The Thing from Another World (1951) – Review

With the arrival of the 1950s the horror genre was slowly moving out of Gothic castles and beaker-strewn laboratories into the wider world of the atomic age, and with that came irradiated monsters and visitors from outer space. Launching this cinematic change was the Howard Hawks film The Thing from Another World, an entry that warned Americans to “Keep watching the skies” and ushered in a whole new kind of terror.

Based on John W. Campbell Jr.’s novella “Who Goes There?” this science fiction horror tale is set in the remote Arctic at an outpost run by scientist Dr. Arthur Carrington (Robert Cornthwaite), who along with a group of scientists report finding a crashed ship north of their facility. A United States military team, led by Capt. Pat Hendry (Kenneth Tobey), is sent to investigate but instead of finding a crashed Russian spy plane or a meteor it turns out to be a large circular object that gives off a very strong “Fly Saucer” vibe, and when an attempt to de-ice the spaceship with thermite bombs results in them blowing the crap out of the craft, leaving the only remaining evidence the frozen remains of the alien pilot (James Arness), they quickly chop it out of the ice and bring it back to their base.

 

“Who asked for the large frozen dinner?”

Things quickly get out of hand when one of the men tasked with guarding their frozen guest is dumb enough to cover its gruesome visage with a heated blanket – to be fair it’d have creeped me out as well – but this allows the creature to thaw out and revive. But something is missing, an element that every 1950s science fiction movie requires, oh yeah, we need a pretty face to pour coffee and scream when required. In the case of this movie, that role falls to Captain Hendry’s past romantic Nikki Nicholson (Margaret Sheridan), who is now working as Dr. Carrington’s secretary. But unlike many women in this genre, Sheridan is given a little more to do with her character than found among the many stock girl scientists tropes out there. Her romantic bantering with Kenneth Tobey’s hard-nosed military man is quite charming, of course, we don’t have a lot of time for romance as this movie is just 89 minutes long and we’ve got an alien creature to flambe.

 

James Arness is definitely holding a torch for Kenneth Tobey.

Like the original story, this movie deals with a scientific research station but unlike the novella, the screenplay for this film adds an additional military element, called in when the spacecraft was discovered, and this allows for the film to delve into themes of scientific curiosity versus military pragmatism, offering food for thought amidst the heart-pounding action. When they discover that the Thing is a plant-based creature that could soon overrun the planet, sprouting out an army of evil little bastards that need our blood to grow, and this is where the film’s real conflict stems, that being the conflict between Captain Hendry’s desire to end the alien threat as quickly as possible and Doctor Carrington’s demands that they keep it alive, “We owe it to the brain of our species to stand here and die… without destroying a source of wisdom.” Needless to say, Hendry is not about to lie down and die simply for the sake of advancing science.

 

“I don’t have to take that kind of crap from eggheads like you.”

Stray Observations:

• This film beat the box office numbers of two other classic sci-fi films that came out in 1951; When Worlds Collide and The Day the Earth Stood Still.
• Both the novella and the John Carpenter remake have the spacecraft crashing to Earth millions of years ago, while in this movie it crashed just a day ago and it was the heat of the craft that melted it into the ice.
• Characters repeatedly mention the crazy Geiger counter readings given off by the crashed craft yet no one seems all that concerned about the fatal radiation poisoning they are being exposed to.
• The block of ice that contained the Thing would have weighed a ton and would have been near-impossible to lift out of the ice let alone transported back to the base.
• Our brave heroes barricade the mess room with wooden boards but as the door swings inwards, towards the creature, this makes their barricade rather useless. Way to go guys.

 

No one accused this group of being military geniuses.

The film’s strength lies in its masterful pacing and tension-building. Director Christian Nyby and producer Howard Hawks (rumoured to have had a heavier hand in directing than credited) expertly create an atmosphere of claustrophobia and paranoia, as the ensemble cast grapples with the existential threat. The palpable sense of dread is heightened by the tight quarters of the Arctic base, leaving no room for escape from the menacing presence. The isolated Arctic setting, with its desolation and endless night, adds an eerie backdrop to the unfolding events, and the use of stark black-and-white cinematography enhances the sense of claustrophobia and fear, creating a palpable atmosphere of dread that permeates the film.  At any moment the Thing could strike out of the darkness and turn you into mulch for its children.

 

More persistent than a Jehovah’s Witness.

