You know, I'm not sure which genre Roger Corman ripped off more: shameless Alien knock-offs (Forbidden World, Galaxy of Terror, plus a couple more who's name eludes me) or shameless Jaws knock-offs (Humanoids From The Deep, Piranha, Piranha 2: The Spawning). Shockingly, Roger didn’t go to the Star Wars well all that often, beyond Starcrash and Battle Beyond the Stars (which was more a Magnificent Seven rip-off than anything). Today's examples of shameless rip-offs add another couple of ticks in the Jaws column: Up From The Depths and Demon of Paradise.
In 1979's Up From The Depths, a prehistoric aquatic monster awakes from its long slumber and begins terrorizing the nearby human population. Said population exists in and around a tropic island resort (in this case, the "Hawaiian Archipelago"), consisting of abused staff, a resort owner who refuse to acknowledge the monster problem for fear of driving away guests, a supermodel and her photographer on assignment to show off her boobs as much as possible, a bickering married couple and some colorful local natives. Eventually convinced of a problem, the local sheriff, a reporter and a scientist (who wants the beast captured instead of killed) set out to do battle with the creature from the deep.
The problem with Up From The Depths is that we never see the monster. While I'm all for the Spielberg "The Shark is Still Working" school of filmmaking, where Less Monster is More (mostly due to technical constraints), he did eventually show us Bruce in all his rubber monster glory. In the meantime we got fins, barrels on harpoons, menacing shadows, and fleeting glimpses of something horrible when people are attacked. In Up From The Depths we don't even get that. The violence consists of super close up underwater shots of something shaking while red food coloring floats about. The monster is only in the movie for - seriously - about 3 minutes running time total and full on glimpses of the beast are counted in seconds.
What does that mean? That means the running time is made up with a whole boatload of characters that you don't care about, that are mostly featureless aside from their one defining trait (the Hen-Pecked Husband from the Bickering Couple wants to get away from his Shrew Wife, the Japanese Guy stomps around waving his katana while wearing a kamikaze headband and Sumo Pants, the Gay Resort Owner is faaaAAAA-bulous, the Stoic Loner Fisherman is Stoic and so on). When the body-count starts to pile up, none of these walking stereotypes will register on your radar.
(Although I do have to admit that the Panic On The Beach scene after the Monster makes his big appearance was kind of funny in a very stupid way. There's the typical Scramble To Get Out of The Water Before Being Eaten scene that these movies always sport and then everyone continues to panic, running around in a stampede on the beach - which goes on for several minutes. Um, you people do realize that once you're out of the water, there's no need to panic and that the aquatic monster can't get you there, right? Well aside from Crowd Stampede scenes on land are easier and cheaper to shoot than Panic in the Water, and they needed to pad out the running time)
Meanwhile over in 1987's Demon of Paradise, a prehistoric aquatic monster awakes from its long slumber and begins terrorizing the nearby human population. Said population exists in and around a tropic island resort (in this case, the "The South Seas"), consisting of abused staff, a resort owner who refuse to acknowledge the monster problem for fear of driving away guests, a supermodel and her photographer on assignment to show off her boobs as much as possible, a bickering married couple and some colorful local natives. Eventually convinced of a problem, the local sheriff, a reporter and a scientist (who wants the beast captured instead of killed) set out to do battle with the creature from the deep.
"Now wait a second", I hear you say. "That's the EXACT same description that you had for Up From The Depths! I call shenanigans!" No, I'm totally serious. Aside from the killer aquatic beast being more of a Creature From The Black Lagoon more than Bruce the Killer Shark, the two movies are more or less identical, right down to the Supermodel on a photo shoot subplot!
Demon of Paradise is better than Up From The Depths, but only marginally so. While there's more way more Monster-On-Human action than Up From The Depths, there's so much boring People Talking bits leading up to the action, you'll find yourself nodding off. When the monster does show up, he's a cross between The Creature and Bob Marley and looks ridiculous. And I mean ridiculous by B-monster movie standards. 30 years of Rubber Suit technology since Creature From The Black Lagoon and this is the best we can get - even on a low budget flick?
I can't really get too mad at Roger for these flicks - he didn’t have a hand in their production. New World Productions purchased these two stinkers from overseas, slapped his name on the opening credits, came up with some salacious poster artwork to draw 'em into the Drive-Ins and released the things on the cheap. Still, the blood of the innocent (or at least the last four hours of my life) is on your hands, Corman!
