For about a decade, a company called Hemisphere Pictures has released movies that are Filipino/American co-productions. Filmed on location in the Philippines, these are often war stories or adventure films. In order to get folks like me into theaters, they also make horror movies.
A quartet of these scare flicks takes place on a fictional isle known as Blood Island. As we'll see, the first one in the series is quite a bit different from the others. Think of it as a prelude to a fugue in three voices.
Since the Journey has expanded its scope to include horror films, especially since they often overlap with the Fantasy milieu, I thought you'd enjoy learning about the wonders that Hemisphere has to offer. Let's take a look.
There’s a volcano that’s ready to erupt on the silver screens, so prepare yourselves for a blast of truth, fury, and funk that has no patience for politeness. These three films, Watermelon Man, The Landlord, and Cotton Comes to Harlem, take a swing at the beast that is American racism as they stumble in their own strange ways trying to wrap their arms around it. These films attempt to not let their audiences off easy as they slap them across the face, daring white America to feel what it’s like to be on the wrong end of the stick. Whether you’re a white boy having your spiritual awakening in a Black neighborhood or a white man literally waking up Black, these films don’t just entertain. They challenge and provoke you with some honesty and a loud Black voice that is no longer asking to be heard.
Before you start reading this essay, let me warn you: I will be discussing major plot details from the latest Hollywood blockbuster, Beneath the Planet of the Apes. This will include the movie’s conclusion. For that matter, this article also ruins the ending of the original film. So be warned in case you haven't yet been to your local multiplex to see these in double-feature. On the other hand, you may well wish to go in with your eyes wide open… because Beneath the Planet of the Apes is both a fascinating continuation and a jaw-dropping pivot.
If…. is a movie which came out a couple of years ago, but is rapidly becoming a staple of the college film society scene here in the UK and overseas. It’s firmly within the satirical-surrealist tradition that characterises the likes of The Prisoner (with whom If… shares an editor, South African activist Ian Rakoff), Monty Python, and The Bed Sitting Room. The question is, how well does that stand up as time and cinematic fashion move on?
The story is set at a British all-male boarding school, where young men from the privileged classes learn the rigid, brutal, complex hierarchies and rules which will characterise their adult lives as well. Through the lens of a new arrival, we encounter a world where senior prefects enforce a rigid regime, obsessed with trivialities like hair length and permitted foods but enforcing this through corporal punishment; where younger students are forced to act as servants to their elders, with an implied sexual dimension to this servitude; where religion and the military bolster and reinforce the regime. However, the school also has its rebellious counterculture in the form of three young men, the “Crusaders”, led by Travis (played by newcomer Malcolm McDowell, whose performance here has reportedly led to Stanley Kubrick casting him in his forthcoming adaptation of A Clockwork Orange). their rebellion begins with minor acts of disobedience like growing a moustache, but grows in commitment and brutality until the climax of the story.
Federico Fellini is unquestionably one of the most beloved filmmakers in the so-called international arthouse circuit. Despite shooting Italian productions, working well outside the Hollywood system, Fellini has already garnered a back-breaking eight Oscar nominations. I won't be surprised if his latest, Fellini Satyricon (which henceforth I'll simply refer to as Satyricon), nabs him another nomination, despite its immense strangeness. United Artists, responsible for distributing Satyricon here in the States, have been shrewd in their marketing, seemingly aiming at the overlap between those who frequent arthouse theaters (people like me) and those who watch B-movies at the drive-in (also people like me).
Fellini Satyricon
Normally, when writing about a film, or really any narrative, I try to give you a blow-by-blow of the plot; however, in the case of Satyricon, I don't think this would be feasible or desirable. This film is the latest effort from Fellini as both a fantasist and a storyteller who, at least since La Dolce Vita a decade ago, has clearly become disillusioned with traditional narrative. Satyricon is so loose in plot and yet so rich in imagery that to go over the plot would be doing it a disservice. I can at least give you the setup, though.