The ensemble cast, led by Kenneth Tobey as Captain Patrick Hendry and Margaret Sheridan as Nikki Nicholson, delivers strong performances helped by the fact that their characters are well-developed and relatable, which makes their struggle against the alien invader all the more engaging. The film’s dialogue is sharp and witty, showcasing Howard Hawks’ trademark style, where the characters engage in fast-paced banter even in the face of danger. Of course, the true star of the film is the alien creature itself, and while modern audiences may be more familiar with John Carpenter’s 1982 adaptation, this 1951 version presented a unique and equally terrifying vision of the extraterrestrial, even if the monster make-up was less than imposing if looked at too closely.

Note: The filmmakers originally intended to style the creature as a shapeshifter, as in the novel, but the limited budget forced them to drop the idea and thus we get the standard man monster make-up.

While the creature is not fully revealed until the climax – a standard movie monster trope – the filmmakers employ clever techniques to create an aura of mystery and terror around it. The practical effects, though dated by today’s standards, were groundbreaking for their time and remain effective in conveying the creature’s formidable nature. The design of the creature is great, helped by an excellent performance by James Arness, is a remarkable achievement for its time and the practical effects hold up surprisingly well even today. It should be noted that Arness was not exactly happy with his role, claiming the costume made him look like a “giant carrot” but with excellent camerawork and lighting his creature is rightfully terrifying.

 

“Guess who’s coming to dinner?”

One of the standout aspects of The Thing from Another World is its taut and suspenseful storytelling as the film keeps us on the edge of our seats from start to finish, blending elements of science fiction, horror, and Cold War-era paranoia. The script, penned by Charles Lederer, provides sharp dialogue and engaging character dynamics that remain engaging even by today’s standards. This is not just a typical monster movie as it also explores deeper themes of human survival and cooperation in the face of the unknown. The film’s portrayal of the scientists and military personnel working together, despite their differences – excluding the one mad scientist who is a total dick – underscores the idea that humanity’s greatest strength lies in unity. And while this sci-fi entry may lack the sophisticated visual effects of modern sci-fi blockbusters, its enduring appeal lies in its intelligent storytelling and expertly crafted suspense. It stands as a testament to the power of atmosphere, character development, and genuine fear over flashy special effects.

 

We do get a nice shocking ending.

In conclusion, The Thing from Another World is a classic of the science fiction genre that has aged remarkably well. Its ability to create suspense, memorable characters, and a chilling atmosphere makes it a must-see for fans of both classic cinema and science fiction. It’s a testament to the enduring power of storytelling and imagination, and it continues to influence and inspire filmmakers to this day. Whether you’re a long-time fan or a newcomer to the genre, this film is sure to leave a lasting impression. And remember, “Everyone of you reading this review, tell the world, tell this to everybody wherever they are. Watch the skies. Everywhere. Keep looking. Keep watching the skies.”

The Incredible Hulk: The Snare (1979) – Review

Richard Connell’s 1924 short story “The Most Dangerous Game” has inspired many adaptations. Yet, none have come close to capturing that premise as a certain episode of a long-running television did back in the late 70s, one that featured Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno, because if you were to imagine a “Most Dangerous Game” you’d be hard-pressed to come up with something more dangerous than the Incredible Hulk.

The plot of this episode is fairly basic, David ‘Bennet’ (Bill Bixby) is invited by millionaire Michael Sutton (Bradford Dillman) to play a game of chess on his private island, unfortunately for David, the man turns out not to be so much a chess enthusiast as he is a hunter of “The Most Dangerous Game” and he has chosen David as his prey du jour. The two cross paths in an airport terminal, David’s plane to Miami is delayed by weather while Sutton’s private jet stops here for quick repairs. To pass the time the two sit down for a friendly game of chess, which our hero wins, but when David’s flight is cancelled Sutton offers to put him up at his private island, to which his jet would later fly David to Miami the following morning. He reluctantly accepts this invitation and soon finds himself being given a tour of a hunter’s paradise. If only David had known what was to follow he would have thrown the game.

 

“Mister Sutton, when I toss a chess board in anger, you better run.”

During the evening, Banner and Sutton eat a fine dinner of rattlesnakes, drink wine, and partake in a game of chess. Well, the game doesn’t quite get past the opening move as Sutton has drugged the wine and Banner passes out, only to awaken the next day in an open grave. Surrounded by graves of other “participants” David learns that Sutton had grown bored of hunting animals and has found that “man” adds a more intellectual challenge to the hunt so he lures unsuspecting guests to his little hunting preserve for a little man versus man action, of course, what Sutton doesn’t know is that David Bennet is actually David Banner, The Incredible Hulk (Lou Ferrigno). While David is able to avoid a net snare he does stumble into a pit trap and it is the sting of a passing scorpion that unleashes the raging monster within. I love the fact that falling into a pit wasn’t enough to trigger the transformation, that it took an extra “fuck you” from the fates and a nasty little scorpion to get David to Hulk-Out.

