Karel Zeman's Invention Of Destruction is the first movie up tonight. It came out in 1958 and it's packed with two other Zeman films in a 3 Blu-ray set from Criterion. It's loosely based on the Jules Verne novel Face au Drapeau or For The Flag/Facing The Flag. It was released in the US under the name The Fabulous World Of Jules Verne and did very well.
The movie is made to look like the original line engraved illustrations in the original Verne novels. It mixes animation and live action, most of the backgrounds are drawn and the people and props inserted where needed. Some of the props are physical and some are two dimensional drawings that people slip in between. It looks pretty interesting. I'm impressed by the set designers and decorators.
The story is about a mad millionaire and his submarine. When he's not out plundering ships in his submarine he's home in his castle in the middle of an old volcano. There he's working on a large cannon to help with his plundering. One engineer escapes and gets picked up by the fleet looking for the pirates. Before they get away they are attacked and sunk. The engineer is back to on the island soon enough. He continues working against the mad man.
The film looks great. I liked it and would watch it again.
I can't say the same for the second movie. I Am Alone is a found footage virus movie about a survival reality show star called Jacob who is out on his own during the outbreak of some sort of zombie making plague. His footage is found by the CDC who see a guy surviving the virus and hope to figure out why. They don't have Jacob but they do find Jacob's cameraman. They show him the footage and ask him to see if there's anything he can help add to the story. We spend a lot of time with Jacob in the woods, it's all rather dull, even after he's attacked and bitten by a zombie. These are the slow shambling types. Eventually most of the footage is watched and there's a big ass open ending. I hardly cared by then. I wouldn't need to see this one again.
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