Some of you that have been reading my blog for a while might have noticed that I haven’t been doing the flashback reviews for the last few weeks. The reason for this is simply a matter of time. See, no matter what movie I am watching, it takes a while for me to get through it as I am usually writing out the plot as I watch, having to pause the movie at times to write what happens. As for the rest of the postings, sometimes I can write them out fairly quickly and sometimes I get writers block or get distracted watching something and so that too can take up time. So in an attempt to try and get more done on Sundays, as well as actually relaxing some on the weekend, I am putting off writing about the rest of the movies I watched before I started this blog until I finish all of my movies, so that I am not watching/writing more than one movie a day. Now that I got that out of the way, on to today’s movie, Galaxy Of Terror.
The plot: On a distant planet, the seemingly last survivor of a crashed star ship is frantically trying to secure himself inside a room when he glimpses a horrifying creature and is killed after repeatedly being hurtled against the walls by an unseen force. On the planet Zerses, an old woman called Mitri, the “oracle of the game”, is playing some sort of game with the Planet Master, a being whose head is surrounded by glowing energy. As they are playing, they receive word that they have lost contact with the spaceship Remus, which had crashed on the planet Morganthus. The Planet Master seems excited to hear the planets name, pressing some buttons on the game board and causing Mitri to speak out about the risk he is taking. The Planet Master has a ship made ready, telling the military commander on the screen, Commander Ilvar, that he will lead the rescue mission but that he (the Planet Master) will hand pick the crew. The spaceship Quest is given the mission and Captain Trantor, the only survivor of the Hesperus massacre, is piloting the ship and decides to make a quick take off and jump to hyperspace, barely giving the assembled crew a chance to get to their seats. As the ship approaches Morganthus, it suddenly veers out of control and ends up crash landing on the planet. After checking whether the planet’s atmosphere is breathable, Baelon, the rescue team leader, leads the rescue team Cabren, Alluma, Quuhod, and Cos) out to the Remus, while Trantor, Ilvar, the ship’s technicians Ranger and Dameia, and the ship’s cook Kore stay on board the Quest. Along the way, Cabren asks Alluma, who is psi-sensitive, if she can sense anything but when she says she senses no signs of life, Baelon scoffs and refuses to take her words seriously. Reaching the Remus, Baelon enters first , stumbling across a body hanging from the ceiling, which he quickly vaporizes with his weapon. Baelon has the team split up, sending Cabren Quuhod to the communications while he and Alluma head to the control deck and Cos, the rookie, patrols the decks. As they make their way through the ship, Cos becomes increasingly more terrified and believing something is chasing him, he panics and makes his way back to the Baelon and Alluma. When Cabren and Quuhod join them, carrying a body back for autopsy, Baelon decides to head back to the ship. As the other’s leave, Cos goes to retrieve his gun and is suddenly attacked and killed by a strange creature. Back on the Quest, everyone is trying to figure out what happened to Cos and the other body and Ivlar points out a strange area that they are unable to scan. Deciding to investigate, they discover a strange pyramid and Ivlar has Baelon, Alluma, and Quuhod head inside while he, Cabren, and Dameia search the perimeter. Scaling part of the pyramid towards an opening, Ivlar decides to rapael down in order to prove that he can still do his job, in spite of protests from Cabren and Dameia. As he is making his way down the opening, he is attacked by some strange creatures and manages to fend off the first two but more attack him, attaching themselves like leeches, and kill him. Elsewhere on the Pyramid, Baelon comes across the remains of Ivlar and vaporizes it. When a door suddenly starts to open, Quuhod uses his three-sided crystal throwing blades to jam the door while Baelon and Alluma stand guard in case something emerges. When Cabren and Dameia rejoin them, and tell them that Ivlar is dead, Baelon shows little remorse for his passing. When the crystals suddenly shatter, Baelon fires blindly into the opening but nothing happens. Entering the pyramid, Baelon give Quuhod, who appears distraught about the crystals breaking, a gun and tells him to stand guard while the others search inside but after he walks away, Quuhod tosses the gun away, having stated earlier that, “I live and die by the crystals.” Making their way through the passageways, they come to a central area and Alluma and Dameia both feel uneasy but Baelon says that he is in charge and wants to keep moving but Cabren decides to send Dameia back to check on Quuhod. Quuhod is growing increasingly uneasy, constantly going back and forth on whether to pick up the gun. When the doors suddenly starts to close, he manages to make it outside, where he is excited to see that his crystal blades have somehow been reformed. As he goes to grab one of them, the blade suddenly jabs itself into his wrist and when he goes to remove it, the blade in his arm breaks off, burrowing under the skin and continues to make his way up his arm. Quuhod uses the other side of the throwing blade to cut his arm off but as he rests against the wall, his severed arm grabs the other throwing blade and tosses it into his chest, killing him. Back on the Quest, Ranger comes across Kore reading a book and tells him that he is unable to find Captain Trantor so Kore goes to help him search for her. Back at the pyramid, Dameia comes across the remains of Quuhod and vaporizes it, then freaks out when she sees the severed arm covered in maggots and vaporizes