In 1950 the genius independently filmed movie Destination Moon was released. It stood as the trail blazing sci-fi movie that genuinely tried to examine the dangers of man attempting to fly to the moon and return safely back to Earth. The movie was produced by the combined genius of producer George Pal and the prolific actor/director Irving Pichel. It was co-written by Robert A. Heinlein, based on his novel Rocket Ship Galileo.

To coincide with the movie a comic book was produced to tell the story, but also inject scientific facts about travel to the moon into the story. In addition Pal included the famous cartoon character Woody Woodpecker, as he was a friend of Woody creator Walter Lantz. Woody featured in a cartoon that was shown as a short alongside Destination Moon, as well as being cleverly inserted into the the movie itself. The itself comic book stands out as a classic and early movie tie-in.

Strange British sci-fi sex comedy, that featured a whole host a renowned comedy actors of the period, and plenty of semi-nudity. A cult classic of British sexploitation, it tells the story of a race of topless, large-breasted women from the planet Angvia (and anagram of vagina), in another dimension, come to earth to kidnap women to repopulate their planet. All lead by an interdimensional sex goddess called Zeta. 

The film is low-budget exploitation film-making at its so-bad-its-good best. A cut-rate Carry On type caper, with a blatant James Bond rip-off theme. (With a super-spy character called James Word.) The plot drags, and the one-shot director Michael Cort uses plenty of padding and scenes that seem utterly out of place. It's bright, gaudy and silly. And must have been an influence on Mike Myers when he was creating Austin Powers. The colours are in-your-face trippy 60s, spliced with a Mod aesthetic. Making it a great example of British psychedelic cinema. 

The film was a flop on its initial release. Zeta One was released in the United Kingdom in 1970, being described by one critic as,  "quite preposterous in illogicality and silliness". It was later released in America by Film Ventures International, briefly in 1973 as The Love Slaves and then wider in 1974 under the title The Love Factor. Despite its failure on initial release, Zeta One has gained a cult following in the subsequent decades.

I was AFK all day yesterday, so no Cult Film Friday post. So instead it's a Cult Cinema Saturday, with the brilliant British-American sci-fi movie Phase IV, directed by the film-maker and famous graphic designer Saul Bass. Bass's only full length movie he directed. Bass is better known, for his graphic design work on some of the most iconic movie posters ever made.

The film, which was shot in both England and Africa, despite being set in Arizona, was a commercial failure on initial release. However it quickly gained a cult status through regular TV runs in the mid to late 70s and early 80s. 

Due to a cosmic event, known as a "phase", ants in a remote desert location develop an intelligent hive-mind and begin to attack the desert inhabitants and facilities of the scientists that are studying them. The movie became well regarded for its stunning cinematography, especially the close-up shots of ants, which were filmed by wildlife photographer Ken Middleham.

Bass originally filmed a spectacular, surreal montage lasting four minutes, showing what life would be like in the 'new' Earth, but this was cut by the distributor. The montage was supposed to suggest that the two surviving characters were altered by the ants creating the next step in evolution for humanity and insects. Shots from the original montage sequence appear in the theatrical trailer, which was likely prepared before cuts were made to the film.

This curiously bizarre invention is from way back in 1925. It was introduced to the world by Hugo Gernsback a member of “The American Physical Society,” and one of the pioneers of science fiction. It was featured in that July issue of Science and Invention magazine, and involved something akin to a large bulbous diving helmet with an oxygen tank. It was supposed to encourage users to be able to focus and concentrate by rendering the wearer deaf, piping them full of oxygen, and limiting their vision to a tiny portholes.

Hugo Gernsback was an inventor, writer, editor, and magazine publisher, best known for publications including the first ever science fiction magazine. He began the modern genre of science fiction in 1926 by founding the first magazine dedicated to it, Amazing Stories. 

Hugo Gernsback's place in science fiction is recognised each and every year with the Hugo Awards (the Hugos), named after him, that recognise the best in science fiction and fantasy writing. First awarded in 1953, they were called  Science Fiction Achievement Awards until 1992. Renamed the Hugo Awards, in recognition of the great work he did to promote the genre.

