How do I know China is a superpower? Besides the massive economy, the massive military, the massive population, and China’s massive effect on world politics? It’s because the Chinese are now making alien invasion movies where they save the day. That is when a nation truly arrives at the forefront — when they can make jingoistic popcorn cinema of the world-saving variety. And, like most American forays into such material, it stinks.
Shanghai Fortress is an adaptation of the sci-fi novel by Jiang Nan, wherein, in the near future, a new energy source called Xianteng has been brought back to Earth by astronauts. It’s a self-replicating energy source, and clean. A new day has dawned for humanity. Except, some aliens get wind of us having Xianteng, and a gigantic spaceship arrives, Independence Day-style, to rain hell on the earth. After five years of conflict, only one major city remains: Shanghai.
On the surface things look mostly the same. The skyline is familiar, with added CGI buildings and doodads here and there. But underneath the great city, the United Nations Defense Council (the Chinese still need to work on their movie jingoism) has built a gigantic Xianteng power-generating facility, that covers the city with an energy field, and feeds a massive laser cannon. By the time the aliens get to Shanghai, they’re in for a fight. Continue reading “Shanghai Fortress”
They Saved Hitler’s Brain, the 1968 sci-fi dog from director David Bradley, has one of the more unique stories in shitty movie history. It was originally released in 1963 as Madmen of Mandoras. A few years later, the owners of the film wanted to sell it for television distribution, but the original running time of 74 minutes was too short. Their solution? Hire some UCLA film students to shoot a new first act, featuring none of the cast from the original, with only a tangential connection to the main plot. These new scenes are an anachronism, looking completely out of place, because they are. The two main characters in these scenes, one of which isn’t even listed in the cast, are both killed off before the movie switches to its original content. These new scenes are a disaster in every way, from plot, dialogue, to acting. Just this part of the film is enough to make this among the worst films I’ve ever seen, and there’s still a whole hour of movie to get through. 
What a disappointing movie. With a title like Venomous and a poster featuring a giant snake’s head on the attack, I was expecting this direct-to-video cheapie to be a ripoff of Anaconda. Instead, it’s a ripoff of Outbreak. All the epidemiological plot points are there, and every character has an analogue. But, Treat Williams is no Dustin Hoffman, Mary Page Keller is no Rene Russo, Hannes Jaenicke is no Kevin Spacey (are we allowed to like his acting again, yet?), and Geoff Pierson is no frickin’ Morgan Freeman.
From the murky realms of Hollywood anonymity comes Double Exposure, the 1982 film by writer/director William Byron Hillman. Basically a remake of an earlier Hillman film called The Photographer, Double Exposure is a psychological thriller wherein a fashion photographer, Adrian Wilde (Michael Callan), is plagued by dreams of bloody murder. Not his murder, mind. Rather, the brutal slayings of young models in his employ.
Half-baked idea: A remake of Apocalypse Now with Nicolas Cage starring in four of the most prominent roles. De-aged, he plays Captain Willard, dancing and twirling, drunk on expensive cognac in Saigon while waiting for a mission and hurting himself. As in the original, it would be an improvisational tour de force, perhaps ending in something more outrageous than a shattered mirror and a bloody hand. Either way, he’d be naked.
