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worst sci-fi TV series of post 1964

Expo67 said:
You doubt my word? Then read this interview with Michael York and then decide for yourself.
Doubt your word about what exactly? You've given me, for the most part, nothing but your opinion. Why would I doubt that you mean what you say, however misguided I believe it to be? You like a horrible movie. That's your right.

As to the Michael York interview: Nothing he can ever say would sway my opinion that he turned in a terrible performance in a terrible film. He and Agutter alternated between wooden and melodramatic. Farrah and the rest of the minor characters were uniformly horrible as well, and the only decent performances in the whole were by Ustinov and Jordan, with an honorable mention to Browne, who turned in a decent performance despite being hampered by that awful robot costume.

I don't know where you see the comparison in quality between that and that godawful robotape outfit.
The comparisons are many. Both are silly looking, look haphazardly thrown together, and the end results are not at all convincing. Both are so obviously guys in bad suits that suspending one's disbelief is nearly impossible. Just as you can see the flesh and blood wrists of the actor in the roboape costume, you can repeatedly see Browne's real mouth through gaps in the robot's mask. Both are horrible design, which have been poorly executed.

It might interest you to know that Michael York, Jenny Agutter, and Peter Ustinov, are classically trained British actors.
It might interest you to know that being trained for the stage often doesn't automatically mean that one can act worth a damn on the screen. Ustinov had been around long enough to know how to reign in his performance for the screen. York and Agutter, not so much. They both turned in performances that might have passed muster in a classical stage melodrama, but were totally unsuited to the far more subtle visual medium of film.
They did an excellent job with the material they had been given.
No. They didn't. And, they weren't given much to work with, but that doesn't excuse the fact that their performances weren't at all good.


WHAT THE CRITICS HAD/HAVE TO SAY ABOUT LOGAN'S RUN

"delivers a certain amount of fun." - Roger Ebert

"the worst major motion picture in seven years of reviewing films." - Gene Siskel

"Had more attention been paid to the screenplay, the movie might have been a stunner." - New York Times

"Logan's Run is the case of a good story being let down by every element of the film. The acting is sub-par, I've already commented on the costumes, and the special effects are beyond lame. We’re only a year away from the premiere of Star Wars, so you can’t tell me there wasn’t better gadgetry in place. There's a good movie here, but this isn't it" - Bad Movie Knights

"The decade before Star Wars was in some ways a golden age of science fiction movies. It produced a diverse crop of interesting and thoughtful movies in the genre... Unfortunately that decade also produced turkeys like Logan's Run. It’s not that Logan's Run isn’t fun. Much of it has a genuine so-bad-it’s-good quality to it" - Cult Movie Reviews
 
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As long as we're branching off into movies...a dreadful piece of crap that no one's mentioned is Saturn 3. Even a brief flash of Farrah Fawcett's tits couldn't make this watchable. Did anyone enjoy this thing other than the brain-damaged?
 
Actually, Greg the phrase used by the Sandmen was "RUN, RUNNER!"

All that aside, I think it has withstood the test of time. It should be left alone. Technically, it was remade once(a year later, actually), as that crappy television series. Something that should never have happened.

The 1976 MGM film is fine the way it is. Warner Brothers, or whatever studio it is, should just leave it be(i.e. abandon any ideas on the remake and focus more on original material).

Ah, my memory is slipping. It's been a long time since I've seen Sandmen and Runners at a con . . . .

But even if the MGM film is fine as is, why not make a new version? Who says there are can only be one definitive movie adaptation of any book or story? Both versions of The Fly are good. Ditto for both versions of The Thing.

Should filmmakers have let Dracula be after Nosferatu? Or after the Lugosi version? If that was the case, we would have never seen Christopher Lee or Frank Langella or Jack Palance or Gary Oldman as the Count. And that would be a shame.

Old movies don't need to be "left alone." It's not like they have to be protected somehow. Why not have ten different versions of Logan's Run? Or twenty?

The more, the merrier.
 
I've seen poor Shakespearean actors...classically trained to boot.. Sometimes it's a matter of direction..

No one is above criticism but Jenny Agutter did much better in "An American Werewolf in London" than in "Logan's Run"...but as eye candy in Logan's Run..there was none better...

I was in lust with Jenny Agutter as she was in Logan's Run, the purest, most innocent form of lust...

I didn't give a damn (and still don't) that her delivery was a tad..wooden..but perhaps it was the director more than the actors...
 
Expo67 said:
You doubt my word? Then read this interview with Michael York and then decide for yourself.
Doubt your word about what exactly? You've given me, for the most part, nothing but your opinion. Why would I doubt that you mean what you say, however misguided I believe it to be? You like a horrible movie. That's your right.

As to the Michael York interview: Nothing he can ever say would sway my opinion that he turned in a terrible performance in a terrible film. He and Agutter alternated between wooden and melodramatic. Farrah and the rest of the minor characters were uniformly horrible as well, and the only decent performances in the whole were by Ustinov and Jordan, with an honorable mention to Browne, who turned in a decent performance despite being hampered by that awful robot costume.