From director Andrey Tarkovskiy, who brought us Solaris in 1972, comes this cult piece of philosophical Russian sci-fi. The Stalker is a guide, that leads two men, a writer and a professor through a strange wasteland known as the Zone, to find a room in the deepest heart of the Zone that will make your deepest desires come true. The film is loosely based on the novel Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky. Considered by many to be one of the best sci-fi films of all time, Stalker is an exercise in deep and considered metaphysics, forcing viewers to contemplate the philosophical layers that Tarkovskiy weaves into his seemingly simplistic narrative. The wasteland of the Zone is littered with symbolism, as viewers are forced to make sense of the often poetic use of imagery and sublime cinematography. Making Stalker a film that you must engage with, think about, and be left with innumerable questions after watching it. Creating a sci-fi piece in its rawest form. 

Stalker is long and drawn out, but never boring. Much of it shot in a brown tinted monochrome, the film consists of 142 shots in 163 minutes, with an average shot length of more than one minute and many shots lasting for more than four minutes. That is until the end, which is shot in rapid cuts, all the more compelling after the long slow build-up. 

Wilkins was the creator and horror host of a popular television show named Creature Features that ran on KTVU in the San Francisco Bay Area from 1971 to 1984, and which began with Del Tenney's infamous The Horror of Party Beach (1964). The show is also famous for featuring the television première of George A. Romero's 1968 zombie classic  Night of the Living Dead.

Creature Features showed both horror and sci-fi, from classics to cheesy schlock, all under the banner of "Watch Horror Films... Keep America Strong." Bespectacled and suited Wilkins famously presented from a bright yellow painted rocking chair, and would smoke his trademark cigar, while delivering his dry humoured patter in a kindly older brother smooth soothing manner. A style that went down well with fans, and made Bob a household name.

"Don't stay up late, it's not worth it," Bob Wilkins warned as he leaned back in his yellow rocking chair, smoke wafting from his big cigar. As he introduced one bad b-movie after another. As the popularity of the show, saw it expanded into a double feature, Bob also attracted some top name guests from the world of sci-fi and horror. Ray Harryhausen, Christopher Lee, William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, John Landis, William Marshall, and Forest J Ackerman, among others. Bob did it all, wrote, produced, presented, booked the aforementioned guests and even answered the fan mail personally.

In 1977, Wilkins launched an afternoon children's program on KTVU. Called Captain Cosmic it featured and mainly focused on imported Japanese sc-fi serials, like Ultraman and Johnny Sokko and his Flying Robot, as well as showing British TV show Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, by Thuderbirds creator Gerry Anderson. Wearing a helmet that his his face, Wilkins was uncredited. His sidekick was a robot named 2T2, parodying R2D2 from Star Wars.

Horror sci-fi comedy and satire on capitalism, Larry Cohen's The Stuff is a much under-rated classic, that deserves re-watching. Cohen a prolific writer, producer and director scored another cult classic with Q-The Winged Serpent in 1982, but by far his best movie is satirical dark comedy The Stuff.

A weird substance is found bubbling up from the earth, and the two guys who discover it decide to taste it (As you would.) It's so delicious that they decide to market it as a new kind of dessert.The Stuff takes off as the new sensation, as consumers clamour to buy it. Becoming addicted zombies, as the stuff starts to take them over.

In the movie sales of The Stuff drastically hit the ice-cream market, and the ice-cream industry hire ex-FBI agent turned industrial saboteur David "Mo" Rutherford, to investigate it. It reality much of the prop "stuff" used in the movie was ironically lots of Häagen-Dazs ice cream. They also used yoghurt, and for one large scale scene of The Stuff coming through a wall, fire extinguisher foam.

Of course The Stuff is in some part a homage to The Blob (1958), and in many ways harks back to the schlock horror of the 50s and 60s. It's very much a movie of the 80s, but is much better crafted than many of its contemporaries. It's unique, quirky, cleverly handled and directed by Cohen with a witty script that has some moments of sharp cutting satire. Making the movie much much more than the hammy schlock horror that it may at first appear to be. Hence why it deserves another watch for those who may have caught it the first time round and missed the clever nuances buried in amongst the quirky humour.