When reading my morning paper, it can feel like the whole world is determined to blow itself up.
Vietnamese peace talks are going nowhere, with American “help” possibly reaching its nadir when a US helicopter killed friendly South Vietnamese forces by mistake. Israel is once again fighting its Arab neighbours with both Communists and Capitalist countries pouring in military aid to their favoured sides. There is not even goodwill within their respective camps, with the Soviets and Communist China continuing to sabre rattle over the border. And this doesn’t even count the civil wars going on in places like Rhodesia.
Closer to home, British troops in Northern Ireland’s attempts to keep the peace so far seem to be counter-productive. Whilst we are also learning more of the atrocities committed by British troops during the so-called “Malayan Emergency” from the official enquiry.
With all this violence going on, it makes you wonder if there could be another way. Well Peter Watkins has come up with one, albeit not necessarily the most pleasant option:
Theatrical poster for An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe
An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe is an hour-long film in which four Edgar Allan Poe stories are recited by Vincent Price. Originally made as a television play (and in a way which suggests it was based on a theatrical production, albeit with the addition of some new visual effects), it’s reminiscent of the BBC’s A Ghost Story For Christmas segment, and I was recently asked to view it as a possible acquisition as a teaching tool by my university’s English Literature department.
The Cask of Amontillado
The programme is split into four segments, in each of which Price recites a different Poe short story. Fairly predictably, these are “The Tell-Tale Heart”, “The Sphinx”, “The Cask of Amontillado” and “The Pit and the Pendulum”. Each segment is performed with Price in character as the narrator of each story, with appropriate costuming and sets. Although Price does show a decent range in playing different characters, they’re all very much within Price’s repertoire as an actor, so, although none of the performances are bad, there are no real surprises to be had here.
The Sphinx
I felt the best segment was “The Cask of Amontillado”. Price really seems to relish the role of Montressor and plays him with a wicked twinkle in his eye, surrounded by luxurious draperies and furniture and a banquet-table of food. The weakest for me was “The Sphinx,” which struggled to hold my attention, though it did have an effective use of special effects when we briefly see a skull overlaid over Price’s face at a crucial moment.
The Pit and the Pendulum
By contrast, “The Pit and the Pendulum” was a good enough dramatization of an exciting story, but the problem was that the producer seemed to feel it needed jazzing up with effects shots of Price falling into the pit, Price helpless before the pendulum, Price faced with colour separation overlay ("chroma-key" to yanks) flames, and so forth. The rats were far too cute, with inquisitive little faces and glossy fur, for me to find them horrific.
Finally, “The Tell-Tale Heart” was a good choice as the opening story, told simply with the set a bare garret, with Price steadily ramping up the hysteria as the narrator follows his path into murder and madness.
The Tell-Tale Heart
One great benefit I can see from this production is a chance to show audiences who may just know Poe from the cinematic productions loosely based on his work, just how skilled a horror writer Poe was in real life. The issue with something like “The Pit and the Pendulum” is that one can’t really get an entire 90-minute film out of it without adding a lot of material, which, while it can work as a movie, means you lose the terrifying economy of the original story (although if anyone wants to adapt “The Cask of Amontillado”, I think one could spend at least 90 minutes exploring the buildup of resentment in the two characters’ relationships that led up to the final murder). For this reason, I’m recommending that the English Literature department acquires a copy, and would also say that, if it turns up on TV in your region, it’s worth a watch.
3 out of 5 stars.
by Victoria Silverwolf
There's A Signpost Up Ahead . . .
Two films I caught recently reminded me of Rod Serling's late, lamented television series Twilight Zone. Let's take a look.
The Moebius Flip
Less than half an hour long, this skiing film is the sort of thing that might be shown at a college campus, before the main feature in a movie theater, or to fill up time on television in the wee hours of the morning. The brief running time isn't the only thing that reminds me of Serling's creation.
