Sunday, March 22, 2015

Grindhouse Sci Fi Collection - Review

Alright!  Finished all the movies in this Grindhouse Sci Fi Collection today.  Here are my reviews, summed up below with plot-lines included.  Reviews go in order of what appears on the front of the box, top to bottom left to right.

The Galaxy Invader - An alien spaceship crash-lands in rural Maryland, the alien survives, and wanders through the woods whilst pursued by drunken rednecks, as well as a local science teacher and student.  The alien's gun gets taken by humans and wackiness ensues.  This movie was a lot of fun, fast paced, and easy to follow.  Truly a B movie, to be enjoyed while drinking would be recommended.  I give it 4 stars.

Kong Island - Bad guys in the jungle are putting radios into the brains of apes, radios that allow these evil people to control them.  Tarzan-like girl Eva and park ranger Burt must stop them.  Bad film quality, bad acting and over the top ridiculousness makes this one fun to watch, but poor pacing and lack of anything cool happening soon kills your vibe. It's a mild chore to get through, but not unlikable.  3 stars.

Warriors of the Wasteland - In this Mad Max ripoff, greasy guys in cool cars drive around post-apocalyptic Earth and defend some innocent group from the local hell raisers.  It's really no plot, but that's what it claims is happening anyways.  Ultimately I wanted to like this movie.  It looks pretty decent, but cheap.  The actors aren't great and plot is very weak, but it's still fun and a great movie to watch with some friends and drink to.  I give it 3 stars.

Cosmos:  War of the Planets - A strange cryptic signal is picked up by a spaceship, and they are off to investigate.  Once they get to the source - a dark planet, they land, only to find a race of silver aliens in fear of a tyrannical robot.  Slow beginning that leads to a pretty decent payoff in the lat 45 minutes, this movie was far better than I expected.  It's got loads of atmosphere and is genuinely kind of creepy (or at least bizarre).  Another 3 stars.

The Day Time Ended - When a strange green object shows up at a house in the desert, it's the start of a bizarre alien war that takes place right in some folk's front yard.  This movie was reallllllly cool.  I loved it.  It's strange, memorable, fast paced, creepy, heavy on the atmosphere, and had fantastic effects.  Something I would see again, and show to people.  Deserves a cult following.  5 stars.

Doomsday Machine - A shuttle takes off with a crew of 4 men and 3 women, en route to Venus.  Will they be able to stand the 2 year journey?  This movie was pretty bad, and the weakest part of the set.  Stereotypical characters, no real tension or interest, it's a movie to put on and then forget what you're watching.  1.5 stars.

War of the Robots - Star Wars ripoff filmed in Italy, the plot revolves around some kidnapped scientists from Earth and the group of robots sent to rescue them.  Not so much terrible as it is completely incomprehensible, this movie is at least cool to look at.  Weird visuals, endless Star Wars rip offs, confusing battle scenes, and bad dialog and dubbing at least give this camp charm.  2 stars.

It's Alive - A sweaty old man has a giant dinosaur thing in a cave, which he feeds people to.  He traps 3 people and they are set to be his next victims.  Extremely bad film quality by schlockmeister Larry Buchanan.  It's supposed to be bad, and in that it succeeds.  Actually, this is the worst move in the set, I take it back, Doomsday Machine.  This movie became a joke for me, as I would endlessly compare bad movies to it.  Although, I do need to see it again.  Somewhere between zero and half a star.

The boxset itself is nice quality.  4 single sided DVDs in those mini-cases, and there's menus, chapter selections, "other features" trailers, and commentary on The Galaxy Invader!  Have to watch that some time.  Since I gave 5/8 of the movie at least 3 stars it averages out to a pretty good score overall.


Mine was given to me as a gift, but sells for $15 on Amazon.  Totally worth it, for The Day Time Ended alone.

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