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Journey to the Seventh Planet
by Darkwing 2010-07-13, 12:22
Journey to the Seventh Planet
1962
Starring John Agar
General Overview
Classified under cult classics, this film definitely belongs in the cult genre, not so sure about the classics genre though. This movie focuses on a team of space explorers bound for the planet Uranus. Expecting a harsh environment, the ship lands amongst a lush green valley with trees surrounding it and a quaint old village in the distance. This movie has a very basic and cliche plot (even for the time) where an alien monster can make illusions appear and make the crew think that certain things are real. Extremely similar to the Ray Bradbury novel, The Martian Chronicles and the Star Trek episode Shore Leave (though Shore leave wouldn’t be made for nearly five years after this movie), the plot wreaks of failure and the acting of desperation.
Acting
The draw name in this film is obviously John Agar, who definitely was a pretty good actor back in the day. In this film however, everything feels superficial on so many levels that even Agar’s acting is quite horrible in this movie. It felt more like a movie where he agreed to make it because his wallet was getting low on cash and his stomach was demanding some food.
The rest of the cast are pretty much unknowns and with good reason too. Not one of them can act worth a cent and the characters feel so incredibly weightless that you wonder if you’re watching acting, or a bunch of balloons floating in the air. The character of Carl seems to get all the bad luck in the film. Carl is the eager beaver of the team who’ll jump forward and do anything without hesitation (including ram his arm through a force-field). Carl is the main subject of the fears that the alien entity throws at them, using Carl’s fears to create hideous monsters. Carl gets it in the end and you’re left wondering what the hell just happened. To make things worse, you start wishing that all of the other characters got killed off too so that the movie would end. There is no remorse or sympathy for any of them because the execution is just horrible.
Cinematography
If the words “my eyes are bleeding” mean nothing to you, then this film is great for you on a technical level. However, my eyes felt like bleeding because this film is full of horrible camera angles, pathetic editing and a bizarre set of horrible special effects. So where to begin? Well, there were a few cool shot angles here and there, but they kind of got over-used to save on film stock. For the most part, the cameraman must have had a thing for men’s asses because that is how most of the shots are framed, such that the heads get cut off and the ass becomes the focal point. I’m not entirely sure if this is on purpose, or if the cameraman forgot his glasses throughout production.
On the editing front, things weren’t much better. Almost every shot is spliced together forming a lot of jump cuts which are very painful to watch. There are next to no cutaways or any attempt really at breaking this trend, where most of everything was basic medium shots.
On the note of special effects, this is a difficult one to pick on because having watched a lot of older films, I can understand and appreciate what are good effects (for the day) and what are bad. These ones were bad. Their stop motion technique was just clumsy, they had bizarre 2D animated graphics overlaying the footage (such as the hypnotic swirl every time we see the alien) that make you wonder if you’re watching Puff the Magic Dragon, or if you simply forgot to turn off Teletoon.
Finally, the concept design for this film must have been absolutely horrible for me to even pick up on this one. I am assuming it was the director’s five year old son who did the designs for this film, because I don’t know of anyone else who would make bright blue space-suits with yellow helmets and pink gloves (except maybe his five year old daughter of course). I’m inclined to think it was his son though because the alien monster looks like an oversized booger that turns into a sea sponge at the end. I wonder if Crayola got a commission from this film, because all of the bizarre colours go against even the sixties colour scheme!
Story
There was one?
Conclusion
I’ve seen good films, new films, cult films, old films. I’ve seen films that had great character and story, but just lacked the budget to make it right and therefore it got misunderstood as being cheesy. This isn’t one of them. This film is just plain atrocious and is so bad that you get bored of laughing at it as you watch it. If you even want a fun cheesy film to watch, this is not it. The only place I can think of for this film is the burn pile my landlord has up the hill.
1/10
1962
Starring John Agar
General Overview
Classified under cult classics, this film definitely belongs in the cult genre, not so sure about the classics genre though. This movie focuses on a team of space explorers bound for the planet Uranus. Expecting a harsh environment, the ship lands amongst a lush green valley with trees surrounding it and a quaint old village in the distance. This movie has a very basic and cliche plot (even for the time) where an alien monster can make illusions appear and make the crew think that certain things are real. Extremely similar to the Ray Bradbury novel, The Martian Chronicles and the Star Trek episode Shore Leave (though Shore leave wouldn’t be made for nearly five years after this movie), the plot wreaks of failure and the acting of desperation.
Acting
The draw name in this film is obviously John Agar, who definitely was a pretty good actor back in the day. In this film however, everything feels superficial on so many levels that even Agar’s acting is quite horrible in this movie. It felt more like a movie where he agreed to make it because his wallet was getting low on cash and his stomach was demanding some food.
The rest of the cast are pretty much unknowns and with good reason too. Not one of them can act worth a cent and the characters feel so incredibly weightless that you wonder if you’re watching acting, or a bunch of balloons floating in the air. The character of Carl seems to get all the bad luck in the film. Carl is the eager beaver of the team who’ll jump forward and do anything without hesitation (including ram his arm through a force-field). Carl is the main subject of the fears that the alien entity throws at them, using Carl’s fears to create hideous monsters. Carl gets it in the end and you’re left wondering what the hell just happened. To make things worse, you start wishing that all of the other characters got killed off too so that the movie would end. There is no remorse or sympathy for any of them because the execution is just horrible.
Cinematography
If the words “my eyes are bleeding” mean nothing to you, then this film is great for you on a technical level. However, my eyes felt like bleeding because this film is full of horrible camera angles, pathetic editing and a bizarre set of horrible special effects. So where to begin? Well, there were a few cool shot angles here and there, but they kind of got over-used to save on film stock. For the most part, the cameraman must have had a thing for men’s asses because that is how most of the shots are framed, such that the heads get cut off and the ass becomes the focal point. I’m not entirely sure if this is on purpose, or if the cameraman forgot his glasses throughout production.
On the editing front, things weren’t much better. Almost every shot is spliced together forming a lot of jump cuts which are very painful to watch. There are next to no cutaways or any attempt really at breaking this trend, where most of everything was basic medium shots.
On the note of special effects, this is a difficult one to pick on because having watched a lot of older films, I can understand and appreciate what are good effects (for the day) and what are bad. These ones were bad. Their stop motion technique was just clumsy, they had bizarre 2D animated graphics overlaying the footage (such as the hypnotic swirl every time we see the alien) that make you wonder if you’re watching Puff the Magic Dragon, or if you simply forgot to turn off Teletoon.
Finally, the concept design for this film must have been absolutely horrible for me to even pick up on this one. I am assuming it was the director’s five year old son who did the designs for this film, because I don’t know of anyone else who would make bright blue space-suits with yellow helmets and pink gloves (except maybe his five year old daughter of course). I’m inclined to think it was his son though because the alien monster looks like an oversized booger that turns into a sea sponge at the end. I wonder if Crayola got a commission from this film, because all of the bizarre colours go against even the sixties colour scheme!
Story
There was one?
Conclusion
I’ve seen good films, new films, cult films, old films. I’ve seen films that had great character and story, but just lacked the budget to make it right and therefore it got misunderstood as being cheesy. This isn’t one of them. This film is just plain atrocious and is so bad that you get bored of laughing at it as you watch it. If you even want a fun cheesy film to watch, this is not it. The only place I can think of for this film is the burn pile my landlord has up the hill.
1/10
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