We begin with scenes of people skiing, edited in a jumpy way. Jazz, rock, and folk music fill up the soundtrack. The skiers also fool around in the snow, eat some fruit, and so forth.
Suddenly, we see a news announcer. He tells us that scientists have determined that every subatomic particle in the universe has reversed polarity. I'm not sure what that means, but let's see what happens.
Somehow, this is supposed to change the way people perceive things. That means the film turns into a negative of itself.
This goes on for a while, then the movie goes back to normal. Once in a while, it turns back into a negative. I guess that's a Moebius Flip. Along with more skiing, we get folks at an amusement park and eating in a restaurant. This part of the film features some pretty impressive and scary scenes of dangerous winter sports. People ski over huge crevasses, wind up on top of a tower of snow, and hang from cliffs.
Is it worth twenty-odd minutes of your time? Well, if you like psychedelic images or are a big fan of skiing, it could be. The science fiction premise is just an excuse to reverse the colors of the film, and there's no real plot at all. I've never been on a pair of skis, so I can only appreciate the athleticism on display here as an outsider.
Two stars.
Sole Survivor
This is a made-for-TV movie that aired on CBS stations in the USA earlier this month. It begins with five men in World War Two uniforms standing around a wrecked American bomber of the time. They seem to be in pretty good shape, given that they're in a desert wasteland. Things get weird when we find out they've been waiting to be rescued for seventeen years.
The crew of the Home Run.
It quickly becomes clear that they are ghosts, waiting for their bodies to be found so they can stop haunting the wreck.
I should note here that the premise is inspired by the case of the Lady Be Good, a bomber that crashed in the Libyan desert in 1943 and was not discovered until 1958.
The real wreck.
Fans of Twilight Zone will remember the episode King Nine Will Not Return, which was also inspired by the fate of the Lady Be Good. That tale goes in a different direction, however.
Two men in an airplane discover the wreck. (By the way, the fact that the ghosts have been waiting for seventeen years means that the movie takes place in 1960 or so. There's no other indication that it's set a decade ago.)
The discoverers, who look more 1970 to me.
This leads to an official investigation by the United States Army. (Remember that the Air Force was part of the Army, and not a separate branch of the service, until a few years after World War Two.) Two officers are in charge of the mission.
William Shatner, fresh from Star Trek, as Lieutenant Colonel Josef Gronke and Vince Edwards, best known as Ben Casey, as Major Michael Devlin.
They pay a visit to the sole survivor of the Home Run. This fellow parachuted out of the plane and landed in the Mediterranean Sea, managing to make it out alive to continue his military career. (More details of what happened later.)
Brigadier General Russell Hamner, as played by Richard Basehart, recently the star of the TV series Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.
Hamner agrees to accompany the two officers to the North African desert. He claims that all of the crew of the Home Run bailed out into the ocean, so the plane must have continued without them for several hundred miles before it crashed. Unlikely, but possible. Flashbacks tell us the real story.
Hamner as the navigator of the Home Run during the war.
The bomber was damaged in an attack by the enemy. The captain ordered Hamner to plot a course back to base, but he panicked and bailed out against orders. Without a navigator, the crew went off course and the plane crashed.
Tension builds as Devlin casts doubt on Hamner's story, and Gronke tells him not to make waves, lest he ruin his career. Both officers have their own concerns about their pasts, adding depth of character. Without giving too much away, let's just say that the truth comes out because of a harmonica, a rubber raft, and Hamner's guilty conscience. There's a powerful and poignant conclusion.
The last ghost faces an eternity playing baseball alone.
This is quite a good movie, particularly for one made for TV. I like the fact that the ghosts appear as ordinary men, rather than being transparent or something. The actors all do a good job. You'll never hear the song Take Me Out To The Ball Game again without having an eerie feeling.
