Doc Savage - The Movie!

[This review of Doc Savage - The Man of Bronze was first cobbled together a decade ago. After giving it a good going over I found little had changed in my assessment.]

Yesterday was a very pleasant day. I was sitting on my front porch (the carport really) in a comfortable chair, ideal weather, aromatic cigar smoke wafting around my face, while I read a dandy Doc Savage adventure. I've been catching up on my Doc Savage reading since school has been out. While I sat there, the UPS man arrived and delivered to my eager mitts the Warner Archives Doc Savage movie on DVD. I've long had a copy on VHS, but I've been meaning to upgrade to the DVD for years. I splurged this week. Ironically, I was reading a Doug Murray essay on the movie as it arrived at my door. I took the flick and later yesterday got around to viewing it. 

It's been quite a few years and I've read many a Doc Savage adventure since I saw it. Before, my interest in Doc was mostly from the comics by Marvel and the fact the great Ron Ely was playing the role. At the time I knew a little about Doc from a few novels, but I had read precious few of them before Anthony Tollin made it possible with his current line of great reprints. Having read over a hundred of those at this point, I am better able to evaluate how effectively the movie evokes the Lester Dent stories. [Note: I have since finished he whole of the original 182 Doc pulp novels plus more than a few of the yarns written since.] And I must say, I was impressed. The campy nature of the movie is regrettable still, but after reading how Doc seems so tongue-tied around women in the novels, it sure makes his "Mona, you're a brick." line go down a bit easier. And by the way, I never realized that Mona is played by Pamela Hensley who went on to play the evil Princess Ardalla on Buck Rogers, a neat fanboy double play there.

 

The John Phillip Sousa theme still annoys a bit, but mostly because it's used inappropriately at times, such as when Doc and his Fab Five are on the journey to the Edge of the World. The Fab Five themselves are reasonably well cast for the most part, though I do think both Ham and Monk are a bit too clownish for the roles in places. Habeas Corpus annoys me in the books and continues to do so in the movie, so no change there. 

The villain, Captain Seas, seems much more typical of a Doc baddie than I realized, and even his over-the-top henchman Gorro is more in keeping than I suspected, though that satiric element does undercut the movie in places. The battle-of-a-dozen-fighting-styles at the end is cute, but it lasts too long. On the upside, the brawl on the yacht seemed pure classic Doc to me. I'm still annoyed by the sometimes slickness of the production, the nasty habit of labeling every piece of equipment Doc uses with his name seemed stupid when I saw this movie in the 70's and every time since. The movie does seem at times to be more interested in branding a toy line or something than telling a good story. 

This isn't the Doc movie I'd have made then, and certainly not the one I'd make now. But I still argue the first half-hour of the flick is pretty dang good as Doc chases the Mayan gunman across the skyscraper while the Fab Five rush to help. There is a good sense of how the books unfold. More of this would've been a great help to the overall feel of the movie. 

I'd still love to see a new Doc movie made, one with a real respect for the vitality of the character and not just for the surface features. Seeing the trailer for the first time in my memory is a treat (see below), as well as the fact the movie looks great on DVD, widescreen is excellent. If you haven't seen this Doc, see it. But if you're a fan of the books, don't judge it too harshly, but rather try to love what is best. It's a movie with mostly good intentions if not always good delivery.

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To Life Immortal!

"To Life Immortal!" is mantra the "Martians" chant when they feel the need to express their core mission. But these are not your daddy's aliens. They've changed quite a bit. 

In 1988 at long last a sequel to George Pal's classic War of the Worlds appeared, but not on the big screen. Rather it was an independent television series that speculated what might have happened after the earth-shaking events of 1953. It seems the "deceased" aliens (which turn out not to be Martian after all) were gathered up and put into barrels and stored away in secret locations around the planet. As the show opens some of these barrels are unwittingly stolen by terrorists who expose them to radiation and the aliens revive after over thirty years of storage. They are somewhat different than we saw before, a bit more robust physically and they seem to have a new talent to actually absorb and become other living creatures, specifically human beings. This change in modus operandi is necessary to maintain the budget of a small independent television show which couldn't showcase war machines each episode, though they did for the debut. 

Really this is a story of four people who are put together to combat the aliens. Their leader is the wildly eccentric Dr. Harrison Blackwood (Jared Martin) who as it turns out was the adoptive son of Clayton Forrester who battled the aliens in the original Pal movie. He is joined by his colleague Norton Drake (Phil Akin) who is a paraplegic and a computer genius. Also on hand is Dr. Suzanne McCullough (Lynda Mason Green), single mother and microbiologist. Her daughter turns up now and again. Their official liason is Colonel Paul Ironhorse (Richard Chaves) who is a by-the-book military officer. These four and a few others are a tiny taskforce with the mission to locate the stymie the aliens who are constantly plotting mischief around the globe. It's a pretty good premise for a TV show and it worked pretty well for one season. 