THE DVD -
While the movies may stink, I have to hand it to Shout! Factory for releasing some top notch DVDs! We get widescreen anamorphic prints that look pretty clean - more or less. There are scratches and dust in places (mostly around the reel changes), but the colors are good and the blacks - of which there are a lot of - are solid. The sound is a 5.1 Dolby Digital mix which sounds clean, although In Up from The Depths the music sometimes overpowers the dialog in places.
THE EXTRAS -
We get way more than these movies deserve. Both come with their original theatrical trailers (which look WAY more fun than what we actually get. I want to see those movies instead!) and Up From The Depths gets a couple of television and radio spots too.
There's a brief documentary, running about 10 minuets with Roger Corman and special effects guy Chris Walas, who goes on about how he built the monster pretty much out of driftwood and happy thoughts. Lastly we get a handful of trailers for other Roger Corman flicks: Firecracker, the much, much better Humanoids from the Deep, Jackson County Jail (which looks like a really good drama) and Caged Heat.
Also, Shout! has included the Roger Corman Experience, where with one push of a button, you get some "Coming to our theater" bumpers, two trailers, a movie, two more trailers and the second movie, all in a row. It's fun if a bit cheesy.
THE BOTTOM LINE -
There are three types of Roger Corman flicks:
* Legitimately good (relatively speaking) movies - Death Race 2000, Piranha, Suburbia
* Cheesy and stupid but still loads of fun - Starcrash, Galaxy of Terror, Rock n Roll High School
* Movies that are a chore to get through - Battletruck and Deathsport
To that last category, you can add Up from the Depths and Demon of Paradise. Rent it once and then never speak of them again.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Saturday, March 5, 2011
DIRTY PAIR: PROJECT EDEN - you'll have a blast (really!)
I've been a long time anime fan, going all the way back to Speed Racer in the sixties (well, I caught it in reruns in the early seventies - I'm not quite THAT old yet), Star Blazers in the late seventies, Robotech in the early eighties - so I have a soft spot for old school anime like this. There's been dribs and drabs of Dirty Pair (and it's sister series, Crusher Joe) released in America, but this is the first time we get a release of one of the better Elder Statesmen of Anime.
Dirty Pair? What's that - let me quickly explain. The year is the twenty-second century and humanity has spread across the sea of stars and the World Welfare Works Association (also known as the WWWA or 3WA) assists member systems of the United Galactica federation deal with various problems and situations that normal police or security forces find themselves unable to handle.
This is where Kei and Yuri come in - a team of troubleshooters codenamed Lovely Angels. Highly skilled, very competent and downright sexy, the Lovely Angels have another name, one that's a little less flattering - The Dirty Pair - thanks to their reputation for leaving a wide trail of destruction behind them wherever they go.
This time, Kei and Yuri are tasked to investigate the planet Argerna, a major source of Vizurium, an element essential in warp drives. The production and refining facilities are being sabotaged and the Vizurium output is dropping dramatically. During their investigations (and between occasional baths) the two cross paths with Carson D. Carson, professional thief and all around letch. After adventures with guns, handcuffs and towels just barley covering nubile bodies, the trio run afoul of Doctor Wattsman, the mad scientist behind everything that's going on.
Using his vast Mad Scientist intellect, Doctor Wattsman is hard at work unraveling the genetic code of the fossilized creatures that make up the Vizorium (think Dinosaurs and Petroilum), attempting to make them the next evolutionary step in the human race. Can the Dirty Pair (plus one) stop Doctor Wattsman before his mad schemes come to a head - and will anything be left of the planet afterwards?
Coming from 1987, the animation style is a bit rougher than what you get in your modern anime series, but it's still pretty fluid and smooth. And Project Eden comes to use before the dawn of CGI animation running anime left right and center - we get nothing but ink and paint here. That right there is a huge plus in my book.
The plot is a bit - well, shall we say simplistic and disjointed. There's a strong opening that's very reminiscent of a classic James Bond flick but once the pair get to Argerna, the story starts to wander and stutter with some random fan-service moments. Still once we get past the middle bits, the show picks up again for the climax. Plus you can spend time picking out all the intentional tropes and homage's to other science fiction franchises and other anime series.