And if you have never seen it. First why not? And second, you are in for a deliciously toxic piece of classic 80s sc-fi horror. Highly recommended.

Interstingly, and somewhat a stand-out from teh rest of his career, one of Larry Cohen's first movies as writer/director was the blaxploitation movie Black Caesar (also known as Godfather of Harlem) in 1973. Starring Fred Williamson, it was a remake of the 1931 gangster movie Little Caesar.

The Quiet Earth is a film that sneaks up on you, a slow paced post apocalyptic sci-fi film from New Zealand that has left a lasting impression on many who have watched it. Directed by Geoff Murphy, who went on to be the 2nd Unit Director on the Lord Of The Rings trilogy, under the famous New Zealand film director Peter Jackson.

Based loosely on the 1981 sci-fi novel of the same name by Craig Harrison, the movie has also been compared to the 1959 post apocalyptic sci-fi The World, The Flesh And The Devil. Which also featured only three cast members, strikingly similar to those in The Quiet Earth. Leading some to describe it as an unofficial remake.

Scientist Zac Hobson awakens to a world where everyone seems to have disappeared. Eventually coming upon two other survivors, they set-out to try and discover what happened to everyone else. Zac believing it has something to do with an experiment he was working on called Project Flashlight, that may have caused something he calls The Effect. 

 A film of two halves. As initially the first half explores Zac's spiral into madness, as he believes himself to be the last man on Earth. Blaming himself for causing the disappearance of all teh people. Then he meets the other two survivors, and the film becomes one of human relationships, between three people from different walks of life thrown together by circumstance. With a cleverly conceived ending that is confusing and mind-bending, leaving some viewers in stunned silence as the credits roll.

Originally a Japanese manga series in the late 1950s by manga and anime artist Tatsuo Yoshida, Mach GoGoGo was developed into an animated series in the late 60s. The story of teenage race-car driver Gô Mifune (known as "Speed Racer" in the American version) who aspires to be the world's best with the help of his friends, family and his father's high-tech race-car, the Mach 5. The series was originally syndicated to the United States, and ran for 2 seasons, totalling 52 episodes. With some of the violence of the Japanese animation cut, and redubbed it became an instant cult classic, that inspired an over-the-top colour saturated CGI movie in 2008.

His often repetitive adventures centered around Speed's car built by his Pops (the Mach 5), his girlfriend Trixie, his little brother Spritle (with his pet chimp Chim-Chim), and his mysterious brooding older brother, Racer X. 

The show's success in the United States spawned a whole Speed Racer franchise, ranging from comics, video releases, merchandise, the live-action film, and new animations in the 1990s and 2000s.

Blaxploitation sci-fi! Now that's a genre you don't hear of often. Starring Joe Morton, better known for his role as Miles Dyson in 1991's Terminator 2: Judgement Day. He plays "the brother", who's an escaped alien slave hiding out in Harlem, after his ship crash lands. Directed by independent cult film director John Sayles, he made the movie as an obvious and at times overworked metaphor for the difficulties of being an immigrant in America.

Unable to speak "the brother" makes his way through New York and the movie in a series of situational vignettes, that often have a comedic nod towards the silent film era. It's clever and inventive, at times unstructured and confusing. Which adds to the feeling of alienation, and being a stranger in a strange land that Sayles is attempting to convey. The gentle comedy that Morton's character brings to the screen is juxtaposed against scenes of racial tension, drug abuse, poverty and urban decay. His outstanding performance as the innocent and charming alien carries the film. He's Chaplin's little tramp, who you root for and warm to.

Beautifully handled by Sayles, The Brother From Another Planet is a quirky and charming movie that stays with you long after you've seen it. Often underrated and overlooked, it's low-budget independent film-making at its leftfield best. And one of my personal introductions to independent cinema as a teenager. Over 30 years on from first seeing it, it still sits as one of my favourite (now) cult films of all time. I highly recommend that people seek it out and give it a watch.