Editorials
‘Forbidden World’ – 40 Years of Roger Corman’s ‘Alien’ Knockoff
Despite being met with mixed reviews upon its release in 1979, the massive box office success made it clear that audiences loved Ridley Scott’s Alien. Its first sequel wouldn’t come for another seven years, but the interim was filled with a variety of imitators hoping for a piece of the intergalactic pie.
The Italians were first to strike, rushing the boldly titled Alien 2: On Earth into theaters less than a year after Alien‘s release, and Luigi Cozzi’s Contamination followed shortly after. Not surprisingly, Roger Corman wasn’t far behind. Never one to miss an opportunity to make a quick buck, the trailblazing producer oversaw Galaxy of Terror for release in 1981 and followed it up with yet another Alien knock-off, Forbidden World, in 1982.
Both Corman productions have their charms. Galaxy of Terror is more blatantly derivative of Alien, but its cast features horror icons Robert Englund and Sid Haig and the crew includes a young James Cameron and Bill Paxton. But Forbidden World (also known as Mutant and as Subject 20) — which celebrates its 40th anniversary this week — is the more interesting case study.
In true Corman fashion, he decided on a whim during the production of Galaxy of Terror that he wanted to utilize a space ship interior before the set was taken down. He gave Allan Holzman, who had edited a few pictures for him and wanted to direct, a matter of days to conceive a prologue to be shot on the set that weekend, with the rest to be written and filmed months later.
Holzman’s original concept was “Lawrence of Arabia in space,” but Corman deemed the idea too expensive, so they agreed to do something in the vein of Alien instead. Jim Wynorski (Chopping Mall, Beastmaster 2) and R.J. Robertson (Beastmaster 2) came up with a treatment in part inspired by Corman’s Attack of the Crab Monsters, for which they receive story credit, and then first-timer Tim Curnen was hired to write the screenplay.
Forbidden World opens with a hypnotic, pulsating visual before pulling out from the monitor to reveal a spaceship cockpit piloted by SAM-104, an android that looks like a cross between Star Wars‘ stormtroopers and Battlestar Galactica‘s Cylons. The emergency signal goes off, setting the plot in motion. Taking a lead from 2001: A Space Odyssey, the scene is set to classical music (Beethoven’s “The Piano Concerto No. 1”) as quick flashes of footage from later in the movie provide near-subliminal stimulation.
SAM awakens Mike Colby (Jesse Vint, Silent Running) from his cryogenic slumber, informing the commander that his flight home has been diverted. He’s being rerouted to the remote desert planet of Xarbia to address an accident at a high-security research facility, where they’re experimenting with genetic engineering to create a new food source.
Upon arrival, Colby meets the team: head of research Dr. Gordon Hauser (Linden Chiles), genetic synthesis expert Dr. Barbara Glaser (June Chadwick, V), lab assistant Tracy Baxter (Dawn Dunlap), chief of bacteriology Dr. Cal Timbergen (Fox Harris, Repo Man), lab technician Jimmy Swift (Michael Bowen, Kill Bill), electrician Brian Beale (Ray Oliver, Child’s Play), and head of security Earl Richards (Scott Paulin, Teen Wolf).
One of the facility’s experiments has gone wrong, leaving a genetic mutant known as Subject 20 on the loose in the space station. Colby wants to terminate it and go home (“If it moves and it’s not one of us, shoot it.”), but the crew convinces him to help contain it. No doubt inspired by the Xenomorph’s unique life cycle in Alien, Subject 20 is a metamorph whose genetic structure mutates as it grows, and the creature is largely kept obscured by shadows and fast cuts.
Subject 20’s final form — something like a spider-Xenomorph hybrid made out of paper mache — is less impressive than some of its earlier stages, but the journey is a lot of fun. The film features prosthetics by Steve Neill (The Stuff) and special makeup effects by John Carl Buechler (Friday the 13th Part VII, Halloween 4) with uncredited work by Mark Shostrom (Evil Dead II, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3).
Holzman (who went on to win two Emmy awards for Survivors of the Holocaust, a 1996 TV documentary special he directed and edited for Steven Spielberg) served as his own editor on the picture. He employs some judiciously frenetic cutting that gives the film an artful touch. It also borrows effects footage from Battle Beyond the Stars, another Corman sci-fi production edited by Holzman.
The cast is committed but perhaps none more so than Harris, whose character is introduced to the audience with a choice quote: “Welcome to the Garden of Eden. We play God here. We create life. The only trouble is some of the life we create just won’t behave.” His character is reminiscent of Day of the Dead‘s Dr. Logan, with both mad scientists delivering scenery-chewing performances.
Despite being only his second feature as director of photography, Tim Suhrstedt displays a knack for elegant camerawork and lighting in spite of the low budget. Even the gratuitous nudity and goopy gore, exploitative as it is, plays more tastefully than most of its contemporaries. It comes as no surprise that Suhrstedt went on to shoot the likes of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Office Space, and Little Miss Sunshine.