Adding a great deal of heft to the cast is Anne Sullivan who reprises her role of Sylvia Van Buren from the 1953 original Pal movie. She is an older lady now who suffers from mental illness as a result of her close encounter to the events of 1953 which for reasons that stay vague, most of the world has forgotten or repressed. Another recurring character is John Colicos (of Battlestar Galactica fame) who plays an alien called "Quinn" who has been alive and on his own since the 1953 invasion. A nifty tie-in is made to the 1938 "Panic Broadcast" of War of the Worlds by Orson Welles and we learn that the radio drama was a cover for a real incursion by the aliens in anticipation of the full-on invasion fifteen years later. 

The schemes the aliens devise to do in mankind range from terrifying to thoroughly half-baked. They use atom bombs, contaminated food products, subliminal messaging, and more. The show can really be quite lurid such as the one where an alien gets sick and his two comrades (they operate in teams of three all the time) get him well by cutting out human brains and dumping them into a big super-science vat. There's a gimmick where an alien possessing a human can somehow reach out of the chest to snatch up anyone who gives them lip. The aliens thrive on radiation and so when they inhabit a body it slowly burns up as evidenced by little black blisters that erupt on the face and elsewhere. It's all pretty yucky.

With the second season new folks took command and the premise was changed. We follow some of our original cast into the near future where the alien "Mor-Tax" have themselves been overrun by another wave of invaders called the "Mothren". It's a rather bleak world we are reintroduced to, and these new aliens are even more vicious than the previous batch. Adrian Paul (of Highlander fame) joins the cast as a resistance fighter of sorts and all around badass. This attempt to make the show more apocalyptic with more action, is a bit of a mess though still quite watchable. Aside from the abysmal fashions of the late 80's and the entertaining but quaint technology on display this is a pretty rousing show, at least in the first season. 

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George Pal's War Of The Worlds!

George Pal's spectacular full-color presentation of H.G.Well's The War of the Worlds remains to my mind the definitive on-screen version of the story despite many later renditions which were truer to the novel or attempted a more recent update. The reason is that this version of the Martians and their deadly machines is at least as locked into the popular imagination as are the original illustrations and descriptions from the classic novel. That said, the movie is limited in some ways. 

Moving the story into the then modern day was like the infamous radio broadcast before it was a good move to make the threat in the story feel immediate and not remote and archaic. As compelling as the original Wells passages can be, seeing the Martian tripods stomping on horse-drawn carriages is less effective than seeing them blast tanks out of existence. The famous green machines from Pal's version are limited by the technology of the time which would've proved quite expensive to create for the screen in stop-motion which was the only option available. Animation was not a viable option given the conflict of imagery which would've resulted. I've seen this movie many times and on my recent viewing it was long enough that I was able to bring somewhat fresh eyes to the experience and I was frankly impressed all over again by what Pal and his team pulled off. I even like the somewhat hokey Martians they cooked up -- which were suitably mysterious since showing them was a nonstarter. 

Another thing that struck me was the heavy-handedness of the Christian theme which takes its origin in a single line from the novel. "...the Martians were destroyed, and humanity saved by the littlest things which God, in His wisdom, had put upon the Earth."  The Pal takes this message of a Godly plan and makes it the underpinning of the entire project with the finale taking us on a tour of several Christian churches before we learn that the Martians have succumbed to Earthly bacteria. 

Gene Barry does a crackerjack job as the scientist-hero who becomes our interpreter of events. He shows a skill and yet also a humbleness which allows us to like him as he faces up the threats of both Martian and his own fellow Earthmen. Anne Robinson is the traditional damsel in distress, and she gets hysterical a few too many times even for a woman of that stereotypical way. It's always a smack in the face to confront the rank sexism of the time with men making all the decisions and taking all the actions to confront the threats while the dames are only good for moral support and a hot cup of Joe. But it's the 50's and while some folks are eager for that halcyon time to return, I can wait thank you very much. 

More on the influence of this classic movie tomorrow. 

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John Henry And The Inky-Poo!

The tale of John Henry resonates unlike many other of the American myths because simply put it deals with a black man, and further makes him the powerful if ultimately tragic hero of the story. For that reason George Pal wanted to make his version of the story in John Henry and The Inky-Poo (the latter being the steam engine John Henry battles against). It's a fine and wonderful example of Pal's Puppetoon technique, striving perhaps for a tiny bit more realism than was the norm.

