spazio oddity.
A few months ago when deciding what film to watch I came across what looked like a nth generation VHS copy of Alfonso (The Beast in Space, War of the Robots) Brescia's little seen Italian Sci-Fi
masterpiece 'Battaglie Negli Spazi Stellari' (AKA War of The Planets)
on Rai TV which bizarrely enough I can get thru' my media player thanks to being an Ubuntu kid.
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If you've never seen it (the film that is, not the channel) it's a lo-fi sci-fi blockbuster starring the fabulous John Richardson as the cream jump-suited womanly hipped Captain Alex Hamilton.
Hamilton is a kinda rougher (and considerably swarthier) penis nosed version of Jim Kirk, shouting at his computer, disagreeing with his superiors and leaving it till the last possible minute to save battery acid scarred crew members from certain death.
"Look it's probably just static or the gypsies" replies our hero to his superior, "Plus we're all a bit tired and want to come home for a holiday!"
Genius.
And why am I mentioning this dear reader?
No idea because we actually watched this instead last night....
Dir: Alfonso Brescia.
Star: Yanti (meow) Sommer, Gianni Garko, Malisa Longo, Cristea Avram, Ennio Balbo, Aldo Amoroso Pioso, Pino Ferrara, Roberto Dell'Acqua, Fred West's dad and Filippo Perrone.
Somewhere in the inky blackness of space on a mysterious planet, a gathering of powerful aliens, known locally as the Lords of the Galaxy is busily bidding on various planets and suchlike to buy their wives as novelty Crimbo pressies.
one of her brothers is her childs father.
The biggest offer of the day is a very familiar small blue/green planet named Sol 3, a planet in which the spiky headed, lank haired Lord Kev Korda is very interested in.
You see, if his bid is successful (it's kinda like an intergalactic Ebay but with fewer overpriced original Star Wars toys) he plans to use the natives of this world as cheap labour throughout the galaxy.
Confident as he is of getting the winning bid he's already set up a number of window cleaning businesses and off-licenses in readiness of his takeover.
Which is nice.
But just to make sure he's definitely gonna win, our pen faced pal is not above using his almost Derren Brown like mind powers (well, a torch in front of his eyes) to scare his main rival away from the bidding table.
100 million credits poorer (but a whole lotta planet richer) Kev boards his spaceship and relaxes with his battered vhs copy of Cosmos: War of the Planets as he travels to view his newly acquired prize.
Hang on, I'm mistaken, it's not actually some clever self referential nonsense regarding a character in one movie watching the directors earlier work, it's just Brescia being cheap and using old footage save him shooting any new effects stuff.
Silly me.
Scanning his new toy to find out what he's actually purchased (yes, I know it's a wee bit like not looking at a new house till you've paid for it but who are we to judge these aliens?), Kev discovers that not only has the planet 'widespread traces of pollution due to chemical combustion and nuclear waste' but that most of humanity live either underground or in sea cities due to the surface being used for growing food and feeding livestock.
Yup, the Just Stop Oil mob have inherited the Earth.
And down at Earth's fantastically minimalist (or just cheap) space command centre, Admiral Steve (probably, the subtitles are atrocious), being understandably shocked by the huge spaceship approaching, launch a fantastic interceptor craft to say hello to the visitor.
But Lord Kev, being a 100% patent bastard, responds by blasting it out of the sky.
Mightily pissed off by this frankly outrageous act of aggression humanity decides to throw everything they've got at Kev's ship but even the combined fire-power of the entire planet is useless against him and serves only to make Kev a wee bit annoyed.
Yikes.
There's only one thing for it, Kev unleashes a terrifying barrage of grainy, black and white stock footage of exploding buildings, erupting volcanoes, cats looking nervous and archive newsreel shots of the battle of Britain in order to convince the human race that he is, in fact 'the daddy'.
London is totally destroyed, as is most of Australia (no loss there then) and (bizarrely) the Okinawa stadium, leaving the Admiral no choice but to call upon the maverick (not to mention "independent, stubborn and undisciplined") scientist Professor Barry Morey, a forest dwelling genius whose "intelligence puts him about two centuries above anyone else" and whose collars would enable him to fly at least two hundred miles above them too.
Desperate doesn't even touch it.
Anyway, Admiral Steve begrudgingly phones the Professor, polishing his ego by telling him that he's Earth's last hope and it's greatest ever scientist/lover/kazoo player etc. before asking him if he can suggest anything to stop the terror from space.