 

“Hulk not like stinging little bastards, also scorpions.”

Unlike a normal person, Sutton doesn’t react with pants-pissing fear at the sight of this raging green monster, instead, he considers this new antagonist to be an even better sport than some random dude who beat him at chess. Thinking back, I don’t quite understand Sutton’s audition process. You’d think he’d want to face off against former Green Berets or at least other big game hunters like himself, but this actually works in the episode’s favour. Sutton isn’t some world-class foe like Kraven the Hunter, he’s a petty jerk who only picked David as prey because he beat him at chess and no one would notice him missing. This makes Sutton not only a memorable foe but one with a more complex motivation, at least more than what we see in many shows of this type, and it’s his character flaws that make him quite interesting. That Sutton doesn’t give up after his first encounter with the Hulk, where the big guy drops a tree on him, shows that he has some modicum of courage.

 

Or he’s more psychotic than previously assumed.

From this point on it becomes a cat-and-mouse game between Banner and his psychotic stalker – our hero must solve puzzles and avoid traps much in the way Jigsaw would later orchestrate in the Saw movies – but what makes this adaptation of “The Most Dangerous Game” so good isn’t the fact that the villain got more than he bargained for in this particular game but that he is actually excited about taking on such a fearsome opponent as the Hulk, decrying to the sky “I saw that beast you turned into David, unbelievable! What was it, how do you do it? It was magnificent, David, Magnificent! Make it come back?” He is so far gone with his desire to take down this “ultimate prey” that when he eventually corners Banner, he doesn’t deliver the coup de grâce, instead, he proceeds to beat Banner with a bullwhip in an attempt to bring forth the beast.

 

I guess you can’t argue with success.

Stray Observations:

• Two days before this episode aired, an episode of Charlie’s Angels titled “Angel Hunt” was broadcast and featured the Angels being tricked into coming to an island where they were also hunted by a madman.
• Three years earlier Bill Bixby starred in the pilot for Fantasy Island, which also featured a take on “The Most Dangerous Game,” though Bixby wasn’t in that particular segment.
• The Hulk certainly isn’t a novice when it comes to being hunted, in season four’s “Bring Me the Head of the Hulk” a mercenary determined to kill The Hulk sets up the perfect trap in order to locate him.
• The Hulk’s “Gentle Giant” nature is highlighted in this episode when he rescues a pair of baby birds when their nest is dislodged by one of Sutton’s tripwire traps.

 

The Hulk is a friend to all animals.

Directed by Frank Orsatti and co-written by Richard Christian Matheson and Tom Szollosi “Snare” is one of the top ten episodes to come out of the five-year run of The Incredible Hulk and if there is any criticism to level at this episode it’s that the producers were hampered by the show’s budget and formula – you only get two Hulk transformations per episode and the Hulk can not directly harm anyone and certainly not kill them – and this limitation definitely lessened the impact of a crazed hunter versus the Hulk. More bizarre is the fact that not only doesn’t the Hulk simply rip this asshat’s head off – Sutton dies due to accidentally stabbing himself with a poisoned tip arrow and then falling off a cliff to the lake below – and the Hulk actually goes down to retrieve the body.

 

Was the Hulk planning to try CPR?

Needless to say, Bill Bixby gives a great performance as a man who has become resigned to the fact that his life sucks and that he will constantly be pulled into these types of situations – from hijacked planes to vengeful ghosts he meets all kinds of problems – but what makes “Snare” such as standout episode is guest-star Bradford Dillman as the demented hunter obsessed with catching the ultimate prey, his performance is nothing short of Emmy worthy and makes every moment of his screen time a true joy to behold. Overall, this episode was a very fun take on “The Most Dangerous Game” and while I would have loved to have seen a more physical altercation between Sutton and the Hulk that doesn’t take away from “Snare” being an excellent entry in the series.

Charlie’s Angels: Angel Hunt (1979) – Review

When Richard Connell penned “The Most Dangerous Game” back in 1924 I doubt the idea that his short story would become an often-used trope in film and television had ever crossed his mind — especially considering the fact that film was a new medium at the time of publishing and television was decades away — I’m also pretty sure he would never have guessed that one day his work would inspire pin-up models running around a tropical island.

