Dead Space 1991 Written by Catherine Cyran, directed by Fred Gallo. A Roger Corman produced remake of Mutant AKA Forbidden World. You can see the animated prequel Dead Space Downfall on YouTube, it's a fairly good rip but the burned in subtitles in some Arabic tongue are a bit annoying. It's only good for finding out if the Blu-ray is worth buying. I haven't seen it but I'm going to guess, probably not. There's also Dead Space: Aftermath from 2011. The films are an off shoot of the games that were developed from the first movie.
In Dead Space Marc Singer is a Commander in the space fleet. He answers a distress call from a research station on a isolated and uninhabited planet. They are doing some sort of genetic research and they've created a virus that infects people and turns their bodies into murderous beasties. It takes a good bit to kill the monsters so the lab folk get picked off one by one. Marc kills the beast and leaves with his robot pal.
Nothing much notable about the film, other than it's an early appearance by Brian Cranston. He's the guy who wants to keep the critter alive so they can study it. It was funny to me when Marc shoved Brian's head in the creature's mouth to slow it down. Marc's not that much of a dick, Brian was already dead. He'd been infected with the virus and that virus had all the diseases known to man in it. Sometimes the script is the beastie. The IMDb trivia page has an entry that says the director didn't see the script until his first day of shooting. It explains a lot.
I couldn't remember seeing Dead Space but it turns out I had back in 1994. I can't say much good about the movie, it's short, only 78 mins, that's something. The old DVD release is only about 72 mins long, that's what's on YouTube. You're better off watching Forbidden World. That's not a great movie but it's more fun.
Blades 1989 Story by John P Finnegan, screenplay by William R Pace and Thomas R Rondinella, produced by William R Race and John P Finnegan, directed by Thomas R Rondinella. The film was made in New Jersey and released by Troma on VHS and later DVD. We watched the Vinegar Syndrome Blu-ray.
From the first few minutes of the "making of" we learn that John P Finnegan wanted to make movies. He wrote 3 and they all got made. He produced 2 of them and directed Girls School Screamers.
With Blades he had the idea to make a shot for shot remake of Jaws but set on land, in a golf course, with a lawn mower. It's a big lawn mower. It grinds men right up. John went to a NYC film school, William and Thomas were the couple of students that were interested.
They don't quite carry out the shot for shot but they capture enough iconic moments to give you that Jaws feel. It's supposed to be a comedy but there are more jokes in Jaws. Nothing tops "We need a bigger boat!" I did laugh out loud once but an hour later I can't remember what the gag was. The cast weren't too bad for people who mostly hadn't made a film before. All in all it's below average but watchable. I doubt I would need to pick up a copy.
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