What is surprising, however, is that composer Susan Justin‘s career didn’t take off in a similar fashion. She may have gotten the gig because she was Holzman’s wife at the time, but she bears a dynamic electronic score that fluctuates between spacey synthesizers and new wave territory with prog rock flourishes. It was her first soundtrack, but she only went on to do a handful more (’80s slasher The Final Terror and Holzman’s Grunt! The Wrestling Movie among them).
The enterprising production design by Christopher Horner (brother of Aliens composer James Horner) effectively elevates the film’s production value. Along with the sets recycled from Galaxy of Terror — some designed by Cameron using McDonald’s takeout cartons — the art direction features modular furniture, vaguely futuristic gizmos, and colorful lights.
Forbidden World’s 77-minute theatrical cut is a straight sci-fi horror outing as a result of Corman demanding all humor be removed after audiences laughed at a test screening (during which an angry Corman allegedly struck a cackling viewer). The original director’s cut, under the title Mutant, runs 82 minutes and features levity along with other extended/alternate bits. Both versions have their advantages; the theatrical cut is comparatively dry but better paced.
Corman produced a remake of Forbidden World under the title Dead Space in 1991. Directed by Fred Gallo and written by Catherine Cyran (Slumber Party Massacre III), it stars Marc Singer, Laura Tate, Bryan Cranston, Judith Chapman, Randy Reinholz, and Lori Lively. Although the general plot is the same, the remake most notably gives the mutant an updated look.
Forbidden World is a cheap B-movie, no doubt about it, but for a quick knock-off it offers an unexpectedly unique vision. It may be but a footnote in Corman’s storied career among several hundreds of productions, but Alien fans will find plenty of cosmic, campy fun. It’s available on Blu-ray and DVD from Scream Factory (with both cuts) and is currently streaming on SCREAMBOX, Tubi, Freevee, and Shout Factory TV.
Editorials
Five Serial Killer Horror Movies to Watch Before ‘Longlegs’
Here’s what we know about Longlegs so far. It’s coming in July of 2024, it’s directed by Osgood Perkins (The Blackcoat’s Daughter), and it features Maika Monroe (It Follows) as an FBI agent who discovers a personal connection between her and a serial killer who has ties to the occult. We know that the serial killer is going to be played by none other than Nicolas Cage and that the marketing has been nothing short of cryptic excellence up to this point.
At the very least, we can assume NEON’s upcoming film is going to be a dark, horror-fueled hunt for a serial killer. With that in mind, let’s take a look at five disturbing serial killers-versus-law-enforcement stories to get us even more jacked up for Longlegs.
MEMORIES OF MURDER (2003)
This South Korean film directed by Oscar-winning director Bong Joon-ho (Parasite) is a wild ride. The film features a handful of cops who seem like total goofs investigating a serial killer who brutally murders women who are out and wearing red on rainy evenings. The cops are tired, unorganized, and border on stoner comedy levels of idiocy. The movie at first seems to have a strange level of forgiveness for these characters as they try to pin the murders on a mentally handicapped person at one point, beating him and trying to coerce him into a confession for crimes he didn’t commit. A serious cop from the big city comes down to help with the case and is able to instill order.
But still, the killer evades and provokes not only the police but an entire country as everyone becomes more unstable and paranoid with each grizzly murder and sex crime.
I’ve never seen a film with a stranger tone than Memories of Murder. A movie that deals with such serious issues but has such fallible, seemingly nonserious people at its core. As the film rolls on and more women are murdered, you realize that a lot of these faults come from men who are hopeless and desperate to catch a killer in a country that – much like in another great serial killer story, Citizen X – is doing more harm to their plight than good.
Major spoiler warning: What makes Memories of Murder somehow more haunting is that it’s loosely based on a true story. It is a story where the real-life killer hadn’t been caught at the time of the film’s release. It ends with our main character Detective Park (Song Kang-ho), now a salesman, looking hopelessly at the audience (or judgingly) as the credits roll. Over sixteen years later the killer, Lee Choon Jae, was found using DNA evidence. He was already serving a life sentence for another murder. Choon Jae even admitted to watching the film during his court case saying, “I just watched it as a movie, I had no feeling or emotion towards the movie.”
In the end, Memories of Murder is a must-see for fans of the subgenre. The film juggles an almost slapstick tone with that of a dark murder mystery and yet, in the end, works like a charm.
CURE (1997)
If you watched 2023’s Hypnotic and thought to yourself, “A killer who hypnotizes his victims to get them to do his bidding is a pretty cool idea. I only wish it were a better movie!” Boy, do I have great news for you.
In Cure (spoilers ahead), a detective (Koji Yakusho) and forensic psychologist (Tsuyoshi Ujiki) team up to find a serial killer who’s brutally marking their victims by cutting a large “X” into their throats and chests. Not just a little “X” mind you but a big, gross, flappy one.
At each crime scene, the murderer is there and is coherent and willing to cooperate. They can remember committing the crimes but can’t remember why. Each of these murders is creepy on a cellular level because we watch the killers act out these crimes with zero emotion. They feel different than your average movie murder. Colder….meaner.