By the third season, Charlie’s Angels was starting to suffer from a diminishing quality of scripts, with Kate Jackson commenting “The scripts are so light it would take a week to get to the floor if you dropped it from the ceiling” which led to the actress departing after that season, being replaced by perfume model Shelley Hack. It was with her hiring that producer Aaron Spelling dictated that the priority for season four was to “bring back the glamour” but Shelly wouldn’t last more than a year and thus a new “Angel Hunt” would begin, leading to Tanya Roberts becoming the last new Angel until the show’s cancellation in the spring of 1988. But today we are discussing a different kind of “Angel Hunt” one where our favourite detective trio find themselves being hunted, not so much for sport but as a part of a revenge plot against Charlie Townsend.

 

“Charlie, could you call the Mod Squad instead?”

The episode opens with the Angels, Kelly Garrett (Jaclyn Smith), Kris Munroe (Cheryl Ladd) and Tiffany Welles (Shelley Hack) spending their day off at the beach, that is until they receive a garbled emergency telephone call from Charlie (John Forsythe) who tells them to immediately head for Diablo Island, located thirty minutes off the coast of Mazatlan, where he and Bosley (David Doyle) will meet them. Needless to say, that wasn’t their boss and the Angels are being led into a trap. They soon discover that they have been duped when their guide Mr. Wilson (Paul Sylvan), who brings them to the island via a small motorboat, abandons them on the seemingly deserted island with only the clothes on their backs. And why are they unarmed? Well, it’s because they stupidly left their luggage and weapons in the boat with good ole Wilson.

 

“Are we gullible or just stupid? I’d really like to know.”

The penny finally drops when Charlie gets a phone call from big game hunter Malcolm Case (Lloyd Bochner), an old enemy who had recently escaped from prison, whom Charlie had helped send there for murdering his family. Seeking revenge, Case has teamed up with fellow escapee and hunting enthusiast Burdette (L.Q. Jones), as well as the aforementioned Mr. Wilson, and Case threatens to kill one Angel per day unless Charlie and Bosley can find them. Why he doesn’t just tell Charlie where to go in the first place is never explained but I guess psychotic hunters don’t have to have clear thinking. What follows is your standard “Most Dangerous Game” plotline, with the three villains trying to track down the Angels and murder them, but unlike many such adaptations, the viewers of this episode are not treated to much in the way of on-screen thrills.

 

This man will fail because he’s an overconfident idiot.

Stray Observations:

• Two days after this show aired The Incredible Hulk had its own take on “The Most Dangerous Game” called “The Snare.”
• Lloyd Bochner had already appeared in a Charlie’s Angels episode titled “Angels Belong in Heaven” because television shows love to recycle talented actors.
• L.Q. Jones tops the recycle pile as he previously appeared as different characters in season one’s “Bullseye”, season two’s “Angels in the Backfield” and later in season four’s “An Angel’s Trail.”
• The Angels take a business card as the only proof that Charlie was the man taken to this secluded island, and I have to ask “Are we sure these girls are detectives?”
• Tiffany spends the night up a tree to stay out of the clutches of a tiger, but this would have availed her naught as there was a leopard nearby, a species known for its tree-climbing abilities.
• Kris takes out Wilson with a Tarzan swing but she and Kelly aren’t able to retrieve his rifle because he fell lying across it, and the idea that two grown women can’t roll over a man is just sad.

 

Is this what female empowerment looked like in the 70s?

This fourth season episode is pretty forgettable, even the “tropical setting” is rather bland and even the stock footage of tigers and leopards fails to spice things up, and the only thing of note that differs this this take on the Most Dangerous Game trope from what we saw in the Incredible Hulk episode is that two out of the three hunters are killed. In the Incredible Hulk episode “The Snare” the villain does die but it is from accidentally stabbing himself, with his own poisoned arrow, while in “Angel Hunt” Malcolm Case is mauled to death by a tiger but Burdette does die at the hands of an Angel when a dead-fall trap drops a tree on him.

 

“Damn, I need a better class of henchmen.”

Overall, this episode can be considered another step back in the feminist movement, with our three heroines spending more time hugging each than figuring out how to bring down these three asshats. Poor Shelley Hack as the new Angel gets the worst of it as her character not only fails in hand-to-hand combat with Wilson, she is easily knocked unconscious and left for dead, and later she is again found by Wilson and quickly captured, turning her into your standard damsel in distress, right down to being bound and gagged to await rescue. It’s at this point in the series I was wondering if Charlie should start outsourcing his cases to the Scooby Gang.

Lost in Space: Hunter’s Moon (1967) – Review

If you spend enough time “lost in space” as the Robinson family were – three full seasons – it’s not surprising that they’d run into one of the oldest story tropes in fiction and that would be adaptations of Richard Connell’s short story “The Most Dangerous Game.” In this third-season episode of Lost in Space, the patriarch of the Robinson clan finds himself being stalked by an alien hunter.

