IN: Review: The original was a good movie. I bought it on tape and have watched it several times. And though I know that sequels are not usually as good as the original I certainly wasn't expecting such a bomb. The romance was flat, the sight gags old, the spoken humor just wasn't. This may not have been the worst movie I've ever seen but it comes close.
What is this review like?
OUT: negative

IN: Review: This is blatantly a futuristic adaptation of Jules Verne's "Mysterious Island". The sound editing is pretty bad. You hear the dialogue on set and you hear the voices being recorded on a recording booth at the same time! This is an amateur film with actors from Boston and shot around New Hampshire. For those living in New Engalnd and who is reading this comment will be wowed with a capital W. This film is full of flaws. You get to hear the director's voice giving directions and giving out directions to the actress. "OK now stand up." As for the other characters. There is this guy who talks with his mind instead of his voice and this blue alien. The alien guy talks with a deep voice. When he is yawning or grunting when he is fighting you hear the actor's voice. As for the special effects, man! This was Brett Piper's early work for crying out loud! The creatures are good but the animation is jerky. Really jerky. Sort of like Karl Zeman animation in JOURNEY TO BEGINNING OF TIME (1955). The special effects are imaginative. Thge music is good. Bottom line, this film makes EQUINOX or PLANET OF THE DINOSAURS look like a Ray Harryhausen epic. Did you know MYSTERIOUS PLANET was a home movie and was on a shoes string budget? A must watch for aspiring film makers.
What is this review like?
OUT: negative

IN: Review: I rated this a ten just because I find it so impressive what a single eighteen year old can do with a video camera. It's no epic but it's plenty engaging and I was never bored. If tens of millions of dollars can go into the countless bad films that are poured out en masse, then give this director the same amount of money and see what happens. I know I'll be lining up at the local cinema for her first major release. Damn good job, and well worth the money. What a script! It might be low budget but it beats the hell out of half the major pictures I've seen lately. Nanavati knows how to tell a story, both in writing and on screen. Serious kudos to her, can't wait to see more.
What is this review like?
OUT: positive

IN: Review: "Footlight Parade" is fascinating on so many levels. There is no way the supposedly staged "theater prologues" could have been produced in any theater on earth, of course. Think of the huge pools and three-story tall fountains for "By A Waterfall," for instance. (Berkeley directed John Garfield in "They Made Me a Criminal" six years later and had the Dead End Kids singing "By a Waterfall" as they took their showers.)

"Shanghai Lil" is the best production number in the picture. It's a catalog of '30s Warner Bros. sensibilities. Note the African guys mixed into the scene with white and Asian prostitutes. You would never see blacks integrated into a social scene in other films of the period unless they were porters on a train or maids in a big house. Here the black guys are sitting at the bar and singing with the others. I also get a thrill when the military dancers do a "card section" presentation of Roosevelt's image. There's also the NRA eagle--the logo of the controversial National Recovery Administration of the New Deal. FDR was the new president and hopes were so high that he'd pull the nation out of the Depression. You'd never see something so working class oriented coming out of MGM, of course. Warner Bros. wholeheartedly supported the uplift dictated by the F.D.R. administration.

Dear little Miss Ruby Keeler was never better than she is playing the Chinese hooker, "Lil." She hardly even watches her feet as she dances, which was one of her signature flaws.

The Pre-Code stuff is fun. The "By a Waterfall" number is wonderful in that regard. The girls change into their bathing suits on the crowded bus speeding through Times Square with all its lights on. The spread-eagle girls swimming over the camera provide the kind of crotch shots that would not be seen for 35 years. In a few months the Production Code would eliminate such naughty pleasures.
What is this review like?
OUT:
positive