Four stars.
by Brian Collins
Over the past several years, AIP has adapted stories by H. P. Lovecraft for the big screen—or at least the drive-in. The results have been mixed, but they could certainly be much worse. The first and still the best of these was The Haunted Palace (adapted from The Case of Charles Dexter Ward) back in '63, directed by Roger Corman, with a script by the late Charles Beaumont, and starring an especially tormented Vincent Price. It was a very fine picture. Now we have the latest entry in this "series," The Dunwich Horror, taken from the Lovecraft story of the same name, although it's a pretty loose adaptation.
The Dunwich Horror
One warning I want to give about this movie, one which has nothing to do with sex or violence, is that, aside from being generally a pretty strange film, there are several scenes featuring flashing lights, or a color filter changing rapidly to give one the impression of a strobing light. Some people (thankfully not many) are susceptible to epileptic fits if subjected to such stimuli.
Now, as for the film itself, once we get past what I was surprised to find is an animated (as in a cartoon) opening credits sequence, we start with what seems to be a flashback of a woman giving birth, surrounded by two elderly sisters and an old man. We then flash forward to Miskatonic University, that college of the occult and Lovecraft's making, in Arkham. Nancy Wagner (Sandra Dee) is a student who, in the college's library, meets a good-looking but unusual young man named Wilbur Whateley (Dean Stockwell), who is terribly interested in the Necronomicon. I'm sure his interest in the accursed book and his strange deadpan way of talking are perfectly innocuous. A certain professor at Miskatonic, Henry Armitage (Ed Begley), gets a bit of a hunch that Wilbur is up to no good, but for now does nothing about it.
The Necronomicon, kept in a cozy glass case.
"The Dunwich Horror" is one of Lovecraft's most celebrated stories, but it's also one of his trickiest. As with "the Call of Cthulhu," Lovecraft wrote "The Dunwich Horror" as if it were a report or an essay, a work of journalism or academia, rather than a fiction narrative. There's no protagonist, properly speaking, although Wilbur is certainly the story's nucleus. This remains sort of the case with the film, although Nancy and Armitage now serve as our eyes and ears, or rather as normal people in what becomes an extraordinary situation. However, it's not Sandra Dee or Ed Begley who caught my attention, but Dean Stockwell as Wilbur, who gives almost what could be considered a star-making role (to my knowledge his most high-profile roles up to now were film adaptations of Sons and Lovers and Long Day's Journey into Night), if not for the movie that surrounds him. Unlike his short story counterpart Wilbur here is not physically deformed, but instead talks in a strangely deadened tone, as if human emotions are foreign to him. Stockwell as Wilbur manages to be uncanny simply through how he talks and acts, which is a major point of praise.
Dean Stockwell as Wilbur Whateley and Sandra Dee as Nancy Wagner.
Director Daniel Haller and his team of screenwriters have opted to streamline Lovecraft's story while giving it a sort of romance plot, as well as a dose of sex and violence. Sex and Lovecraft have always been uneasy bedfellows, even in something like "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" which explicitly involves sex in its plot. Wilbur is one of two twins, the other having supposedly died in childbirth, with the father being unknown, and his mother having been kept in an asylum for the past two decades. Wilbur lives with his grandfather, Old Man Whateley (Sam Jaffe, who some may recognize as that one scientist in the now-classic The Day the Earth Stood Still), who seems convinced his grandson is also up to no good, but arbitrarily (the film does nothing to explain this) does nothing about Wilbur being a scoundrel. For his part, Wilbur sees Nancy as a pretty fine girl—for a dark ritual, that is. The idea is that if he can steal the Necronomicon and impregnate Nancy (the implication, via a mind-bending scene, is that he rapes her), he can bring one of "the Old Ones" into the human world.
Sam Jaffe as Old Man Whateley and Ed Begley as Professor Henry Armitage.