The episode opens with your standard Lost in Space crisis, in this instance, it has to do with Jupiter 2 having to land on a nearby planet to initiate repairs or risk their life support failing, but there is a small wrinkle to this plan as the Earthlike planet is “Girdled by some sinister and unquestionable fatal contamination” or at least that is what Doctor Smith (Jonathon Harris) believes, of course, stalwart hero John Robinson (Guy Williams) won’t let the threat of death stand in the way of keeping his family safe, so he and the Robot (Bob May) take the Jupiter 2’s Space Pod out to make sure the planet is safe for them to land. As expected, things aren’t all that safe and while the planet isn’t surrounded by “fatal contamination” it is protected by a high energy force field that causes the Space Pod to go out of control and results in a forced landing. Soon our two “heroes” learn that dangerous force fields are the least of their worries.

 

Professor Robinson in Caged Heat.

The always-at-the-ready John Robinson easily dispatches a rampaging beast – he’s an outer space quickdraw – but seconds later a blue-skinned alien named Megazor (Vincent Beck) shows up and the danger levels move back up to critical. Turns out that John and the Robot have trespassed on this dude’s private hunting grounds and the two are taken prisoner for interfering in his sport and the alien destroys John’s ability to warn his family of the dangers this planet holds. Sadly, this leads to one of the more disheartening tropes of the series, that of Doctor Smith’s abject cowardice almost getting everyone killed. When the Jupiter 2 is unable to communicate with John, the Robinsons decide to land on the alien planet to search for him, needless to say, Smith doesn’t want to risk his life and he holds a vote on whether or not to leave John for dead. Of course, the vote doesn’t go his way and he tries to take control of the ship but all he manages to do is to send it flying out of control and crash-landing on the perilous planet.

 

Question: At what point would you decide that “enough is enough” and toss Doctor Smith out of an airlock?

Meanwhile, John learns that Megazor is from a race that chooses its rulers by how good they are at hunting, having to rack up 500 points during his field test and John’s killing of the beast cost him 350 points. It’s at this point we clearly know that we are in The Most Dangerous Game territory, but when an impartial robotic judge, who tabulates scores and monitors for infractions, notifies our hero that humans are only worth one point things get a little tense. But when John uses cunning to defeat an invisible monster – you can just imagine how much Irwin Allen saves using invisible opponents – Megazor changes his mind and decides that the professor could make for an interesting game after all.

 

“Hey John, Star Trek wants their menagerie back.”

Stray Observations:

• In the episode “The Challenge” young Will Robinson had to deal with a young Kurt Russell, playing an alien who had decided that fighting a Robinson is the best way to prove you are a badass.
• Irwin Allen was big on recycling as the alien creatures that we see caged by Megazor are ones that the Robinsons had faced in previous episodes.
• An impartial robot that sits in judgment over an alien race has certain The Day the Earth Stood Still conations.
• The planet that John Robinson lands on turns out to be an alien game preserve and this concept is quite similar to that of the 2010 film Predators, starring Adrien Brody and Topher Grace.
• Major Don West sends Will and Doctor Smith out to look for John, while he stays aboard the crashed Jupiter 2, but as this is a very likely hostile planet I have to wonder “Does he want these two dead?”

 

I was rooting for the rock monster.

As adaptations of “The Most Dangerous Game,” this episode is pretty weak sauce, unlike the 1932 version there is no real “horror” to this adaptation as it was made for “family entertainment” and thus there was no chance of there being a trophy room for human heads or implied rape – though I’d pay to see Doctor Smith being raped by a rock monster – but while it fails at being a good adaptation of the source material it does have some interesting elements. We learn that Megazor is from a race of beings that consider emotions like empathy and love to be defects, having been synthesized in incubators and so not raised by love parents, this leads to a little debate between Will Robinson (Billy Mumy) and Megazor, with one rather fun exchange before the alien runs off to hunt Will’s dad.

 

Will Robinson: “Well, if you’re gonna be such a great ruler, you should try and understand others. Even your enemies.”
Megazor: “I do understand my enemies. They all want to kill me.”

This third-season entry has a couple of nice ideas but Doctor Smith is more annoying than usual and Will’s constant running off on his own, despite orders from his parents, has at this point become rather tiresome and lame. The caged menagerie of alien creatures was also a bit of a letdown – they never leave their cage and the only really interesting monster in this episode was the rock monster that I’d like to assume inspired the makers of Galaxy Quest – and the final hunt between John and Megazor was less than gripping and they way John won was a complete camera cheat – he creates a dummy out of his protective suit to lure Megazor into an ambush but he was never out of Megazor’s sight so this was impossible – and we never even got a decent payoff on “human deficiencies” aspect and how Will had possibly affected the alien ruler with his compassion.

