Galaxy of Terror (1981)

Movie: Galaxy of Terror (1981), directed by B. D. Clark

Watched on: HBO Max

Ran: 8.13 miles, 8’46”/mile, 01:11:18 (recovery run)

 

I’m not the world’s biggest science fiction fan, but apparently folks of that persuasion are currently shouting “FEAR IS THE MIND-KILLER!” because they’re all hyped up for the new film adaptation of Dune, which they feel will be more faithful to Frank Herbert’s novel than the 1984 version. I can’t offer any input on that, other than to say that the last time I saw Dune it made me want to crush my own skull in a vise. Granted, this was decades ago during an all-night college sci-fi marathon, and I allow that if I were to see it again today with these wiser (and presbyopic) eyes, I might feel differently, but frankly, I’m not that keen to try. Besides, “fear is the mind-killer”? C’mon, that theme had been run into the ground three years earlier in Galaxy of Terror.

 

Yes, believe it or not, despite having endured Bloodsucking Freaks the night before, tonight I voluntarily chose to watch another film from the 50 Worst Movies Ever Made list, because apparently I did a genocide or three in one or more previous lives and have decided to cash the karma check all at once. I started the movie with trepidation, true, but then imagine my delight to see soon-to-be horror mainstays Sid Haig AND Robert Englund in the opening credits! But wait, that’s not all: order now, and we’ll throw in a free Ray Walston and a bonus Erin Moran! That means that if you’ve ever dreamed of seeing Captain Spaulding and Freddy Krueger on a spacecraft crew with Mr. Hand and Joanie Loves Chachi, this is your chance, hotshot. What a time to be alive!

 

Of course, after the opening credits the movie all went to crap pretty much immediately, as one might well expect from a Roger Corman production. You wouldn’t necessarily guess it from the basic plot, which is uninspired, but has enough bones to support a decent movie: sent to investigate a craft that crash-landed on the distant planet Organthus, the crew of the spaceship Quest finds only corpses. Before long, the Quest crew are picked off one by one in various mysterious and brutal ways. Worse yet, an energy field prevents them from leaving, which leads them to explore an ominous black pyramid in hopes of securing their escape. Cue more deaths, a slowly (ohmigod SO slowly) dawning realization, and a final boss battle, then roll credits.

 

But the plot sketch doesn’t do justice to what actually appears onscreen. Here’s a partial list of what you’re in for if you actually tune in: colorful characters, such as a near-mute spiritual warrior with crystal throwing-star-thingies! A psi-sensitive who announces that she is, indeed, psi-sensitive! A mysterious energy-blob-headed Planet Master who could not possibly turn out to be evil! A reckless and damaged female space captain who was the only survivor of the Hesperus Massacre, and who is DEFINITELY NOT supposed to be Ripley after she piloted herself home after Alien!

 

Come for the characters, stay for the grisly deaths: someone’s head explodes when crushed by tentacles! Someone has to cut off his own arm, which proceeds to kill him and then sprouts maggots! One of those maggots grows to enormous proportions and, in an infamous scene that is more or less this film’s entire cinematic legacy, proceeds to rip a woman’s clothes off, cover her in slime, and rape her to death! You get all this AND MORE!

 

But Galaxy of Terror’s cardinal sin is that, even with such bonkers-sounding ingredients at hand, the overall dinner is so bland and uninspiring I fell asleep face down in my soup. (Well, not literally. Soup is difficult to eat while running on a treadmill. NEVER AGAIN!) Judging unscientifically based on my memory of the viewing experience, 71% of all dialogue consists of crew members asserting that they’re the ones in charge here, while 43% of the camera time is split about 50/50 between stern looks and slow-motion rock-climbing (which, amazingly enough, is just as boring to watch no matter what planet it’s happening on). And forget about fear—the REAL mind-killer is just how long it takes the crew to figure out what’s going on. When one character suddenly says, apropos of nothing in particular, “boy howdy, I sure am scared of X,” and shortly thereafter dies of X, and then another character says “well that was certainly a shame but at least he didn’t die of Y, which is something that I, personally, am SUPER-terrified of,” and then that character dies of Y, you’d think maybe everyone would go “hey, WAIT a minute here” before literally only two crew members are left standing.

 

I know that Galaxy of Terror is (somehow) held in high regard by fans of horror B-movie schlock, which explains its current availability on HBO Max, but frankly, I just don’t share the love—and I AM a fan of horror B-movie schlock. Everything about it looked good (well, “good”) on paper, but I found the execution lacking. More than anything, I got the distinct feeling that no one involved in the production was having a good time, as if this entire endeavor were nothing more than a contractual obligation and/or a paycheck. And that’s the biggest mind-killer of them all.