As this point the plot splits in two, with one half focusing on Wilbur and Nancy's "romance" while the other sees Armitage tracking down the mystery of Wilbur's birth, since it becomes apparent the young man and the Necronomicon are somehow connected. One of the strangest (sorry, "far-out") scenes in the whole movie is when Armitage goes to see Wilbur's mother (Joanne Moore Jordan), who apparently had lost her mind many years ago upon giving birth to Wilbur and his dead twin. When it comes to this movie, there are two types of strange: that of the unnerving sort, and that of the cheesy sort. There are parts (sometimes moments within a single scene) of this movie that do a good job of spooking the audience, and others where it's rather silly. With that said, the nightmarish effect of Jordan's performance combined with the changing color tints in this scene make it one of the most effective. This is a movie that generally shines brightest when it focuses on Stockwell's performance and/or the Gothic cliches (including a creepy old house) that clearly also influenced Lovecraft's writing. Maybe it's because they didn't have the budget for it, but the lack of an on-screen monster for the vast majority of the film's runtime also works in its favor.
Joanne Moore Jordan as Wilbur's mother, who's spent the past two decades as a mental patient.
When Old Man Whateley finally decides to take action, Wilbur kills him for his troubles, along with imprisoning one of Nancy's friends and turning her into some kind of abomination. Meanwhile Wilbur gives his grandfather a heathen burial and in so doing provokes the wrath of the Dunwich townspeople, who never liked the Whateleys anyway. It's revealed, or rather speculated, that Wilbur's twin may not have died after all, but instead gone to the realm of the Old Ones while Wilbur got stuck on Earth as a human. Armitage and the townsfolk succeed in stopping Wilbur from completing his ritual with the unconscious Nancy, Armitage being well-versed enough in the Necronomicon to use the book against Wilbur, killing him with a blast of lightning. So the last of the Whateley men is dead. Unfortunately, the final shot, eerily showing a fetus growing inside Nancy (which is odd, because she's probably only been pregnant a day or two), implying an Old One may be born after all.
Dean Stockwell at his most devilish.
Lovecraft purists will surely be much disappointed with this movie, and even as someone who is not exactly a Lovecraft fan, I have to admit it's by no means perfect. Even at 90 minutes it feels a bit overlong, and it tries desperately to contort one of Lovecraft's more unconventional stories into having a three-act structure. I also get the impression that the addition of blood and breasts was to appease those (people my age and younger) who are suckers for AIP schlock. Not too long ago we had Roger Corman's so-called Poe cycle, which for the most part did Edgar Allan Poe's (and in one case Lovecraft's) fiction justice on modest budgets. I would say The Dunwich Horror is on par with one of the lesser of Corman's Poe movies.
A high three stars.
[New to the Journey? Read this for a brief introduction!
Journey to the Far Side of the Sun, also known as Doppelgänger in England, is a British science fiction film directed by Robert Parrish and produced by marionette/miniature wizards Gerry and Sylvia Anderson (Stingray, Thunderbirds, Fireball XL5, Supercar, etc.).
As a movie, it is both visually appealing and tonally complex, with layered characterizations from its cast. The film gets off to a decent start, featuring beautifully realized sets and model effects, as well as intriguing characters with backstories I wanted to know more about. It sets up an epic quest that seems exciting and full of potential. Sadly, by the end of the film, everything (and I do mean everything) falls apart, leaving me feeling cheated.
The Beginning: A Futuristic Start
The movie opens quietly at Eurosec headquarters (the European Space Exploration Council). Two men enter a guarded, futuristic, secure complex to review some documents. To access the document room, an X-ray scan is performed, displaying the men’s bones in motion and detecting a metal pen that triggers an alarm. From the start, the film showcases its advanced technology.
The Exciting Mission
The discovery of the century is at hand: scientists have determined that on the far side of the Sun lies another planet, identical in size to Earth (stop me if you've heard this one before.) Jason Webb, the Eurosec director (played by Patrick Wymark), collaborates with other nations to finance a manned mission to this planet. American astronaut Colonel Glenn Ross (Roy Thinnes—"David Vincent" from The Invaders) is selected for the mission, accompanied by astrophysicist Dr. John Kane (Ian Hendry).