THE DVD -
Being such an old feature, I was shocked how good this thing looked! There's the occasional scratch here and there, but the colors look great and the print is solid. As an added bonus, ADV gives us the original 1.85:1 ratio anamorphic widescreen. We get a Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo English dub or the original Japanese soundtrack with English optional subtitles. While I went with the Japanese language track, the American dub was actually pretty good. I could sit through it without cringing or running from the room.
THE EXTRAS -
We get the original theatrical trailer for Project Eden, and a bunch of ADV trailers - Blue Seed Beyond, Dirty Pair: Flight 0005 Conspiracy , King of Bandit Jing, RahXephon, Angelic Layer and City Hunter Season 2 (A wicked cool series if you've never seen it!) The only other item in the package is a 1 page leaflet with a list of chapter stops on it.
THE BOTTOM LINE -
It's a bit goofy, and more than a bit gratuitous with the sexy, but Project Eden (and Dirty Pair as a whole) is a whole lot of fun. If you're not put off by the mid eighties primitive-ish animation, you'll probably have a blast. (Wait - with Kei and Yuri on the job, you're sure to get blasted!)
Dirty Pair? What's that - let me quickly explain. The year is the twenty-second century and humanity has spread across the sea of stars and the World Welfare Works Association (also known as the WWWA or 3WA) assists member systems of the United Galactica federation deal with various problems and situations that normal police or security forces find themselves unable to handle.
This is where Kei and Yuri come in - a team of troubleshooters codenamed Lovely Angels. Highly skilled, very competent and downright sexy, the Lovely Angels have another name, one that's a little less flattering - The Dirty Pair - thanks to their reputation for leaving a wide trail of destruction behind them wherever they go.
This time, Kei and Yuri are tasked to investigate the planet Argerna, a major source of Vizurium, an element essential in warp drives. The production and refining facilities are being sabotaged and the Vizurium output is dropping dramatically. During their investigations (and between occasional baths) the two cross paths with Carson D. Carson, professional thief and all around letch. After adventures with guns, handcuffs and towels just barley covering nubile bodies, the trio run afoul of Doctor Wattsman, the mad scientist behind everything that's going on.
Using his vast Mad Scientist intellect, Doctor Wattsman is hard at work unraveling the genetic code of the fossilized creatures that make up the Vizorium (think Dinosaurs and Petroilum), attempting to make them the next evolutionary step in the human race. Can the Dirty Pair (plus one) stop Doctor Wattsman before his mad schemes come to a head - and will anything be left of the planet afterwards?
Coming from 1987, the animation style is a bit rougher than what you get in your modern anime series, but it's still pretty fluid and smooth. And Project Eden comes to use before the dawn of CGI animation running anime left right and center - we get nothing but ink and paint here. That right there is a huge plus in my book.
The plot is a bit - well, shall we say simplistic and disjointed. There's a strong opening that's very reminiscent of a classic James Bond flick but once the pair get to Argerna, the story starts to wander and stutter with some random fan-service moments. Still once we get past the middle bits, the show picks up again for the climax. Plus you can spend time picking out all the intentional tropes and homage's to other science fiction franchises and other anime series.
THE DVD -
Being such an old feature, I was shocked how good this thing looked! There's the occasional scratch here and there, but the colors look great and the print is solid. As an added bonus, ADV gives us the original 1.85:1 ratio anamorphic widescreen. We get a Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo English dub or the original Japanese soundtrack with English optional subtitles. While I went with the Japanese language track, the American dub was actually pretty good. I could sit through it without cringing or running from the room.
THE EXTRAS -
We get the original theatrical trailer for Project Eden, and a bunch of ADV trailers - Blue Seed Beyond, Dirty Pair: Flight 0005 Conspiracy , King of Bandit Jing, RahXephon, Angelic Layer and City Hunter Season 2 (A wicked cool series if you've never seen it!) The only other item in the package is a 1 page leaflet with a list of chapter stops on it.
THE BOTTOM LINE -
It's a bit goofy, and more than a bit gratuitous with the sexy, but Project Eden (and Dirty Pair as a whole) is a whole lot of fun. If you're not put off by the mid eighties primitive-ish animation, you'll probably have a blast. (Wait - with Kei and Yuri on the job, you're sure to get blasted!)
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