one year of “Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner.” Forged in time of Covid – and originally titled “Remembering Science Fiction Television Shows of the 1960s and 1970s” (truth in advertising if ever there was) – this hour or two (or more) of sci-fi movie/TV banter – and your commentary – has become something of a weekend tradition.

Tomorrow night, Roy and I will chat about our early sci-fi experiences, and then we’ll throw it open to you, our viewers. Weigh in with your own favorite sci-fi memories, and your favorite “Sci-Fi” memories, and tell us what you’d like to see. We’ll lubricate your thoughts with slides of some of the year’s special guests and special moments (like the “Rollerball” Super Bowl Party and the “Darby O’Gill” Drinking Game).

“Tie-Dye” never says die. Join us for a Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner anniversary celebration, livestreamed on Facebook, this Friday evening at 7:00 EDT!

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

April 1, 2021
Andromeda Strain Still Scares 50 Years Later

Is Robert Wise’s adaptation of Michael Crichton’s seminal techno-thriller “The Andromeda Strain” (1971) the most suspenseful boring science lesson ever? Hold my beer.

Roy and I will be joined by Rob Kash for the next Roy’s Tie Dye Sci Fi Corner and a three-way discussion of this sci-fi classic, 50 years-old and still terrifyingly fresh.

Surely, if there’s anything more dangerous than a virus from outer space, it’s man: his ignorance, negligence, skepticism, bureaucracy, opportunism, and stubborn inability – or unwillingness – to think ahead. Interestingly, though all of these things are touched upon in “The Andromeda Strain,” it isn’t really what the story’s about. This is not an entertainment predicated on low-hanging fruit.

Rather, the focus is on the nuts and bolts of research against the clock, exhaustive analysis, the methodical process of arriving at knowledge and solutions, to meet the challenges of containment, immunity, and eradication. You know, SCIENCE. How very quaint.

The craftsmanship and restraint are impressive. Douglas Trumbull’s low-key, wholly believable special effects are entirely at the service of the story, while Gil Mellé’s insidious electronic score rachets up the psychological tension. There are no big-name actors, no histrionics, no inflated conflicts; just a good, solid, frighteningly believable story, absorbingly told.

Half a century later, in the middle of a pandemic, “The Andromeda Strain” is, if anything, more relevant, even as it’s unlikely a film like this would ever be released today. It’s too deliberate and thoughtful an enterprise for a world fueled by sound bites, outlandish conspiracy theories, and opinions at the expense of fact.

Unnervingly, 50 years on, things have gotten a whole lot worse. But those issues can be addressed at another time. In “The Andromeda Strain,” contagion is conflict enough.

For now, better start slamming the Sterno. It will be like we’re dodging automated lasers on our race to disable an atomic bomb, metaphorically speaking, on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner. Cry your lungs out in the comments section, when we livestream on Facebook, this Sunday night at 7:00 EST!

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

February 21, 2021

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