 

“Can I borrow this to shoot Doctor Smith?”

Directed by Don Richardson, Hunter’s Moon is typical of the third season’s continued descent into silliness and the “Most Dangerous Game” trope wasn’t even properly utilized, and once again most of the crew of the Jupiter 2 are left standing around without much to – Maureen (June Lockhart) and Judy Robinson (Marta Kristen) spend most of their time off camera “setting up a perimeter” while Don West (Mark Goddard) tries to fix their battered spacecraft – and while this is episode is more John Robinson centric then many others of this season, the stuff with Will and Doctor Smith is tedious and unfunny. Overall, this is one of those episodes you can feel free to skip.

The Running Man (1987) – Review

There have been many screen adaptations of the works of legendary horror writer Stephen King, some that have resulted in great movies like The Shawshank Redemption and Stand By Me but we’ve also had to suffer through the likes of Dreamcatcher and The Dark Tower, but in 1987 the world was treated to a film based on a book written by King under the pseudonym Richard Bachman, a film that starred the king of action 80s films, Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s The Running Man isn’t quite an “In Name Only” adaptation of the book but what similarities the film has with its source material are few and far between. The novel is set in a dystopian United States during the year 2025, in which the nation’s economy is in ruins and world violence is rising and people participate in violent game shows so that their families can receive whatever winnings are earned – the participants are not expected to survive – the main character is a man named Ben Richards who needs money for his gravely ill daughter’s medicine. After rigorous physical testing and mental testing, he is chosen for The Running Man, the Network’s most popular, lucrative and dangerous program, where the contestants are declared enemies of the State and are sent on the run. While they are allowed to go anywhere in the world they are chased and hounded by the general public, who get a huge bounty if they kill them. But the Network doesn’t rely on the bloodthirsty public as they also send out professional hitmen to ensure that there are no survivors, needless to say, not much of that survived the transition to the big screen.

Note: The Ben Richards of the book was your basic every-man and while he is physically fit he is no Superman and certainly not built like Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The protagonist of the movie may be named Ben Richards (Arnold Schwarzenegger) but he is nothing like his book counterpart, in this version he is a police helicopter pilot who refuses to fire on a group of unarmed civilians during a food riot and then framed by the government as the “Butcher of Bakersfield” for the very thing he was attempting to stop. So yeah, right off the bat the movie quickly diverged from the source material in favour of making this a more typical Arnie action flick. That’s not to say this is a bad thing, as 80s action movies go this one is a lot of fun, but gone is the thoughtful dystopian tale from the book in favour of over-the-top action moments and a handful of Arnie’s trademark one-liners. The book also didn’t have a female sidekick which the film gives us in the form of network employee Amber Mendez (María Conchita Alonso) who starts as a hostage but ends up tossed into the Running Man game when she starts to question the facts surrounding the “Bakersfield Massacre.” To say their relationship has a rocky start would be a vast understatement.

 

What’s a little bondage between friends?

Where the book had the game take place all across the globe, with the protagonist hounded by informers and professional hitmen, the movie places the game in four quadrants of a confined neighbourhood that was destroyed during a past earthquake. They are hunted by armed mercenaries called “Stalkers” who look more like Marvel Comic supervillains than they do professional killers. It’s clear this movie was borrowing quite a few elements from the World Wrestling Federation as the Stalkers are larger-than-life personas and quite flamboyant – casting several actual wrestlers hammers that point home quite nicely – and they are easily the most memorable element of the movie. Of course, the idea of the government using entertainment to placate the masses is nothing new, the Roman Empire practically invented it with their “Bread and Circuses” gladiatorial games, and as a science fiction trope it’s been mined quite often – the original Star Trek series even had an episode called “Bread and Circuses” – but it was with this movie that the idea of using flamboyant gladiators took the concept to the next level, giving us the likes of Stalker turned commentator “Captain Freedom” (Jesse Ventura), the pyrotechnical “Fireball” (Jim Brown), a chainsaw toting “Buzzsaw” (Gus Rethwisch), the chilling killer “Professor Subzero” (Professor Toru Tanaka) and the electrifying opera singer “Dynamo” (Erland Van Lidth) who all do their best to bring down Ben Richards.