Pal's Puppetoons are entertaining if somewhat date in certain cases. But unfortunately the most successful of the line were cartoons dedicated to a frisky young man named "Jasper". Jasper was not the ugliest stereotype of the era by no small margin, but nonetheless not unlike Will Eisner's "Ebony White" can be a little hard to decode properly in the modern era.

It seems Pal was sensitive to the criticism he got in the day about Jasper and made the John Henry cartoon as something of an attempt to treat black characters with more deliberate dignity. Not all might agree, but then that never happens. I recommend catching this particular Puppetoon if you not seen it. Here's a link.

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When Worlds Collide!

The world really does come to a shattering end in When Worlds Collide, a movie by George Pal based on the novel by Phillip Wylie. There's not much to say about a movie that has a razor sharp plot. Another planet is discovered heading on a collision course with our lovely Earth and scientists calculate only a tiny time for survival and the so a scheme is hatched to build a rocket and send desperate survivors to a satellite of the onrushing destroyer.

It's a crackpot scheme built on wishes and hopes and little else but it consumes what remains of the lives of the people we follow in this movie. The real point of the movie was to fabricate the enormous craft which will speed into space carrying its precious cargo of people and other living things of Earth. The method is visually spectacular, with a ship sliding along a great track. The movie ends with the utter destruction of the Earth but what happens after is the secret. Getting to that point is the story and shows off man's best and worst characteristics.

This is a must of sci-fi buffs who don't need me to tell them that and for others, it's a well-crafted movie which suffers from too much head and too little heart, but both are there.

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Pal's Man Of Bronze!

Yesterday was a very pleasant day. I was sitting on my front porch (the carport really) in a comfortable chair, ideal weather, aromatic cigar smoke wafting around my face, while I read a dandy Doc Savage adventure. I've been catching up on my Doc Savage reading since school has been out.

While I sat there, the UPS man arrived and delivered to my eager mitts the Warner Archives Doc Savage movie on DVD. I've long had a copy on VHS, but I've been meaning to upgrade to the DVD for years. I splurged this week. Ironically I was reading a Doug Murray essay on the movie as it arrived at my door.

I took the flick and later yesterday got around to viewing it. It's been quite a few years and I've read many a Doc Savage adventure since I saw it. Before, my interest in Doc was mostly from the comics by Marvel and the fact the great Ron Ely was playing the role. I knew a little about Doc from a few novels, but had read precious few of them before Anthony Tollin made it possible with his current line of great reprints.

Having read over a hundred of those at this point, I am better able to evaluate how effectively the movie evokes the Lester Dent stories. And I must say, I was impressed. The campy nature of the movie is regrettable still, but after reading how Doc seems so tongue-tied around women in the novels, it sure makes his "Mona, you're a brick." line go down a bit easier. And by the way, I never realized that Mona is played by Pamela Hensley who went on to play the evil Princess Ardalla on Buck Rogers, a neat fanboy double play there.


The John Phillip Sousa theme still annoys a bit, but mostly because it's used inappropriately at times, such as when Doc and his Fab Five are on the journey to the Edge of the World. The Fab Five themselves are reasonably well cast for the most part, though I do think both Ham and Monk are a bit too clownish for the roles in places. Habeas Corpus annoys me in the books and continues to do so in the movie, so no change there.

The villain, Captain Seas, seems much more typical of a Doc baddie than I realized, and even his over-the-top henchman Gorro is more in keeping than I suspected, though that satiric element does undercut the movie in places. The battle-of-a-dozen-fighting-styles at the end is cute, but lasts too long. On the upside, the brawl on the yacht seemed pure classic Doc to me.

I'm still annoyed by the sometimes slickness of the production, the nasty habit of labeling every piece of equipment Doc uses with his name seemed stupid when I saw this movie in the 70's and every time since. The movie does seem at times to be more interested in branding a toy line or something than telling a good story.

This isn't the Doc movie I'd have made then, and certainly not the one I'd make now. But I still argue the first half-hour of the flick is pretty dang good as Doc chases the Mayan gunman across the skyscraper while the Fab Five rush to help. There is a good sense of how the books unfold. More of this would've been a great help to the overall feel of the movie.

I'd still love to see a new Doc movie made, one with a real respect for the vitality of the character and not just for the surface features. Seeing the trailer for the first time in my memory is a treat (see below), as well as the fact the movie looks great on DVD, widescreen is excellent.

If you haven't seen this Doc, see it. But if you're a fan of the books, don't judge it too harshly, but rather try to love what is best. It's a movie with mostly good intentions if not always good delivery.



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