The Beautiful People
Ross arrives at Eurosec with his beautiful but emotionally detached wife, Sharon (played by Lynn Loring). It quickly becomes evident that Glenn and Sharon’s marriage is in serious trouble, and they are barely holding it together as a couple. The other prominent female character, Lisa Hartmann (Loni von Friedl), is a strikingly beautiful woman whose role in the plot is never clearly defined, making her presence feel more ornamental than essential to the story.
The Creative Technology
As the mission preparation begins, the audience is treated to exquisitely designed rocket ships and futuristic sets. Even the cars and homes the characters live in reflect a near-future aesthetic. This is where the movie truly excels—transporting viewers from the mundane to a world of speculative technology. While the spaceships are clearly models, the craftsmanship is exceptional, maintaining credulity far better than the poorly constructed props often seen in other films of our era. Like some of the films from the Orient, for example.
The Tragic and Confusing Journey
The journey to the new planet is uneventful, filled with slow, ponderous shots of the spacecraft moving through space. Soon, Ross and Kane arrive at their destination and face the critical decision: should they land on the planet? Ross determines that the Earth-like planet has a breathable atmosphere and abundant plant life but sees no signs of intelligent inhabitants. They choose to land. Detaching their landing module from their main ship, they then end up crash landing on the new planet. As they complete their fiery collision with the new world, Ross is thrown clear of the ship. Despite his injuries, he manages to pull Kane, who is gravely wounded, from the burning ship before it explodes.
It is nighttime where they impact, and a strange light appears in the sky, scanning the crash site. A humanoid figure descends from an aircraft and Ross, terrified, attempts to fight it. To his shock, the figure turns out to be human, and subdues Ross.
The Ridiculous Truth
The next scene reveals Ross and Kane in Eurosec’s infirmary, under the watchful eye of a furious Jason Webb. As Ross recovers, he is interrogated by Webb and other Eurosec staff, including Lisa Hartmann, as they demand to know why he turned around and returned to Earth. Ross adamantly insists that they had not turned back and instead had landed on the new planet.
Alone due to Kane’s critical condition, Ross becomes increasingly frustrated. Upon returning home, he argues with Sharon, accusing her of reversing the layout of their furniture and even noticing that labels on her perfume bottles are printed backward. This fight leads to the collapse of their marriage but provideds Ross with a startling revelation: he is not on Earth but on the other planet, a mirror version of his world.
The Overblown Ending
Ross and the Eurosec team realize the truth: he is trapped on a doppelgänger Earth, where everything is reversed. Plans are made to send Ross back to his own Earth. He boards the alien lander (the Doppelgänger) and docks with the main spacecraft still in orbit. However, due to the mirrored nature of the ship, a systems failure occurs, causing the craft to lose power. Unable to escape, the ship and lander plummet to the surface, crash-landing directly on Eurosec and destroying the entire base in a massive explosion.
The film ends with a haunting scene: an elderly Jason Webb, crippled and defeated, reflecting on the catastrophic loss. Alone in a wheelchair, he gazes at his reflection in a mirrored window before tragically crashing through it, marking his demise.
Final Thoughts
This movie started so well, only to end so poorly. It had so much going for it: great looking sets and technology, attractive people (albeit lacking any compelling backstory), and an interesting adventure for them to embark on. For the counter-Earth to turn out to be a mirror copy just felt lazy. So many simple things had to be ignored for the story to go as long as it did. The astronauts not finding any life from orbit was the dumbest thing of all…until that was followed up by the two explosive crashes by a trained astronaut. The fact that everyone died made the story a waste of time and a missed opportunity. A real shame. I give this Doppelänger two of five stars.
[New to the Journey? Read this for a brief introduction!]
With so little decent science fiction and fantasy film available this year, I’m back at the second-run cinemas again, catching up on movies I missed the first time round. Bedazzled is a modern take on the legend of Faust in the inimitable style of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, accompanied by Eleanor Bron as an up-to-date Gretchen who doesn’t sit around pining at the spinning wheel. It’s got a couple of nice psychological character studies at its heart and a few wry things to say about human nature, though coming to an optimistic conclusion on the subject.