Note: As cool as Jim Brown was, and I admire Professor Toru Tanaka with all my heart, but the title of best Stalker belongs to Erland Van Lidth as Dynamo, he was right kind of over-the-top character that this movie needed.

Now, as cool and badass as all those Stalkers were the real star of The Running Man is its amoral host Damon Killian (Richard Dawson), whose casual cruelty to all – even to his own staff let alone the people whom he sends out into the game to die – made him a truly great villain and proved to the world that Arnie didn’t need musclebound adversaries or creatures from outer space to be a good antagonist.  Even though Richard Dawson certainly couldn’t take Arnie in a fight he was the figurehead of all the evils that this totalitarian society represented and thus he was the perfect embodiment of what our heroes were fighting against. You can’t punch a government or a corporation in the face but you can take your anger out on their spokesperson, and in that area, Richard Dawson excelled at creating a truly smarmy villain, one that had us eager to see get his comeuppance.

Note: Numerous people who worked with Richard Dawson on Family Feud say that in real life Dawson was quite a bit like his character Damon Killian in his nasty handling of underlings.

Stray Observations:

• The opening text crawl tells us that “By 2017, the world economy has collapsed. Food, natural resources and oil are in short supply. A police state, divided into Paramilitary Zones, rules with an iron hand.” While this didn’t quite come to pass give it a few more years and we still might get there.
• We get a commercial for a game show called “Climbing for Dollars” which is the only hint of there being other violent game shows for the public to watch.
• The footage of the attacking helicopters is lifted from the 1976 King Kong remake which had me wishing to see a fight between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Kong.
• Mendez finds the original unedited footage of the Bakersfield massacre, but what purpose could the government have for keeping such damning evidence around?
• If Richard hadn’t refused to fire on the rioters how would they have spun the massacre without a patsy to frame? Would they have claimed, “They were coming right at us!”
• The game’s professional killers are called “Stalkers” but as the contestants have been injected with tracking devices, and the course they run is heavily monitored, it doesn’t require much in the way of stalking skills to track your prey.

 

As if giving them high-tech weaponry wasn’t enough of an advantage.

Even though Tri-Star’s The Running Man was not all that faithful to the source material, something that plagues most Stephen King adaptations, the result was still a very entertaining film – though its entertainment value will hinge on your ability to handle an overabundance of Arnie one-liners – and the film’s production value is excellent as is Schwarzenegger’s supporting cast, which includes the likes of Yaphet Kotto and Mick Fleetwood as freedom fighters. The film has developed a bit of a cult following over the years but it still falls below the upper echelon of 1980s action films and is considered by many as a lesser Arnie outing. Overall, this over-the-top satire is a fun critique of American television culture that will continue to engage fans of the sci-fi action genre and is easily one of the entertaining takes on The Most Dangerous Game.

The Haunting (1999) – Review

In 1963 Robert Wise helmed an adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, which was a wonderfully executed psychological thriller with subtle horror aspects, flash forward to 1999 when Jan de Bont, the director of Twister, helmed a new take on the novel, one that didn’t bother with pesky little things like subtlety.

As was the case with the original story, this film centres around Eleanor Vance (Lili Taylor) a meek and mild-mannered woman who had spent the last eleven years caring for her invalid mother, who was rather demanding to the point of being a complete bitch, but now she is dead and Eleanor is about to lose her home due to the cruel machinations of her asshat sister (Virginia Madsen) and dickhead husband.  Then out of the blue, a phone alerts her to a money opportunity that could help solve her problems, so she quickly accepts an invitation to participate in an insomnia study that is being held by Dr. David Marrow (Liam Neeson) at the ominous Hill House. Unfortunately, the study Marrow is working on is not actually about insomnia, instead, his true purpose is to study the psychological response people have to fear and he intends to expose his subjects to terror to see how they will react in a given situation. Joining Eleanor on this rather dubiously ethical experiment is the bohemian bisexual Theo (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and goofball Luke Sanderson (Owen Wilson), who in the book was the heir to the estate but in this movie is just here to provide some comic relief. As the story unfolds this group will spend their fateful weekend in a mansion plagued by terrifying ghostly occurrences that are, at first, chalked up to group hysteria but soon a more sinister reason is revealed as the mystery of Hill House is exposed.

 

“Should we call the rest of the Scooby gang?