I don't know where you see the comparison in quality between that and that godawful robotape outfit.
The comparisons are many. Both are silly looking, look haphazardly thrown together, and the end results are not at all convincing. Both are so obviously guys in bad suits that suspending one's disbelief is nearly impossible. Just as you can see the flesh and blood wrists of the actor in the roboape costume, you can repeatedly see Browne's real mouth through gaps in the robot's mask. Both are horrible design, which have been poorly executed.

It might interest you to know that Michael York, Jenny Agutter, and Peter Ustinov, are classically trained British actors.
It might interest you to know that being trained for the stage often doesn't automatically mean that one can act worth a damn on the screen. Ustinov had been around long enough to know how to reign in his performance for the screen. York and Agutter, not so much. They both turned in performances that might have passed muster in a classical stage melodrama, but were totally unsuited to the far more subtle visual medium of film.
They did an excellent job with the material they had been given.
No. They didn't. And, they weren't given much to work with, but that doesn't excuse the fact that their performances weren't at all good.

"delivers a certain amount of fun." - Roger Ebert

"the worst major motion picture in seven years of reviewing films." - Gene Siskel

"Had more attention been paid to the screenplay, the movie might have been a stunner." - New York Times

"Logan's Run is the case of a good story being let down by every element of the film. The acting is sub-par, I've already commented on the costumes, and the special effects are beyond lame. We’re only a year away from the premiere of Star Wars, so you can’t tell me there wasn’t better gadgetry in place. There's a good movie here, but this isn't it" - Bad Movie Knights

"The decade before Star Wars was in some ways a golden age of science fiction movies. It produced a diverse crop of interesting and thoughtful movies in the genre... Unfortunately that decade also produced turkeys like Logan's Run. It’s not that Logan's Run isn’t fun. Much of it has a genuine so-bad-it’s-good quality to it" - Cult Movie Reviews

I'm not trying to sway your opinion, however misguided and hateful it is. Judging by what you have posted, you seem to have a real hate for the film. God only knows why.

Just how in hell do you know that they didn't give an excellent performance? Let alone were not given much to work with? Were you there at the MGM Studios or the filming at the former Dallas/Ft. Worth Mall in 1975? Did you have access to David Zelag Goodman's screenplay of the film?

Silly looking? Horrible design? Not from where I am standing.

Did you ever stop to think that the part where you could see Browne's real mouth through the gaps in the robot's mask, was possibly an accidental oversight on the director of cinemaphotography's part? Or maybe even the director? Or the costume designer? Those things have been known to happen in cinema.

Or even better, since BOX was originally a human/machine hybrid in the 1967 novel, and to some extent in the film(BOX: "I am more than machine. Or man. More than a fusion of the two.")that could have been also another reason why his real mouth was shown behind that gap.

Just because it sounds far fetched doesn't mean that it is not impossible.

Think about that.
 
Okay, just for the sake of argument, let's stipulate that the 1975 version is fine as is. Again, why not make a new version that might be just as good or better?

There's no harm in trying--and you might end up with two good versions of Logan's Run.
 
Okay, just for the sake of argument, let's stipulate that the 1975 version is fine as is. Again, why not make a new version that might be just as good or better?

There's no harm in trying--and you might end up with two good versions of Logan's Run.

Giggle, silly idea...

THe Logan's Run Challenge....

10 new filmmakers receive a 100k budget to remake Logan's run....the best one gets a grand prize of...a six million dollar budget to make ...Logan's Run.....

All 11 Logan's Run are then sold in a DVD set to offset the costs......
 
Okay, just for the sake of argument, let's stipulate that the 1975 version is fine as is. Again, why not make a new version that might be just as good or better?

There's no harm in trying--and you might end up with two good versions of Logan's Run.

Giggle, silly idea...

THe Logan's Run Challenge....

10 new filmmakers receive a 100k budget to remake Logan's run....the best one gets a grand prize of...a six million dollar budget to make ...Logan's Run.....

All 11 Logan's Run are then sold in a DVD set to offset the costs......


But you have to be under twenty-one years old to enter!
 
Just how in hell do you know that they didn't give an excellent performance?
Because I've seen the film (many times), and am neither deaf nor blind. Their performances are there to see and hear, and with few exceptions, they aren't good.

Did you ever stop to think that the part where you could see Browne's real mouth through the gaps in the robot's mask, was possibly an accidental oversight on the director of cinemaphotography's part? Or maybe even the director? Or the costume designer? Those things have been known to happen in cinema.
Yes. It happens all the time in cinema. And when such accidental oversights are allowed to go uncorrected, its a sign of a bad movie. In good films, the cinematographer, or director, or costume designers don't let slipshod work simply slide, but do what is necessary to correct it.