Original movie poster for "Bedazzled"
Moore plays Stanley Moon, working as a cook in a Wimpy Bar and living in a grotty London bedsit, consumed with desire for his coworker Margaret (Eleanor Bron) but unable to work up the courage to ask her out. This makes him easy prey for Satan, aka “George”, played by Peter Cook, turning up initially in a stylish black and red cloak, little sunglasses and velvet dinner jacket.
After Stanley has signed away his soul in exchange for seven wishes, the rest of the movie is mostly sketches in which Stanley’s wish comes true—he is a witty intellectual, a millionaire, a pop star, a fly on a wall, and other things—and yet he fails to win Margaret. These are interspersed with more metatextual sketches in which George goes about his business of spreading unhappiness and misery in petty but effective ways (sending pigeons out to defecate on pedestrians; issuing parking tickets; conning little old ladies; scratching LPs) while Stanley trails after him, complaining, but finding it hard to take the moral high ground. Over the course of the story Stanley gradually comes to realise some things about himself, Margaret, and George, and, without revealing the ending, it’s fair to say that he comes out of the experience a better man than he went in.
Stan, about to strike out with Margaret again
Like Oh! What a Lovely War, this is a movie which makes a virtue of a low budget. It’s shot around London but with a sometimes witty and surreal choice of locations: the Devil’s headquarters is a cheap nightclub, Heaven is the Glass House at Kew Gardens, George at one point takes Stanley up to the top of the Post Office Tower in a visual joke about the Devil showing Christ the kingdoms of the world. Modern takes on the Seven Deadly Sins all turn up, with Raquel Welch typecast as Lust (and we learn she’s married to Sloth), and Vanity represented by a man with a mirror physically growing out of his chest. There’s a delightful parody of pop hits programme Ready, Steady, Go!, and there are clever little touches like a record scratched by George in one sketch putting Stan off his game with Margaret in another, or a headline, “Pop Stars in Sex and Drugs Drama”, shifting by one letter to become “Pope Stars in Sex and Drugs Drama”.
Within all of this, though, there are running themes about human nature and our ability to make ourselves contented or miserable. Stan, at one point, rails at George, “you promised to make me happy!” and George counters, “no, I promised to give you wishes.” Throughout the sketches, Stan keeps screwing things up with Margaret not through George’s intervention but through his own personal failings: as an intellectual, he completely misreads her willingness to sleep with him; as a millionaire, he keeps giving Margaret expensive gifts but no personal attention. He never fights to win her away from his rivals; he never takes an interest in her as a person. He whines that freedom of choice is all a lie, citing the fact that he had no choice where he was born, or to whom, but it’s obvious the problem is less Stan’s lack of opportunities, and more his inability to take advantage of the opportunities he has. It’s only when he recognises that being himself is better than the alternatives, that he can finally escape George’s grasp.
The Top of the Pops parody is spot on.
But, as the film continues, we also get a sadder insight into Stan and George and why they are the way they are. Stan tells George that George is the only person who has ever taken an interest in him, or done anything nice for him, showing how people can fall into temptation and sin not through moral depravity, but simple loneliness. George, for his part, eventually shows his own vulnerability: he is bitterly envious of God and wishes he could once again be among the angels, but at the same time is unable to rise above petty game-playing and point-scoring and can never understand why Heaven is closed to him. There’s also a running critique of modern life, with the Devil being associated with things like parking meters and tedious slogans like “Go To Work On An Egg”. Peter Cook gets in a rant about the evil of the banality of Wimpy Bars and Tastee Freezes and advertising and concrete, whose sentiment at least recalls Tati’s visual skewering of the sameness of global cities in Playtime.