Seeing as Earth is so desperate as to ask a balding, piss stained hippy type for help it comes as a wee bit of a surprise to hear that the planets government and military have refused to give him any cash, support or even a shiny new commode for his troubles if he agrees to help.
I even watched this bit twice to see exactly how this magnificent piece of reverse psychology works but I'm fucked if I could figure it out if I'm honest, so I'll put it down to being an Italian thing.
lady arse a-going spare!"
Luckily the Professors hearing is going, meaning he misses everything except the "you're great please help us" bit and decides to give it a go.
Analyzing the alien ship he quickly discovers that it's hull is constructed from a strange substance called iridium, which, it turns out is virtually indestructible.
As is the way in such movies, the Professor has the only other example of this rare metal locked in his garage, a keepsake from his research days when (and this is a scary coincidence so sit down now) him and his team of geeks were working on a way of breaking down iridium to its base molecular structure.
For what purpose I've no idea.
always a big hit amongst his cartoon buddies.
Earths only hope is that the Professor can round up his old workmates (who all fucked off around the globe after the Professor was discredited for pissing himself in a funding review) and pick up the research where they left off.
If only he had access to a spaceship and daredevil pilot, it'd certainly be better (and more exciting) than catching the bus looking for his ex colleges.
Enter (OK if I must) the Professors beautifully bouncy - and scarily bouffanted - niece Irene (Sommer - in the city probably), whose boyfriend, Jeff, happens to be a hunky space pilot.
Even better is the fact that he spent the night at the house and his spaceship is parked outside!
But how can the kindly scientist convince him to help in his quest?
Would you believe that the Professor has the same spooky mind powers as Kev?!?
Within minutes Jeff is eating an onion as if it were an apple and flying off to round up this sci-fi A-Team whilst the Professor gets down to some serious 'work' in his lab.
First on the list is the roguish mercenary cum chemist (and first love of Irene...yes it really is that convoluted so i'd suggest that you begin taking notes, I know I did) Dirk Laramie (Dell'Acqua), who now spends his days fleecing alcoholics out of their dole money in seedy backstreet bars.
Yup, you guessed it, Dirk too has the very same scary mind powers as Barrie and Kev and has been using them to cheat at cards.
Obviously when the local council estate scum whose Giro's he's been taking find out about this they decide to administer a darn good kicking, which gives our man a chance to show off his sexy street fighting skills to impress his buxom ex, tho' if I'm honest Jeff seems much more impressed.
Meanwhile back in the main plot Lord Kev has unleashed an army of face stomping alien Nazi's across the planet to collect 'worker units' and, in a scene of ball aching badness, attack the planets sub-tropical continent, capturing 2000 'dark-skinned human units' to use as slaves.
Hmmm, see what they did there?
Whilst all this political musing is going on, Irene is off enjoying herself at a community centre boxing match where ex-scientist cum pugilist Bill Norman (The late, great Garko, looking for all the world like a pervier, gone to seed Sporticus from Lazy Town) is having a girly slapping match with the frighteningly realised warrior robot Hercules (some poor guy in a Mickey Mouse gimp suit).
Being surprisingly fit for someone so close to deaths door Norman beats the crap outta poor Hercules before donning a silk disco jacket and joining our merry band.
candy wee man!"
Deciding to bring a few friends along for the ride, Norman leads the gang to a deserted junkyard (the producers garden) where they meet up with a couple of dwarfs dressed in silver painted bins decorated with the contents of their mums kitchen drawers and topped off with Orville The Duck sex masks.
Norman, keen to justify why the films overworked - and underpaid - designers would foist such monstrosities on an already threadbare production is quick (maybe too quick if you ask me) to point out that not only do our plastic pals have a full range of human emotions but they're also fitted with some kinda energy conversion bollocks that allows them to phase out of real space so that laser fire passes right through them (a wee bit like chocolate does with me).
Oh, and I forgot to add that due to their emotional chip the pair are in love.
Meanwhile, back at the space command centre, it appears that Kev's spaceship (despite being big enough to comfortably hold the entire population of Earth plus a shed load of stormtroopers) is actually impossible to track via radar, showing up only when it lands to grab some slaves.
Have they tried turning the monitors on?
No-one dares make this suggestion tho' for fear of interrupting Admiral Steve's Oscar worthy performance as he grimly reads the list of humans already captured by Kev as his stunned comrades look on in mild apathy.
Hiroshima (how's your luck?), Russia, the Arabs and rather oddly "those farmers in the United States of Africa" have all been captured, leaving only the good ol' US of A, half of Govan and the West Midlands left to battle against this thoroughly bad man.
Whilst all this shit - as you youngsters say - is going down, our heroes (in case you thought I'd forgotten about them) are heading towards the notorious 'Moonspace', a space age Alcatraz orbiting the moon (obviously) in order to break out two other members of the aged professor's science club, some middle-aged bloke named Sean and a sexily square faced lady going by the name of Bridget ('played' by the infamous - well, around here she is - Malisa Longo, AKA Malisa Lang, one of Italy's greatest and most moon headed, exploitation stars and one of the few reasons to sit thru' this film).
The pair are being held in a 'suspension ray machine' designed to keep them awake but unable to move (why? you may ask), giving the lone guard a great excuse to quietly perv over her prostrate form whilst rubbing his leather clad thighs.
Ah, so that's why.
Unable to control his sexual desires any longer the guard turns off her suspension machine and gazes lustfully as she emerges from within, stretching and cooing like your mum after a particularly hard bingo session whilst complaining about how long it's been since she had a real man (hang on, that's exactly like your mum the morning after bingo) before slinking up to him and giving him a big girly kiss.
With tongues and everything.
Well not everything but you get the gist.
Of course, this is all just a ruse so she can release all the prisoners and escape herself in the ensuing sexual confusion.
Freed from their frozen confines the thawed out felons vent their frustrations by instigating a bitch-slapping fest of epic proportions as perky prisoners and leathery guards alike slowly kick and punch each other before taking it in turns to roll around the floor gurning and dribbling.
Don't fret tho' because the break-out is eventually subdued before it gets too embarrassing and/or homo-erotic and everyone involved is given a slap on the wrist before being put back in their cells.
Luckily for us (and the plot), our merry band have been penciled in for a meeting with the prisons governor about releasing Sean and Bridget.
A pity then that he refuses to let them go free.
What a jobsworth bastard.
Remember tho', Dirk has those scary mind powers so it's only a matter of time before he's persuaded the guv to let them go (and convinced him that he's a dog) meaning that finally (thank fuck) that the science squad is fully assembled and that they can head on back to the Professor's house and prepare to kick some alien arse.
Which in Bridget's case involves getting trussed up in a skin tight leather dominatrix outfit
Will our heroes defeat the evil Kev?
Will there be anyone left on Earth to save?
Will our robot pals ever consummate their relationship?
And, most importantly, will Kev be able to sell on Earth at the next space auction?
Alfonso Brescia's space epic with it's powerful social message regarding Colonialism and the ethno-centric belief that the morals and values of the colonising power are superior to those of the peoples being colonised is a little seen gem of the Italian Sci-fi genre.
Forget 2001, Interstellar or even the latest season of Doctor Who because if it's high concept/budget busting intergalactic adventure you're after then this is the movie for you.
If you don't mind having to piece the plot together yourself tho' seeing as every single fucking version of this film seems to have the reels in the wrong order.
Seriously, characters appear and the plot starts to move on only to jump back to introductory scenes and bits of action and dialogue from earlier in the film.
Luckily it has a very serious social commentary for the more intelligent viewer.
So it's unfortunate then that it's buried alive beneath a slurry pile of skid row acting, cheap robot suits, borrowed effects and scratchy old stock footage of second world war battles.
Was this a clever way of comparing Lord Kev's jackbooted minions to the Nazi Stormtroopers of yesteryear or just a lack of anything remotely resembling a budget?
You decide.
Tho' if you need a clue it's the latter by the way.
If, like me tho' you get bored with trying to justify a love of shite cinema by over intellectualizing every single thing about it then there's always the sight of Malisa Longo dressed up like a particularly saucy turkey as well as the Amazonian delights of Yanti Sommer's cleavage to keep you occupied.
And just in case you think I'm being sexist then don't forget that all you female viewers can gaze lustfully at the professors yellowing bald pate and wibbly wobbly manbreasts.
For everyone else there's a pulse pounding fart-tastic synth score and the chance to see some once great (OK, once so-so) actors such as Gianni Garko and Chris Avram, reduced to playing second fiddle to a couple of dwarfs in dustbins.
And be honest now, what more could you want from an evenings entertainment?
