Space Men |
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Italy • 1960 • 73m •
  • Directed by: Antonio Margheriti. • Starring: Rik Van Nutter, Gabriella Farinon, David Montresor, Archie Savage, Alain Dijon, Franco Fantasia, Joe Pollini, David Maran, José Néstor, Anita Todesco, Aldo Pini. • Music by: Lelio Luttazzi, Carlo Savina.      In the 21st century Ray Peterson, reporter for the Interplanetary News, is assigned to write a story aboard a space station. Tension mounts between Peterson and the station commander, who believes he is in the way, but has orders to leave him alone. Errant spaceship Alpha Two enters the solar system and its photon generators are radiating enough heat to destroy Earth as it approaches. It falls to Peterson to try to figure out a way to enter the spaceship, disarm the generators, and escape before suffocating.
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The Story: In 2116, in a future where everyone has a name and an alpha numerical code name painted on their backs and obeys orders from "The High Command", roving reporter Ray Peterson is sent to report on a routine mission to "check on infra radiation flux on Galaxy M13". The fact that he and the crew are put into hibernation for the trip would suggest that Galaxy M13 is a long long long way away - Wrong! If the movies internal logic (hah!) is to be believed Galaxy M13 is somewhere between the orbits of Mars and Venus. Planets that our intrepid crew zoom off to at the drop of a hat without getting deep froze - so why bother with all that malarkey in the first trip out? Dunno. But it does give the American editors a chance to cut in some switches and buttons with English words on them. "Peak Wow" and "Max Db" were two I spotted that were probably filmed in the dubbing studio as they recorded the dialogue. "Ok we need another shot of a switch here, just flip that one will you... OK, got that, what's next?"
Anyway, so there he is on Space Station XYZ-Bravo-Three or whatever it is called and has a testosterone moment with the grumpy captain. Then he sneaks out to watch the ship he came in being refuelled. Suddenly! there is a bad special effect and he pushes a suited figure out of the way of a hurtling meteorite (WOW!) it turns out later he has saved Lucy (AKA Y13) the only piece of girl-flesh within a bejillion miles! Soon Ace Space Nutter gets wind of a secret mission and blags his way on-board and they are zipping off to Mars with Nutter strap hanging all the way as there aren't enough seats for him (Though why he doesn't go lie on one the neato curved beds that they put all the people they rescue later is a bit of a puzzle).
Van-von Nutter finds out what the secret mission is all about. They are off to save Earth. A nuclear spaceship Alpha-two is running out of control and generating a sphere of deadly heat which will turn the whole planet to boiling mud unless... unless... unless they do something!
On the way to Mars they encounter another space ship in distress (I think the wick had gone out in the engine) and it was crashing into Mars! But no it wasn't crashing into Mars at all! because one of Mars' moons suddenly gets in the way! Argh! One of the stricken ships crew jumps out (WHY?) and the other one crashes his ship in the worst, I mean THE WORST special effect ever. In the history of everything - and that includes Ed Wood's hub caps.
I mean this is total sht. It's a stream of consciousness "...and then, and then..." screenplay. This script was written by secretly tape recording two Italian kids playing Space Rangers in their back garden. My Three year old daughter, Holly, makes up more coherent stories than this.
Our gallant crew land on Phobos and rescue the guy who jumped - then zip off to Venus. Damn! Wrong planet! I guess they had the map upside down.
On Venus (which turns out to be a lot nearer the runaway) they all stand around with their arms folded as nukes are fired at Alpha-two. All explode at 5000 miles from the target, apart from one, which convinces Al that there is a way Alpha-two can be destroyed - all power by the way to this movie for having a strong black character - the sphere of force is being generated in two halves with a thin gap between them. They borrow another space ship and try for a closer shot down the gap. Suddenly Space Station XYZ is in the Alpha-two's direct line of flight and all the crew are going to die except for two who are outside on a space taxi. (How big IS the solar system by the way?) Y13 and Space Ace go off to rescue them and Al gets blown up trying to sneak down the gap. Then Space Ace Nutter gets on board the Space taxi and by judicious throwing away of "spare bits" of it, he pilots a way through.
Hurrah!
He gets inside. He tries to disconnect the Electronic Brain but it's got really tough cables you know, but luckily all space ships have a pair of HUGE bolt croppers under the co-pilot's seat so he chops all the power cables. Terrific! the Earth is saved. Only fly in the ointment? - he has just buggered up power to the automatic door that he needs to get out of before he is toasted Space Ace. He also, in a moment of sheer genius, managed to throw away a vital bit of his space suit. But all space ships also have oxy-Acetaline cutting gear! They rescue him. The End - thank God!
Some of the science in this SF movie is just hysterical even to a layman like me.
"What are these? - Flowers?" asks roving Space Hunk VanVon Nutter."No," replies Space Babe Lucy (Y13 - who, by the way, has a very nice bum)."They are converting hydrogen into breathable oxygen." What???? Hydrogen into Oxygen??? They have plants that do cold fusion!!!!!! .
Review by junk-monkey from the Internet Movie Database.
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