Irwin Allen's CITY BENEATH THE SEA (1971)

It's kind of interesting that the producer who dominated sci-fi television programming in the Sixties couldn't seem to get a genre show on the air in the following decade. Prolific producer Irwin Allen, whose creations Lost In Space, Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea, Time Tunnel, and Land Of The Giants were staples of late-60s network TV, found his particular brand of genre fare out of step in the 1970s. Like Gene Roddenberry, he pitched a few sci-fi pilots that aired as TV movies, but none of them went to series. Among these failed attempts were 1976's Time Travelers, 1978's The Amazing Captain Nemo, and 1971's City Beneath The Sea.

Stuart Whitman is Admiral Michael Matthews, who is ordered by the President of the United States to retake command of Pacifica, a large, underwater scientific research facility. Upon his arrival at the city beneath the sea, he is besieged by crises, including sabotage, espionage, various disgruntled colleagues, and a rogue comet that is going to collide with Earth right above his sub-oceanic seabase! In addition, Pacifica is in the process of receiving the U.S.' entire gold reserve from Fort Knox (shipped by rocket!) and a group of thieves (including Matthews' own brother - played by Robert Wagner) have an elaborate scheme in place for stealing all of it! 

City Beneath The Sea is vintage Allen, with the same Cold War-tinged plotting, colorful production design, and Old School miniature effects that had been the hallmarks of his 60s productions; in fact, he re-used some of the models and sets from his earlier shows (most notably, Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea's "flying sub"). A lot of familiar faces from those shows appear, too - James Darren, Robert Colbert  and Whit Bissell from Time Tunnel and Richard Basehart from Voyage, among others.

I don't recall seeing City Beneath The Sea on television in '71 (I was only six), nor did I catch it on TV in the years between then and now. Fortunately for me, it is available as part of the Warner Archive Collection, both as a manufactured-on-demand DVD and on their online streaming service, which is where I finally caught up with it. I enjoyed it considerably (as you probably guessed), but then, I'm a big fan of the Voyage to The Bottom Of The Sea series and Allen's other 60s shows. I'll definitely be adding the DVD to my 70s sci-fi library one of these days.

As for Irwin Allen, he may not have sold City Beneath The Sea as a weekly series, but he continued to do pretty well as a producer of theatrical films (and TV movies) during the decade, becoming the king of 70s disaster epics, with such hits as The Poseidon Adventure, The Towering Inferno, The Swarm, and others.

THE OMEGA MAN (1971) Theatrical Posters

Just in case the world does end tomorrow, I thought I'd pay tribute to one of the other well-known post-Apocalyptic science fiction films of the 1970s - Boris Sagal's The Omega Man, starring 70s genre icon Charlton Heston (Planet Of the Apes, Soylent Green) as the last man on Earth.

Long-time readers of this blog may remember that two years ago this month, I attempted a "theme week," devoted to the End Of The World cinema of the Space: 1970 era. I didn't quite pull it off (although I did manage a few decent posts, I thought), and my greatest "failure" of that theme week was that I never got around to my promised review of The Omega Man.

So, I'll make a new promise: if we're all still here on Friday, I'll finally post my long-delayed review. No, seriously - I mean it this time. Really. Cross my heart and hope to... well....

While we wait, let's enjoy this selection of International one-sheets created to market the 1971 Warner Brothers film around the world....

Coming Attractions: THX 1138 (1971)

George Lucas' first science fiction feature, THX 1138 from 1971. I saw this on VHS years ago, but don't remember it at all, frankly. One of these days, I'll have to watch it again....

STAR TREK 4 Art by Lou Feck

As a sci-fi fan in the 1970s, the Bantam Books Star Trek paperbacks by James Blish were a steady part of my reading diet. These volumes each contained a half-dozen or so short story adaptations of the original television episodes, and, as the series was inconsistently aired in my central Maine TV market, my first exposure to many of the classic Original Series stories was through Blish's adaptations.

For some reason, almost all of the Bantam editions featured paintings of the Enterprise rather than the characters. I don't know if, this early in the Trek merchandising phenomenon, likeness rights were still a tricky issue, or if someone just thought that the iconic starship was a stronger way to attract the eyes of both Trekkies and science fiction readers in general. Either way, there was quite a variety in styles and artists, and that was cool.

A number of striking starship images graced those covers, but even as a kid, something about Lou Feck's rendition on Star Trek 4 (first published in 1971, and endlessly reprinted throughout the decade) really struck a chord with me. Perhaps it was the cool, blue palette, or the simple, effective composition, with the graceful Enterprise orbiting between a dying planet and its jagged-surfaced moon... I dunno. But I love it.

Someone else liked this painting too  - Bantam re-used it a few years later, sans obscuring cover type, on a collection of puzzles for kids, the Star Trek Puzzle Manual.

Artist Lou Feck is something of a fascinating mystery to me. He was one of the first paperback cover illustrators whose style and signature I recognized as a voracious, adolescent reader, and was one of my favorites.

His work seemed to mostly appear on books from Bantam in the 70s, including many of the early Clive Cussler adventure novels. I even actually own one of his originals (not this Star Trek one, though). Unfortunately, there's virtually no info about this talented artist on the Internet, except that he died in '81.

Anyway, when I stumbled upon this beautiful scan of Feck's painting, it sparked a powerful wave of nostalgia, and I wanted to share it here. The Bantam Star Trek paperbacks were a huge part of my childhood sci-fi fandom and this particular cover holds a prominent place in those memories. Enjoy.

Coming Attractions: THE OMEGA MAN (1971) Theatrical Trailer

Here's the trailer to 1971's The Omega Man, the second (official) film adaptation of Richard Matheson's novel, I Am Legend, and the second of Charlton Heston's Space: 1970-era sci-fi triptych (Planet of the Apes, The Omega Man, Soylent Green). Look for a full-length post on this quintessential Seventies doomsday flick in a day or two....