*Blog started on April 11, 2020.
Maybe I have lost some of my passion for politics. Acquaintances from Morton are sharing and reacting positively to my Facebook posts. What does it take to get unfollowed? I guess my tolerance for bullshit is gone. This week has led me to unfollow anyone implying that they are not going to vote for Joe Biden.
It all ends up being a conspiracy by the baby boomers. Millennials were given everything growing up, so they feel entitled. Thus, they need to get their way or no one gets their way. Their parents were playing the long game. Be pushed around and underappreciated by your crotch fruit so that these twats feel like the world owes them just as much as you. Hillary Clinton fairly beat Bernie Sanders, so they voted against all of their interests instead of protecting some of them via Jill Stein or Donald Trump.
The rode to hell is paved with good intentions. How else did you expect me to transition this rant to a Roger Corman movie? He knew that we needed "Alien" and "Star Wars" to feature over-the-top gore and female nudity, but what we got was a cinematic purgatory in "Forbidden World.
Forbidden World (1982)
Being awoken to battle some space pirates, Troubleshooter Mike Colby's robot custodian SAM-104 advises him that he has received a new assignment. The two are to head to planet Xarbia to contain a research experiment that may have gone wrong or horrendously right. Dr. Hauser and his team have been trying to develop a new food source to solve all galactic hunger concerns by creating organisms with Proto-B DNA. It seems a noble cause, but because it is playing God, they are isolated on this deep space planet.
This new DNA's metamorphic nature puts into question who is actually playing the all mighty on high. The latest mutation decided to kill all of other test subjects before cocooning itself in the lab. Its violent nature leaves Colby believing that it needs to be terminated, but Hauser and his primary assistants want to see how this plays out...even after it attacks the janitor and escapes the lab.
Technically, the cleaning guy is still alive, just dissolving into protein with a pulse. That sounds like a fate worse than death, so the majority of the crew is ready to side with Colby's intentions. The minority seems a little to eager to further study the events, so everyone will eventually be on the same page, but will they have enough numbers to battle the large-toothed, intelligent insectoid that it has become?
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IMDb.com - Forbidden Planet
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Roger Corman's importance to cinema should make his last name an entry in the Oxford Dictionary. Aside that word should be the primary poster for "Forbidden World". It tells you the film knows what you want, but this is still a deal with the devil.
A few months ago, I had watched the Corman-produced "Galaxy of Terror". It was entertaining enough despite a haphazard story, so I expected this feature to be the same. Aside from the reuse of James Cameron designed sets and overall tackiness, this film lacks the originality of its predecessor, and once we witness the space dog fight (from Corman-produced "Battle Beyond the Starts") and concept of hypersleep, you know you are just settling into a cheap knock off of the biggest sci-fi of the time.
The acting is hindered by everyone trying to be either hip or sexy, with our male cast focusing on being David Carradine hot, so it feels like 2000's indie wrestling. Its special effects are all around laughable with an Ed Wood equivalent monster as the villain and a robot that just misses the mark. There are some good gore effects too start, but it all just becomes a mess of red and transparent gelatin by the end of the flick.
Despite all of its flaws, it does show the beauty of a good Corman production. In trying to differentiate itself from what it is ripping off, possible inspiration for classic films are present. The monster's development is very much like 1995's metamorphic alien film "Species", and the demise of the beast is very similar to the end of "Species 2". It attempts to improve on some of the sequences from "Alien", which you have to applaud the effort, and in turn offers up devices that may have been used in that film's sequels.
If anything beyond the production values can be said to have aged poorly, it is all the female nudity, but I can defend that. "Game of Thrones" first season is classic television and it shows us that sexposition is still a valid storytelling device.
With some Clark & Sheffield Vodka, Kahlua and Meijer's brand Italian Sweet Crème Coffee Creamer, "Forbidden World" was a fun experience. If you can talk some friends into watching it with you, there are few better celebrations of mediocrity. This is not art, but you will not feel dirty seeing classic films being subverted and perverted. You can accept that is just part of the deal if a flick has been labeled a Roger Corman Cult Classic.
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IMDb.com - Forbidden Planet
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