Post by Keith Heitmann on Dec 25, 2003 18:49:34 GMT -5
Planning ahead, back in September I gave the wife a list of all the DVDs I'd like to have from the Best Buy war collection.
I got 5 last month for my birthday, which included:
The Longest Day
Mad Max
Force 10 from Navarone
All Quiet on the Western Front (the one with Ernest Borgnine)
Forbidden Planet
Even though we decided not to exchange Xmas gifts this year due to recent expenses, she had already picked up another five for me:
Von Ryan's Express
Sink the Bismarck
Run Silent, Run Deep
North to Alaska
Dark Star
I've watched all the latest ones save for Von Ryan's Express. I just finished watching Sink the Bismarck a while ago and it was really nice seeing the whole movie as it was intended to be seen instead of seen the hacked up PG version I managed to record off TV some 20 years ago. The movie actually made some sense today.
On my VHS recording the big grand battle scene, the climax of the whole movie, is shortened to one German and one British Salvo and the everything after that is cut up to the point where the Bismarck is afire and already sinking beneath the waves. According to the tv editor the battle took all of ten seconds. ; )
I noticed one thing, in the movie just before the Bismarck is finally cornered she's engaged by torpedo firing destroyers. One is hit by gunfire and blows up. The thing I noticed about this destroyer is that it looks suspciously like the Japanese destroyer used in the bow-shot torpedo sequences of Run Silent, Run Deep. Both destroyers had those "ear-like" radar antennae atop the control tower, except in RS, RD they leaned to the left side of the screen, and STB they leaned to the right side of the screen. RS, RD was shot in 1957-1958 and STB shortly there after in 1960-1961. Looks like they borrowed a little footage and just revesed the negative.
Dark Star is a comedy. It was John Carpenters (Halloween) and Dan O'Banon's (Alien) first movie. It was a 68 minute long film class project that the studios got wind of and asked them to shoot an additional 15 minutes of footage so it could be released nationally. You can tell it's low budget and the appearance of the crew of the scout ship Dark Star all look like mid-70s hippie leftovers. But it has its moments.
They roam the universe exterminating unstable planets with boxcars size "Thermoglobal weapons" they drop in bomb runs. They get rid of these unstable planets to keep them from spinning into the local suns and causing a super nova, thus making that solar system safe for colonization. The funniest parts are that the bombs are intelligent and intent on their purpose and they talk, especially Bomb #20.
They drop each bomb, jump to hyper speed to get out of the area before the explosion and look for other targets to eliminate. Although they have been in space 20 years, they have only aged 3 years and earth support can no longer get them supplies as the cost of sending a support ship 18 parsecs is just too high. All this leads to critical systems failures that cause problems with Bomb #20.
The crew is bored mindless, the ship is a shambles and slowly self-destructing, the commander is killed prior to the start of the movie but is kept in a frozen limbo state "on ice" in sub-zero so the crew can talke with his still active mind when they need to.
Sargent Pinback is the malcontent. He complains about everything and the other crewmembers just tend to ingore him which makes him very upset.
The "alien" feeding chapter is the most hilarious part of the movie. Evidently on some previous stopping point at a planet Pinback found a creature and brought it on board as a mascot. It's basically a red gas filled ball with webbed feet. Pinback gets tired of taking care of it and the creature escapes into the ship and the chase is on.
If you get a chance to rent this B movie cult classic give it a try. Especially if you like science fiction. It's not a long movie so bear with it. If you can get a versoin that is the "UNCUT" version. The Special Edit version cuts out too much of the story. My DVD has both versions.
I got 5 last month for my birthday, which included:
The Longest Day
Mad Max
Force 10 from Navarone
All Quiet on the Western Front (the one with Ernest Borgnine)
Forbidden Planet
Even though we decided not to exchange Xmas gifts this year due to recent expenses, she had already picked up another five for me:
Von Ryan's Express
Sink the Bismarck
Run Silent, Run Deep
North to Alaska
Dark Star
I've watched all the latest ones save for Von Ryan's Express. I just finished watching Sink the Bismarck a while ago and it was really nice seeing the whole movie as it was intended to be seen instead of seen the hacked up PG version I managed to record off TV some 20 years ago. The movie actually made some sense today.
On my VHS recording the big grand battle scene, the climax of the whole movie, is shortened to one German and one British Salvo and the everything after that is cut up to the point where the Bismarck is afire and already sinking beneath the waves. According to the tv editor the battle took all of ten seconds. ; )
I noticed one thing, in the movie just before the Bismarck is finally cornered she's engaged by torpedo firing destroyers. One is hit by gunfire and blows up. The thing I noticed about this destroyer is that it looks suspciously like the Japanese destroyer used in the bow-shot torpedo sequences of Run Silent, Run Deep. Both destroyers had those "ear-like" radar antennae atop the control tower, except in RS, RD they leaned to the left side of the screen, and STB they leaned to the right side of the screen. RS, RD was shot in 1957-1958 and STB shortly there after in 1960-1961. Looks like they borrowed a little footage and just revesed the negative.
Dark Star is a comedy. It was John Carpenters (Halloween) and Dan O'Banon's (Alien) first movie. It was a 68 minute long film class project that the studios got wind of and asked them to shoot an additional 15 minutes of footage so it could be released nationally. You can tell it's low budget and the appearance of the crew of the scout ship Dark Star all look like mid-70s hippie leftovers. But it has its moments.
They roam the universe exterminating unstable planets with boxcars size "Thermoglobal weapons" they drop in bomb runs. They get rid of these unstable planets to keep them from spinning into the local suns and causing a super nova, thus making that solar system safe for colonization. The funniest parts are that the bombs are intelligent and intent on their purpose and they talk, especially Bomb #20.
They drop each bomb, jump to hyper speed to get out of the area before the explosion and look for other targets to eliminate. Although they have been in space 20 years, they have only aged 3 years and earth support can no longer get them supplies as the cost of sending a support ship 18 parsecs is just too high. All this leads to critical systems failures that cause problems with Bomb #20.
The crew is bored mindless, the ship is a shambles and slowly self-destructing, the commander is killed prior to the start of the movie but is kept in a frozen limbo state "on ice" in sub-zero so the crew can talke with his still active mind when they need to.
Sargent Pinback is the malcontent. He complains about everything and the other crewmembers just tend to ingore him which makes him very upset.
The "alien" feeding chapter is the most hilarious part of the movie. Evidently on some previous stopping point at a planet Pinback found a creature and brought it on board as a mascot. It's basically a red gas filled ball with webbed feet. Pinback gets tired of taking care of it and the creature escapes into the ship and the chase is on.
If you get a chance to rent this B movie cult classic give it a try. Especially if you like science fiction. It's not a long movie so bear with it. If you can get a versoin that is the "UNCUT" version. The Special Edit version cuts out too much of the story. My DVD has both versions.