Amtrak, B-Movies, Web Development, and other nonsense

Day: March 14, 2014

Lifeforce

LifeforceThe B-movie credentials for Lifeforce are staggering. Director? Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Poltergeist). Producers? Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus of the venerable Cannon Films, producers of countless first-run B-grade action flicks (a genre that doesn’t quite exist any more). “A Golan-Globus Production” always produces a lusty cheer at B-Fest. Dan O’Bannon (Alien) wrote the script. Henry Mancini does the score. It’s adapted from a book titled Space Vampires. Throw in Patrick Stewart, Peter Firth (Hunt for Red October), Michael Gothard (For Your Eyes Only) and you’ve got actors to work with.  Does it deliver?

In a word–yes. This is such an ’80s film: grand sets, bad hair, self-important people standing around pontificating, gratuitous (if tasteful) nudity, overuse of electrical effects. I liked it. The creature effects are excellent throughout. There’s a bunch of creepy weird stuff too. It’s not overwritten nor does it lag. It also gets credit for the proper use of “desiccated” in a feature film. Patrick Stewart has a limited role but he sells it as only he can.

It’s weird watching and realizing there was serious money involved. Reportedly Cannon put up $25 million–considerable for 1985–and got about half of it back at the box office. The money’s on the screen–the destruction of London in the third act is way more convincing than you’d expect–but the story is goofy. It’s something of a soul-collection plot, but on a totally different scale from Dark Side of the Moon or Ghost Ship, and definitely superior to the former.

What really holds it back is Steve Railsback as the ostensible protagonist. His character is potentially interesting but he brings nothing to the role. The whiny, conflicted overwrought alpha male is something of a type in ’80s flicks. Thankfully writers eventually realized these characters are uniformly unsympathetic: we just don’t care about their problems. He’s on screen far too much for how boing he is. At least he’s usually paired up Peter Firth, who’s far more interesting.

I’m deliberately not discussing the plot. Not for fear of spoilers, but because it doesn’t matter. It’s all of a piece–you either like all the crap, er, elements, I’ve mentioned above or you don’t. You don’t watch a show like this for the plot.

Aerial navigation

This is part of a series of posts chronicling our difficult journey to the 2014 edition of B-Fest, the annual bad movie festival at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

If you’re just joining I recommend reading the older posts first, so that you know how things got to this state. We’re now racing to BWI on a MARC commuter train, chasing the last Southwest flight to Chicago.

Jammed into a seat on a MARC bi-level surrounded by commuters isn’t the best way to purchase plane tickets, but sometimes life is shit. MARC delivered us to the BWI station a little before 6:00 PM, and we hopped the shuttle bus to the airport. Check-in and security went smoothly enough and after locating our gate we found a place to eat dinner while I booked a hotel in Chicago for the night. The flight would land at 9:25 and we’d be at the hotel before 11.

Yeah, not today. Not with our luck. No sooner had we settled back in the gate Southwest announced a two-hour delay, later shortened to 1 hour 20 minutes. Our plane was late coming up from Florida or some such. Sigh. Cue depressing music from Planes, Trains & Automobiles.

Finally at about 9:40 PM we’re airborne. The Capitol Limited is running up the Potomac toward Cumberland, dead on schedule. CSX is stabbing the Lake Shore Limited in Central New York. There’s no Wi-Fi and one of the bathrooms is out of service but we’re moving west for the first time today. With the delay we should be in by 10:45 PM CT. That puts us at the hotel by midnight, which sucks, but doesn’t affect the rest of the plan (renting a car at Union Station and driving up to Evanston).

We landed early, at 10:25. Our bag arrived in good order and we proceeded to the CTA station, where of course we had problems making the ticket gates work, because nothing else had worked properly all day. A kind employee helped us along. 40 minutes and a snow-filled walk through the Loop later we presented ourselves at the Hampton Majestic in the Theatre District, about which I have nothing but good things to say. The Capitol Limited had just arrived early into Pittsburgh. The day was over.

Tune in tomorrow for my reflections on What It All Meant.

Featured image courtesy of BriYYZ from Toronto, Canada (SouthwestUploaded by russavia) [CC-BY-SA-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons.