In honor of Earth Day, this week CLASH OF THE SCHLOCKMEISTERS! dips deep into the cinematic cesspool to dredge up these two outstanding examples of the eco-horror genre, which, trust me, really was popular for a while in the 1970s. Both based on successful novels, by John Christopher and Roger Zelazny respectively, these two films are the movies Roland Emmerich must have watched as a child and been left thinking, “I can’t do much worse, but I certainly can do the same damned thing a lot bigger, longer, louder, and more expensively!”
Again, in this head-to-head battle of losers, we’re looking for the answers to a few simple questions:
1. Which of these two movies is the more cringe-inducing to watch now?
2. Do either of these movies have any redeeming values?
3. Would Jan-Michael Vincent have sold the role better if his motorcycle helmet had had devil horns on it?
4. “An Adventure You’ll Never Forget:” is that a promise or a warning?
The challenge has been presented. The clock is ticking. Have at them, hammer and tongs, and already remember:
Have fun!
See you tomorrow,
~brb
CLASH OF THE SCHLOCKMEISTERS! appears each Sunday morning on StupefyingStories.com, until we either run out of films to slag (fat chance) or find a better feature to run in this space (slightly better chance). The rules are simple: the two contestants in this head-to-head “too bad they can’t both lose” battle must be big-budget productions, released by major studios, made by experienced directors and producers, and starring recognizable movie stars.
Please feel free to suggest future matchups, but remember, no indie, low-budget, semi-pro, student, or badly dubbed foreign films will be considered, nor will we consider anything distributed by The Asylum, as mocking such movies is like beating up a kid in a wheelchair. Be advised also that I do have a soft spot for Roger Corman and consider his book, How I Made a Hundred Movies in Hollywood and Never Lost a Dime, to be excellent reading for anyone who dreams of building a company based on hopes, ideas, chutzpah, and no investor capital, and therefore I feel no need to deprecate his films.
Golan-Globus, on the other hand…
Which brings us back to Golan-Globus, and The Apple…
1 comments:
No Blade of Grass takes itself way too seriously. It's a downer that drives the point home with a sledgehammer.
Damnation Alley is trashy fun. It doesn't hold a candle to the source novel, but Jan Michael Vincent and George Peppard play well off each other and take their roles seriously. I'd watch it again.
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