Inseminoid (1981)

the audience applauded

Pretty Good

Let's be realistic.

an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.

Seriously, how hard can it be for an entire group of people to include at least five guys to restrain or kill one psychopath!!?? Some people found this a well-written story with a few problems. It's not well-written, and it has more than a few problems. Some have compared it as a rip-off of the movie Alien, however it came out only the following year. To me it appears to be just a bit of a coincidence, but this comparison is like comparing one of Mozart's piano concertos to chopsticks. The stupidity of the reactions of the crew upon realizing the threat they faced is pretty much like watching a long version of the Keystone Cops, just not as funny. They did everything that they could possibly do wrong and added a few new things that weren't even in the book of wrong things to do.Case in point, you know she has murdered her co-workers brutally, instead of sending every able-bodied man with blunt objects, or any kind of weapon knowing that she's a little on the strong side the commander sends takes the doctor and Sharon to subdue the brutal psychopathic herculean woman killer. As the doctor is struggling with her, Commander Holly McKay stands right behind him during the struggle with a high-powered welding gun triggering it needlessly a few times, just feet behind the doctor. You don't have to be a road scholar to know how this scene is going to end. The person who wrote this, did they have to skip kindergarten that day? This is really bad! Horribly horribly awful! And I'm being polite here. Another of many serious flaws is when the commander knows about the death of Barbara at the hands of Sandy, instead of giving an announcement that Sandy has gone out of her mind and is extremely dangerous her instructions are simply to go back to your rooms and lock the door. I'm not entirely sure but a better suggestion would have been, Sandy has gone nuts, we have to go and find her, everyone get together in pairs and make your way to the command room. That way we may be able to organize a search for the dangerous lunatic. Again, just my suggestion. This is written so badly for scientists they're all ignorant morons if they couldn't see this happening and did nothing plausible to prevent it. Seriously, four or five guys can't take down one pregnant female? Really!?

I remember seeing the trailers for this film on TV when I was far too young to see the movie itself, so I was happy to finally get hold of it as a VHS release on the Vipco label. Read the novelisation by Larry Miller, which was fairly gripping for pulp sci-fi horror. The budget of the film seems a bit low, but it works surprisingly well, and the alien is used sparingly, Geeson herself does much of the work and is very convincing, changing constantly between scared, vulnerable and helpless and homicidal and cannibalistic, when she goes mad she is very scary and intimidating, and shows sadistic relish for her victims, eating dead bodies and even eating a man's intestines just after shooting him while he is still alive and watching. There are plenty of murders and a fair bit of cannibalism so it's never boring. The mine set is a good choice, this is enhanced by lots of running/creeping around dark corridors and tunnels, which adds a certain intensity, the sets look a little cheap but it's forgivable. There is a startling sequence in which Geeson flashes back to her alien rape which is fairly explicit, but it's the murders which score. One scene in particular, not a murder but self mutilation, is fairly shocking, but the film can also be understated yet very nasty, for example when Geeson looms evilly right over the dead bodies of some of her colleagues, ready to feed. There is plenty of violence and creepiness, even if some moments look low budget. Stephanie Beecham is fair support as a Ripley look-alike, the rest of the cast play more convincingly than expected, no real character development but they all look dirty and stressed, which plays well, there is a certain feeling of conviction to it if you accept that they are all workers on a long-term space mission. A fairly good low budget shocker, with a parental subtext, the mother is both the killer and the victim. She's only trying to protect her young in the end.

A group of archaeologists on an unnamed planet get more than they bargained for when they unearth some crystals. One crew member immediately dies when exposed to them and soon Sandy (Judy Geeson) finds herself kidnapped and impregnated by an alien. This causes her to have superhuman strength and decide to kill everyone. Totally a bummer for Mark (Robin Clarke), the mission leader and her old boyfriend. My earlier viewing Norman J. Warren's PREY (1978) prompted me to revisit the only Warren film I had seen. I still enjoy this cheap-o ALIEN (1979) clone as it unfolds like a slasher in a space mining camp. Seriously, these characters act just like the thick headed teens in a body count flick, always doing dumb stuff like leaving secure areas. Hell, they fall for the "I'm okay, help me" bit from Sandy twice! It is the kind of movie where someone gets their oxygen helmet opened and instantly fall back with their arms out, gasping for air (hint: use your arms to close the helmet). I also love the bit of tension from a woman whose foot gets caught. She barely attempts to dislodge it, cries when they tell her to connect two wires on her suit and then decides the best course of action is to cut her own foot off. She doesn't make it. The film also answers the age-old question of "which alien pregnancy came first, the INSEMINOID or the XTRO?" It was INSEMINOID, although XTRO topped it in terms of the gross out factor. What is up with you Brits and alien pregnancy?

This is the mindblowing story of a couple and all their friends/coworkers on a business trip of sorts to a foreign country. They are there to study the place actually. Well, they go into a bad area at the wrong time and look too deeply, resulting in the death of one guy and the emotional scarring of another. Badly affected with post-traumatic stress disorder, his friends first become worried about him (leading them to investigate further into what really went on that terrible night), but then find themselves under attack from him when he finally goes postal. To make matters worse, the female of the couple I mentioned at the start of this review is raped and impregnated by a local scumbag who seems to have a lot to do with the mystery behind their friend's rampage (along with some crystal meth being manufactured in the area). The scarred rape victim goes over the edge even worse than the previous psycho, who himself has to be taken out by one of his own friends. The now even crazier soon-to-be mother has a such a total and psychotic breakdown that it's her who begins to kill her own friends, believing that the only way for her to give her children nourishment is to feast on the flesh of all who surround her. It's eventually up to her boyfriend to take her down, but his plans are violently disrupted when she has two twin kids. Apparently, the story jumps ahead a bit at this point, and the guy takes the kids away from Mommy (for obvious reasons). Of course, there's nothing else better to make her resume her killing spree once again, and so the poor, tortured guy must finally do what he originally set out to do: kill this poor, deranged woman. Unfortunately for him and his only surviving friend (as well as some cops who get involved way too late in the whole mess, toward the end), the kids show that their mother left a very peculiar mark on them as evidenced by their own culinary choice... Make no mistake about it, this movie is a lot of things, but rarely do you see a rape-revenge movie where the rape victim goes around killing everyone who DIDN'T rape her, rather than the other way around! The rapist himself disappears from the story, hitting us hard with the fact that not everybody's going to pay for what they've done (while others pay for it, despite innocence). A nihilistic view, maybe, but an effective one all the same. Judy Geeson puts in one of the most extremely well-wrought portrayals of madness ever committed to film. While the gore and the rape scene may upset or offend some (as well as distract them from the deeper issues at hand), these people could be watching a movie that simply glosses over or avoids such extremes, like "Lilo And Stitch". The score is great and the direction is flawless. Very much one of the greatest films ever made, but I can only hope to see the uncut version soon.