Mystery Science Theater 3000 - The Movie was first on the agenda this morning. I am still looking in my dvdr's for fodder. I hadn't bothered to buy a real dvd of the movie when either edition came out. There was one in 1998 which was out for a couple of years and another in 2008 that is still around. I have a laserdisc that I copied to dvdr and that looks good enough for me. Dr. Forrester beams up This Island Earth to the guys in the Satellite of Love. That's a pretty good movie, TIE, that is somewhat better than their typical fare. Unfortunately, it's been chopped down so much that only the bare bones of the movie exist. TIE is an 87 minute movie and MST3K-TM is 73 minutes long and some of that running time is made up of host segments. There are some funny bits in those and the occasional laugh while watching the guys riff on the movie but TIE is harder to make fun of than the poorer fare Mike and the Bots are normally forced to watch. The cast said that the company producing the film wanted to dumb down the jokes and add a bit of profanity to keep the movie from having a G rating. It's not one of my favorite episodes that's for sure.
I followed Mike and the Bots with Night Of The Comet. It's a 1984 end of the world pop music fueled zombie fest. Catherine Mary Stewart and Kelli Maroney are a couple young valley girls. There's a comet coming by and everyone is excited, throwing parties and the like. Catherine is working at the movie theater where her boyfriend is the projectionist. They spend the night in the steel lined room of the projection booth. Next morning they are some of the only survivors in a depopulated earth. The boyfriend is our first victim when a zombie clubs him to death in the alley behind the movie theater. Bummer for him. The bulk of the people have been turned to red dust and some small number of people have been turned into zombies. Kelli, Catherine's sister, survived the comet by spending the night in a steele garden shed. After meeting at home they hear a radio station operating and head there. It's a tape playing but Robert Beltrami shows up. He had survived by being in his truck's sleeper. While Catherine and Robert make some small talk Kelli plays around with the radio station. That broadcasts their conversation to some scientists hiding out in an underground bunker. They are collecting the survivors in order to effect a cure. The scientists have been contaminated and it's only a matter of time before they are doomed. Mary Woronov and Geoffrey Lewis are part of the science team who go out to get the girls. Robert goes home to see if his mom survived while the girls go shopping. The science team rescues the sisters from some zombies at the store and take Catherine back to base.
Kelli is supposed to follow in the next chopper but the scientists think she is contaminated and the plan is to kill her and suck the blood from Catherine. They aren't a nice bunch of scientists, are they. Mary W, dying and remorsefull, discovers that Kelli is fine and only pretends to kill her. She kills the other waiting science guy and waits for the return of Robert Beltrami. She tells Robert and Kelli where Catherine is and they go rescue her, and a couple of kids, from the scientists. They move into LA and set up a family unit. Nice. There's lots of stuff there to have, it's a big place. It's a light hearted fun movie with a happy sort of ending. The story is silly and the girls are cute. I'm not much of a Robert Beltrami fan for some reason but I do like seeing Geoffrey Lewis and Mary Woronov in just about anything. It wasn't a big hit but it seems to have developed a nice following. The dvd didn't come out until 2007 for some reason. I have a dvdr that I made from a vhs tape. I think that will do me for the non, its not like I watch it very often.
Nice post. For those who enjoy Night of the Comet there is a fan site at www.nightofthecomet.info
Posted by: dmk | September 13, 2010 at 05:34 AM
My name is Catherine Mary Stewart, not Mary Catherine...:) It's a common mistake so all is forgiven! THanks for the pretty positive review!
CMS
Posted by: CMS | September 14, 2010 at 08:42 AM
Oops! Sorry Catherine Mary. I twist names up like that occasionally. Brain isn't always working. I'll fix it. Thanks for the nice comment.
Posted by: Garth Danielson | September 15, 2010 at 06:34 AM