I'm not trying to sway your opinion, however misguided and hateful it is. Judging by what you have posted, you seem to have a real hate for the film. God only knows why.
But I don't hate it. I saw it a dozen or more times when it was in theatres, and I actually have the film in my collection. (I even had a copy on RCA Lazerdisc back in the 80s). Of course, it currently occupies a space on the shelf I lovingly refer to as my MST3K shelf, next to other so-bad-they're-good films like "Plan 9 from Outer Space" and "Jesse James meets Dracula's Daughter", "Star-crash: The Adventures of Stella Star", and "The Green Slime". I like the film, but don't delude myself into thinking its actually any good.
 
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Okay, just for the sake of argument, let's stipulate that the 1975 version is fine as is. Again, why not make a new version that might be just as good or better?

There's no harm in trying--and you might end up with two good versions of Logan's Run.

Giggle, silly idea...

THe Logan's Run Challenge....

10 new filmmakers receive a 100k budget to remake Logan's run....the best one gets a grand prize of...a six million dollar budget to make ...Logan's Run.....

All 11 Logan's Run are then sold in a DVD set to offset the costs......


But you have to be under twenty-one years old to enter!

sounds fair enough to me, though I was thinking 25 or under to catch some of the "just out of college crowd" ....

You could also make a reality show following the production of the movies with no budget to help defray the costs....:techman:
 
You could also make a reality show following the production of the movies with no budget to help defray the costs....:techman:


And, of course, you need to have a crossover episode with FACE OFF, where struggling young makeup artists compete to do the character makeups . . . .
 
As long as we're branching off into movies...

Oooh!

Now, one sci-fi film that was so bad I wasn't actually able to sit through the whole thing was Loga... wait, moving on.

One of my less pleasant memories as a youngster was watching all of the pre-Burton Apes films in a week. The first film was and is great fun, but it's all downhill from there. I know 3 and 4 have their defenders, but there wasn't a single one of those films I liked, and 2, 3 and 5 in particular were hard slogs.

I was just left feeling so empty after the whole damn thing. Offhand it's hard to recall films that have hit me quite as negatively.

And let's have a shout-out for Wing Commander! Poor Jurgen Prochnow. Here's a film so dedicated to wringing him dry for every possible bit of leftover Das Boot awesomeness that they have him shush the crew of a spaceship so they can remain deathly silent outside the range of the enemy sona... waaait.

Laughable non-science aside, it's more important that the script is a terrible medley of half-thought war movie cliches and the lead and his friend are depthlessly annoying.

Oh yes, and Mission to Mars and Red Planet. I saw them both in theatres, and ah, the disappointments.

And over here I'm going to wander into the 'so bad it's good' category. The list above is mostly you know, professional Hollywood films often with decent actors, SFX and a degree of competence. In a minor genuflection to the morass of truly terrible cinema, I got this last gem.

In terms of sheer unprofessionalism as a sci-fi flick, The Man Who Saves The World could give most films a run for their money. You may know this one better known as Turkish Star Wars - which is unbelievably greatly terrible. Great movie if you want to kick back with some friends and riff on a film, that.
 
I didn't give a damn (and still don't) that her delivery was a tad..wooden..but perhaps it was the director more than the actors...

Maybe the script, which was dreadful - memorizing that dialogue could give someone a brain tumor. :lol:

You sure you're not confusing the film with the crappy 1977 television series 90-minute pilot? Or the butchered version of Tin Woodman?
 
Wing Commander was one I enjoyed in a B-movie kind of way. The original Planet Of The Apes is a great movie. Mission To Mars and Red Planet - whichever one of those starred Gary Sinese, I saw on DVD. It was okay but not great.
 
Okay, just for the sake of argument, let's stipulate that the 1975 version is fine as is. Again, why not make a new version that might be just as good or better?

There's no harm in trying--and you might end up with two good versions of Logan's Run.

Actually it's the 1976 version. But, that's neither here or there.

Granted there are always possibilities...but given the track record of cinematic remakes over the years, they have a very bad tendency of becoming huge box office flops.

It's almost like paying to go see a recreation of the Mona Lisa. Or worse a recreation of Michelangelo's wonderful masterpiece in the Sistine Chapel. I would rather see the original than someone else's own interpretation on the source material.

If some filmmaker wants to take such an artistic risk...then so be it. Same as with the studio taking a huge financial risk on the project.

All I'm saying is this. Both parties should be prepared for the negative backlash when the remake flops at the box office.
 
No one is above criticism but Jenny Agutter did much better in "An American Werewolf in London" than in "Logan's Run"...but as eye candy in Logan's Run..there was none better...

I was in lust with Jenny Agutter as she was in Logan's Run, the purest, most innocent form of lust...

I didn't give a damn (and still don't) that her delivery was a tad..wooden..but perhaps it was the director more than the actors...

You're not the only one. I had such a huge crush on her, myself, after Logan's Run. Then I saw her in the 1977 film Equus and then 1981's American Werewolf In London...

Yes, she is definitely eye candy and the purest, most innocent form of lust.

But a very talented form of eye candy and lust, I should point out...
 
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