it too, but one of the maggots crawls away and begins to grow. Heading outside, she tries contacting the quest but is unable to reach anyone so she heads back inside. Once inside, she is assaulted by the giant worm, which proceeds to rape her before killing her. Back on the ship, Ranger discovers that the ship’s weapons are being fired but before he can investigate, he is knocked out by Kore. Kore heads to the rear of the ship, where he tries to talk Kore into stopping her firing at a threat that doesn’t exist but she insists the threat is real and heads outside to attack it and ends up killing herself with a ricochet. When Cabren, Alluma, and Baelon return to the ship, the surviving crew members try to figure out what to do and Cabren says that they have to take out whatever force brought them down if they want to have a chance at escaping. All five crew members head back to the pyramid, but Ranger expresses his doubts about Kore to Cabren. Reaching a set of narrow tunnels, the group is forced to slide down them and Alluma is reluctant to do so due to claustrophobia but when she gets stuck down in the passageway, Ranger slides into her, forcing her to continue. Making their way across a narrow bridge, Baelon starts acting more erratic and after something trips him into Ranger, he tells Cabren to go ahead with the others while he follows. Entering a chamber, Kore notices a device that controls the door and as it closes, Ranger notices a triangle shaped opening forming on the roof. When Kore closes the door all the way, the triangle opening is fully formed, but Baelon is trapped on the passageway, which is suddenly plunged into darkness. As Cabren and the others try to reopen the door, Baelon is attacked by a demonic creature and ends up falling to his death. Getting the door open, the others look for Baelon before they notice that Kore has suddenly disappeared. Heading back into the chamber, Cabren closes the door and Alluma is about to climb through the triangle opening when Ranger suddenly starts yelling at Cabren to stop trying to be their master. After he apologizes, the three head through the opening nut find themselves separated inside a giant maze of crystals. Trying to locate the others, Ranger finds himself attacked from behind but when he comes face to face with his assailant, he finds himself facing his mirror image. After fighting with his doppelganger for a bit, Ranger manages to create some space and quickly hides behind one of the crystal walls, where he is able to observe his copy and realize that it isn’t real, causing the copy to vanish. Meanwhile, Alluma wanders around and finds a tunnel that seems to connect to the outside so she decides to go inside it. As she makes her way through the tunnel, she is suddenly attacked by several wires, which wrap around various parts of her body before they begin to constrict, tearing her body to bits. Cabren sees Alluma and tries to follow her but ends up getting lost in the maze. When he finally reaches the tunnel, he is too late to save her. Ranger finds Cabren and the two continue making their way deeper into the pyramid. Ranger tells Cabren that it was his own fear that attacked him and Cabren says that there is no horror which they didn’t create themselves. Thinking it is over since they figured out what was attacking them, they suddenly hear Kore’s voice calling out to them. Climbing a staircase towards the sound of the voice, Cabren enters a chamber to find Kore sitting there waiting for him. As Cabren approaches, Kore reveals himself to be the Planet Master and Kore fires his gun at him in rage but the Master easily deflects the blasts. The Master explains that the pyramid is a children’s game from a long ago race, designed to test their fears and help them overcome them. The Master then has Cabren face off against some of the creatures his friends had created, followed by bodies of his dead friend’s. When he defeats all of them, Cabren finds himself face to face with the Master again and kills him, only to find himself inheriting the power of the Master. Kore tells him that he is free to do what he wants, but that the fate of his planet will feel the effects of his decision due to his being the Master. Cabren tells Kore that he will never do what he did, then vaporizes him and stands there watching as the body burns away.
Galaxy Of Terror did not find much love with the critics, holding a 33% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. While there isn’t a critical consensus on the site, most of the detractors cited it as being nothing more than a cheap knock-off of alien but did have praise for Corman’s ability to make do with a limited budget. The famed scene involving Taaffe O’Connell’s death was changed during filming and actually wound up getting an X-rating when it was submitted for review but director Bruce D. Clark made a couple of small cuts to the scene, mostly of the worm making “humping” motions, that allowed for the R-rating. The movie was a mild financial success as it made $4 million off of a $1.8 million budget but would gain a cult following, probably due to the O’Connell death scene.
I don’t know who exactly should take the credit here but Roger Corman and Bruce D. Clark made a really good movie. The acting was good with just about everyone, with all the characters doing a good job reacting to their fears, or trying to deal with them. The story was really good, and while it did seem to borrow from some classic sci-fi and horror movies, it also seemed like it might have inspired some more recent movies. The special effects were pretty decent for the budget given and part of that might have something to do with the man that served as Production Designer and Second Unit Director, James Cameron (of Terminator and Aliens fame). A great classic sci-fi/horror movie that is well worth watching.
Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5
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