One of the most glaring issues with this adaptation is the departure from the source material, Shirley Jackson’s novel The Haunting of Hill House, as well as Robert Wise’s 1963 adaptation, was a deep sense of psychological horror but that is not the case here.  In this adaptation, director Jan de Bont was more concerned with creating a thrill ride rather than a psychological thriller. Both the original novel and Wise’s adaptation focused on the unravelling of the characters’ sanity in a haunted house, relying on subtlety and the power of suggestion to terrify the audience, in contrast, Jan de Bont’s version abandons these subtleties in favour of a more overt CGI-driven approach, one that sacrifices atmosphere for spectacle. While this film boasts an impressive cast and visually stunning set design, the supernatural elements fall short of capturing the psychological depth and suspense of the source material.

 

This is more about visual eye candy than anything else

The characters in this adaptation also suffer from one-dimensional development and their cliche-ridden dialogue isn’t something even this talented cast could overcome. The characters on display here never transcend their stereotypical roles, such as the fragile troubled heroine, the sexually fluid beauty and the comic relief, respectively. There’s little to invest emotionally in this group and the relationships between these characters feel forced and underdeveloped. As our protagonists wander down dark and foreboding passageways it becomes apparent that the film is more about the gorgeous and creepy setting rather than the people within. The elaborate special effects and CGI used to bring the supernatural occurrences to life often overpower the story’s subtlety and the plot into a Haunted House thrill ride.  It should also be noted that the one thing that dates the film is the look of the 90s-era computer animation, while the statues that come to life look fine the ghostly images of the murdered children look like a cross between Casper the Friendly Ghost and soap bubbles.

 

“Let’s keep it dark, really dark so no one can see how bad the CGI effects are.”

Stray Observations:

• Eleanor’s sister and brother-in-law are so cartoonishly rotten, to the point that I half expected the ghosts from the Hill House to eventually hunt them down.
• If the housekeeper of a creepy mansion told me “We live in town, nine miles away, so there won’t be anyone around if you need help. We couldn’t even hear you in the night. No one could. No one lives any nearer than town. No one will come any nearer than that, in the night, in the dark.” I’d have packed my bags and left immediately.
• Hill House was built by a 19th-century textile tycoon in the hope of populating it with a large family, but why it is full of architectural optical illusions, hidden passageways, mirrored hallways and a carousel room is beyond me. It’s more a Walt Disney attraction than a home.
• On the first night Marrow’s assistant is injured by the malevolent forces of Hill House and she is taken to the hospital by another of Marrow’s group, but even though they are told “Hey, I want you guys back as soon as possible” we never hear from them again. Did both of them decide “Fuck it, we’re not going back to that spook show.”
• On the second night Eleanor wakes up and follows ghostly voices and tiny bloody footprints that mysteriously appear on the floor to a hidden room. This is after they had just discovered “Welcome Home Eleanor” written in blood on Hugh Crane’s portrait, yet she’s still up to following ghosts through the halls of this spooky-ass mansion? It’s at this point that I lost all sympathy for her character.
• Hugh Crane was clearly an evil man, abducting and murdering children, but would he have commissioned a portrait that looked like something you’d find in Dorian Gray’s attic? Did he ask the artist “Can you make me look like a nightmare in the flesh?”

 

I’d say this art style was a little on the nose.

Without a doubt, the one aspect of this film we can all agree on is that the production design was great, with Hill House working as a character in itself and its Gothic architecture, creepy statuary and eerie interior lighting providing a chilling backdrop to the unfolding events of this story. If only the story was worthy of it. And to be fair, Jan de Bont’s The Haunting does sport some nice practical effects and the art direction was simply fantastic, not to mention the set decoration by Cindy Carr which elevated the entire production to a whole new level, making Hill House a character in and of itself. Say what you will about the bad CGI and cheap jump scares this film has killer production values and makes you want to wander these amazing halls and rooms.

 

Book your tour now, the only cost is your soul.

But good art direction can only get you so far, and this adaptation was hobbled by a script that sometimes veered into melodrama, with characters reacting predictably to supernatural events while lacking the depth and nuance of Shirley Jackson’s original novel or Robert Wise’s 1963 adaptation. The reliance on jump scares and loud sound effects also diminished the psychological horror elements that made the original novel so captivating and the pacing also feels uneven, with a slow start and a rushed climax that leaves many questions unanswered. Despite these flaws, Jan de Bont’s re-imagining does manage to pull off a few moments of genuine terror and intrigue, and if you’re a fan of haunted house tales and can overlook the film’s narrative shortcomings, The Haunting may provide an entertaining, albeit somewhat superficial, horror experience.
 

In the end, The Haunting is a visually appealing but ultimately poor adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s classic ghost story, one that is overshadowed by its inability to capture the psychological depth and subtlety of the source material. It may be worth a watch for horror enthusiasts, but it doesn’t quite live up to the legacy of its literary inspiration.