Sermon on the postbox
All that having been said, it’s not a perfect movie. The metatextual sketches tend to go on a bit too long, and, although the message of the film is in part that Stan needs to stop viewing Margaret as a prize to be won and instead let her be her own person, we don’t really get much of a sense of her except as a prize to be won. The message—appreciate what you’ve got and don’t go looking for more—also doesn’t feel very aspirational. I suspect that if you don’t happen to like the humour of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore more generally, you’ll find the movie offputting. If you do like them, though, check Bedazzled out when it shows near you.
Trek Correspondent Joe Reid has jumped from TV to film. We think you'll enjoy his take on a most mind-altering movie!
by Joe Reid
Change of Mind, directed by Robert Stevens, is a film about David Rowe (played by Raymond St. Jacques), a successful white district attorney whose brain is transplanted into the body of a terminally injured Black man, Ralph Dickson. The story operates on many layers: it’s a respectful and intelligent thought experiment on how a newly reborn Black man might engage with and find relevance in a prejudiced society. It’s also a courtroom drama about the murder of a woman and the fight to bring her killer to justice. Primarily, however, this movie explores the complexities of the relationship between David and his wife, Margaret Rowe (played by Susan Oliver of Star Trek fame), who struggles to fully accept her husband after his physical transformation.
The title, Change of Mind, is somewhat misleading, as David Rowe’s mind doesn’t really change throughout the movie. Instead, it’s the minds of those around him that David must work to change.
My overall experience watching Change of Mind was a pleasant one. However, I have three key criticisms of the film. First, the movie starts abruptly with the brain surgery, never allowing the audience to experience the white David Rowe or the original Ralph Dickson. While I understand that this approach was likely more efficient and less complicated (as it avoids the need for two actors to portray the same character), it is a missed opportunity for deeper context. Second, there were a few strange, psychedelic dream sequences—while musically scored by the great Duke Ellington, they felt somewhat out of place within the overall narrative. Lastly, the ending was too abrupt. David, through grit and integrity, overcomes numerous challenges and takes some losses, all in pursuit of the truth. He’s portrayed as a character who does everything right. But at the last minute, he makes a seemingly foolish decision, and the movie ends. The conclusion felt jarring, to say the least.
What I liked most about the movie is that it successfully delivered on its key themes. There are many scenes featuring David and Margaret navigating their new lives together. While Raymond St. Jacques’s performance was fantastic, Susan Oliver stood out, delivering a subtly nuanced portrayal of a woman who deeply loves and supports the man she married—even after the change—but struggles to fully reintegrate him into her heart. With messy and unwavering devotion, she does everything possible to fight for her husband, which is admirable to see. The movie stops just shy of delivering a payoff for all her efforts.
Along with Ms. Oliver, the beautiful and talented Janet MacLachlan (Lt. Charlene Masters from the Star Trek episode "The Alternative Factor") demonstrated not only her singing talent but delivered a soul stirring performance as Elizabeth Dickson, the wife of the deceased Ralph Dickson (who's body David Rowe now inhabited). At a point in the story when it seemed that David and Margaret were at their weakest, Elizabeth showed up and restored both their spirits.
Throughout the film David battles his new body. He fights for his love. He fights former friends, employees, authorities, entire communities, and even the government. These led to some powerful scenes that we are unaccustomed to seeing a black lead in a movie navigate. St. Jacques portrays David as a confident and mostly self-assured man moving through each encounter with practiced ease.
The courtroom scenes were smartly done and carried significant weight. David proved himself capable of handling every challenge the story threw at him, tackling problems with integrity and intelligence.
Despite the few drawbacks I mentioned, I would recommend Change of Mind as a story that tackles tough topics with a degree of realism and emotional depth. The situations in the movie were believable without being predictable, and the emotional gravity of the characters doesn’t come across as heavy-handed or preachy. The acting is more than adequate, and the musical score is hip.
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Theatrical poster for An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe
The Sphinx
The Pit and the Pendulum
The Tell-Tale Heart
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Stan, about to strike out with Margaret again
The Top of the Pops parody is spot on.
Sermon on the postbox
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