What’s going on here is that a man named Mamiya (Masato Hagiwara) is walking around and somehow manipulating people’s minds using the flame of a lighter and a strange conversational cadence to hypnotize them and convince them to murder. The detectives eventually catch him but are unable to understand the scope of what’s happening before it’s too late.
If you thought dealing with a psychopathic murderer was hard, imagine dealing with one who could convince you to go home and murder your wife. Not only is Cure amazingly filmed and edited but it has more horror elements than your average serial killer film.
MANHUNTER (1986)
In the first-ever Hannibal Lecter story brought in front of the cameras, Detective Will Graham (William Petersen) finds his serial killers by stepping into their headspace. This is how he caught Hannibal Lecter (played here by Brian Cox), but not without paying a price. Graham became so obsessed with his cases that he ended up having a mental breakdown.
In Manhunter, Graham not only has to deal with Lecter playing psychological games with him from behind bars but a new serial killer in Francis Dolarhyde (in a legendary performance by Tom Noonan). One who likes to wear pantyhose on his head and murder entire families so that he can feel “seen” and “accepted” in their dead eyes. At one point Lecter even finds a way to gift Graham’s home address to the new killer via personal ads in a newspaper.
Michael Mann (Heat, Thief) directed a film that was far too stylish for its time but that fans and critics both would have loved today in the same way we appreciate movies like Nightcrawler or Drive. From the soundtrack to the visuals to the in-depth psychoanalysis of an insanely disturbed protagonist and the man trying to catch him. We watch Graham completely lose his shit and unravel as he takes us through the psyche of our killer. Which is as fascinating as it is fucked.
Manhunter is a classic case of a serial killer-versus-detective story where each side of the coin is tarnished in their own way when it’s all said and done. As Detective Park put it in Memories of Murder, “What kind of detective sleeps at night?”
INSOMNIA (2002)
Maybe it’s because of the foggy atmosphere. Maybe it’s because it’s the only film in Christopher Nolan’s filmography he didn’t write as well as direct. But for some reason, Insomnia always feels forgotten about whenever we give Nolan his flowers for whatever his latest cinematic achievement is.
Whatever the case, I know it’s no fault of the quality of the film, because Insomnia is a certified serial killer classic that adds several unique layers to the detective/killer dynamic. One way to create an extreme sense of unease with a movie villain is to cast someone you’d never expect in the role, which is exactly what Nolan did by casting the hilarious and sweet Robin Williams as a manipulative child murderer. He capped that off by casting Al Pacino as the embattled detective hunting him down.
This dynamic was fascinating as Williams was creepy and clever in the role. He was subdued in a way that was never boring but believable. On the other side of it, Al Pacino felt as if he’d walked straight off the set of 1995’s Heat and onto this one. A broken and imperfect man trying to stop a far worse one.
Aside from the stellar acting, Insomnia stands out because of its unique setting and plot. Both working against the detective. The investigation is taking place in a part of Alaska where the sun never goes down. This creates a beautiful, nightmare atmosphere where by the end of it, Pacino’s character is like a Freddy Krueger victim in the leadup to their eventual, exhausted death as he runs around town trying to catch a serial killer while dealing with the debilitating effects of insomnia. Meanwhile, he’s under an internal affairs investigation for planting evidence to catch another child killer and accidentally shoots his partner who he just found out is about to testify against him. The kicker here is that the killer knows what happened that fateful day and is using it to blackmail Pacino’s character into letting him get away with his own crimes.
If this is the kind of “what would you do?” intrigue we get with the story from Longlegs? We’ll be in for a treat. Hoo-ah.
FALLEN (1998)
Fallen may not be nearly as obscure as Memories of Murder or Cure. Hell, it boasts an all-star cast of Denzel Washington, John Goodman, Donald Sutherland, James Gandolfini, and Elias Koteas. But when you bring it up around anyone who has seen it, their ears perk up, and the word “underrated” usually follows. And when it comes to the occult tie-ins that Longlegs will allegedly have? Fallen may be the most appropriate film on this entire list.
In the movie, Detective Hobbs (Washington) catches vicious serial killer Edgar Reese (Koteas) who seems to place some sort of curse on him during Hobbs’ victory lap. After Reese is put to death via electric chair, dead bodies start popping up all over town with his M.O., eventually pointing towards Hobbs as the culprit. After all, Reese is dead. As Hobbs investigates he realizes that a fallen angel named Azazel is possessing human body after human body and using them to commit occult murders. It has its eyes fixated on him, his co-workers, and family members; wrecking their lives or flat-out murdering them one by one until the whole world is damned.
Mixing a demonic entity into a detective/serial killer story is fascinating because it puts our detective in the unsettling position of being the one who is hunted. How the hell do you stop a demon who can inhabit anyone they want with a mere touch?!
Fallen is a great mix of detective story and supernatural horror tale. Not only are we treated to Denzel Washington as the lead in a grim noir (complete with narration) as he uncovers this occult storyline, but we’re left with a pretty great “what would you do?” situation in a movie that isn’t afraid to take the story to some dark places. Especially when it comes to the way the film ends. It’s a great horror thriller in the same vein as Frailty but with a little more detective work mixed in.
Look for Longlegs in theaters on July 12, 2024.
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