Outland is another favorite space Western of mine. When I saw this in the theater during the summer of 1981, I was at the peak of my James Bond fanaticism, and, as far as I was concerned,
Sean Connery could do no wrong. Of course, the best thing about this film is
Frances Sternhagen, although I really like the production design, miniature effects and
Jerry Goldsmith score, too.
Despite the "functional" look of the Io mining station sets,
Outland is no more realistic than most of the other films I write about here at
Space: 1970. Slightly less fanciful, perhaps, but it's still good, old fashioned space opera, just dirtied up a bit.
"...as far as I was concerned, Sean Connery could do no wrong."
ReplyDeleteSafe to assume you hadn't seen ZARDOZ yet...?
That would be a correct assumption.
ReplyDeleteAlthough, once I did see ZARDOZ, I actually still had to admire Connery's guts.
I just saw this for the first time a couple weeks ago. I had it DVR'd from .....hmmnnn... one of the Encore channels, maybe?.... can't recall.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I really liked it. Kinda got caught off-guard with the "shotguns in outer-space" and such, but really that made it pretty unique in my mind.
I also just picked up the novelization, by Alan Dean Foster. I've been picking up some of his books, if I don't already have them, as I run across them in the used PB bookshops. Recalling your recent post on Foster, any of his stuff *not* worth snagging? Off the top of my head, I have SW, Splinter, The Black Hole, Outland, a good bunch of the Trek Logs, Clash of The Titans, and ... Shadow Keep.
Thinking I'll grab Krull and now maybe Aliens, since a number of folks have recommended it. What about the others?
Thanks, and another GREAT (and relevant) post!
I saw Outland on cable tv back in 1982 and really enjoyed it. Watched it again last year for the first time in ages and it still holds up well IMO.I know that critics called it "High Noon" in space,but there's worse films to be compared to.
ReplyDeleteDid you ever read the comic adaptation Jim Steranko did for Heavy Metal Magazine?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thedrawingsofsteranko.com/out1.html
Steranko's Outland is total genius. The comic adaptation was made nearly 20 years ago and it is still ahead of us in terms of sequential language (IMHO) :)
ReplyDeleteHave to go back and watch this again, saw it like 20 years ago on cable...
ReplyDeletewhen I was 12 or 13 I went to my first Creation comic convention in NYC; this was back when the convention were COOL and you had great sneak previews (saw great clips for the original The Fog) and real celebrities that didn't charge (or charge outrageous amounts) to sign something... At this convention they were previewing Outland as well an they had a booth of props etc. I had (maybe still have) a security badge from the movie (they gave out replicas for FREE) and I got to try on and wear the space helmet from the film. That was cool: it was large, had cooling fans inside and lit up.. Sadly I did not bring a camera that day - although lugging one of those HUGE cameras on neck strap would not have been fun, they must have weighed around 10 lbs...