Miscellaneous Movie Musings

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Originally Posted by Alex

In addition to the three you're thinking of (I'm assuming Planet of the Apes, Omega Man, and Soylent Green) I'd add Earthquake one of the great cheesy disaster epics of the '70s. Post-apocalyptic, but on a more local scale.

Then there is Solar Crisis in which the post-apocalypse must be prevented. It was a proto-Armageddon (for which Heston provided narration services). Astronauts must go drop a bomb into the sun to prevent a solar flare that will destroy the earth.

Plus a small part in the Tim Burton Planet of the Apes remake.

I think he was just such a big presence on the screen (sometimes good and sometimes bad) that he just needed to be in the middle of massive-scale events for him to not overwhelm things.

You're probably right. Regarding Earthquake, eh, I don't count it.

That's a whole thread in itself. It's far from the best 70's cheesy disaster epic, as Poseidon Adventure and Towering Inferno are leagues better. Oddly, I never did see Airport (or Airport '75), though I did see Airplane! many, many times. I tried to catch some of Airport on TV, but couldn't watch it. It's much harder to sit through those '70's films now, unless you saw them way back when and have a soft spot for them.

[Alex]

Yeah, the short story is justifiably a classic (though I don't care for much else by Matheson).

[Gemini Cricket]

So is there something wrong with me that I like post-apocalyptic stories/movies? I love The Stand. I recently bought a documentary called Life Without People. It was very interesting, it talked about what would happen to the Earth if man suddenly disappeared one day. I'm even writing a story right now about alien beings visiting Earth five hundred years after everyone on it has died...

[cirquelover]

I'm right there with you GC. I love the Stand and we really enjoyed the Discovery special too!

I recently saw Omega Man and Logans Run again, the guys having been watching the old movies on netflix. We have to give the kid a good rounded education, don't we

[alphabassettgrrl]

Husband is watching E.T.

That little guy really was strange-looking, wasn't he? Interesting movie, looking at it at distant history.

[Alex]

I watched Airport '75 on TV in Rome. Needless to say it was in Italian.

That may have helped my enjoyment.

[bewitched]

Saw Coraline yesterday. Other than the awesome stop motion animation, it was a complete yawnfest. The only excitement came when my friend's heretofore "unscareable" 4 year old got scared when the 3 Scotty dogs jumped at the door when Coraline knocked.

[flippyshark]

Add me to the league of Heston Apocalypse enthusiasts. I only wish there could have been more! (Heck, if the "Left Behind" movies had been made in the 70s, with bigger budgets and Heston in the lead, I'm sure I'd count them as guilty pleasures. Kirk Cameron cannot hope to fill such bombastic shoes.)

The first Airport holds up for me as an entertaining sixties soap opera with action/disaster elements. After that, the franchise went awfully cheesy quite fast, with Airport '75 being good mostly for laughs, and the rest close to unwatchable.

[innerSpaceman]

Must echo, the original Airport was not a disaster film. It was a soapoperatic melodrama that may have inspired the genre to come ... the first (and best) of which was The Poseidon Adventure. Both films are very decent peices of work (Airport was nominated for Best Picture if I'm not mistaken). Their followers were pretty much pure schlock. Earthquake, in particular, is practically unwatchable - postapocalypto Heston notwithstanding.

[Alex]

I must clarify that when I called Earthquake one of the great cheesy disaster pictures I was not in any way meaning that resulted in quality.