ALL SCI-FI

[Bogmeister]

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_____________ The Quiet Earth (Official Trailer)


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A man named Zac (Bruno Lawrence) wakes up one morning in a motel room and soon finds out he is alone on this Earth — so it seems.

As it happens, he is a scientist and his most recent work may have been responsible for this cosmic event. The audience has to come up with their own theories on this plot right from the get-go. Perhaps Zac died in that motel room and this is his purgatory. Or he is in the last few seconds of his life and the film's events are just what flashes through his brain. Or it's all really happening — but what is reality anyway, eh?

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I first saw this in a theater back in the mid-eighties and it quickly became one of my favorite science fiction films. I'm not as awed by it now, because I've seen it several times, and seeing it on the big movie screen makes a difference.

I think it's one of a very few sci-fi films which attempts a poetic visual approach towards a science fiction concept and actually succeeds to a great extent. This is also an end-of-the-world and last-man-on-Earth scenario which just ends up being better than all the others. One of these days I'd like to see a sci-fi film which literally sticks to the 'last man' concept all the way through to the end, but . . . oh, well.

Is there such a film? I don't think so.

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Bruno Lawrence is very good as the central character who, after finding out he's all alone, rapidly moves through stages of insanity and periods as (1) the wealthiest man, (2) a cross-dresser pretending to be female, (3) the dictator of Earth, and finally (4) knocking God himself off his/her pedestal as the new deity before accepting his 'new' reality — as best as is possible. It's a fantastic study of the human condition, the human mind. Is he imagining his later two companions or are they as 'real' as he is?

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As for the ending, I don't think the filmmakers themselves knew exactly what it all means. It's up to each individual watching to determine what the ending means — one of those.

Has Zac moved into yet another dimension? Is he off Earth, on a moon of Saturn? Is he on an alternate Earth? Is he in the far future? Is he dead?

No sequel, so we'll never really know. But, it was a very interesting, even fascinating sci-fi adventure.

BoG's Score: 9 out of 10


BoG
Galaxy Overlord Galactus

[Bud Brewster]

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Bogmeister has a very high opinion of this movie (his rating is 9 out of 10), despite the fact that he provides a frank assessment of the convoluted and puzzling plot. I watched the trailer and I read the Wikipedia plot summary (see link below).

Neither of those tempts me to watch this movie any more than BoG's review does.

But I loved to hear other comments on the film.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quiet_Earth_(film)
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Phantom]

The Quiet Earth (1985)

Intriguing film from New Zealand in which three people seemingly find themselves the sole survivors on Earth after a scientific experiment goes wrong.

The movie is neatly divided into three segments, each about thirty minutes long, the most striking being the first act in which Zac Hobson wakes to find himself on what appears to be a totally deserted planet. His slow discovery of a landscape devoid of people, which he describes as, “This quiet Earth” and his eventual disintegration into insanity, is stretched to the breaking point, a tour de force for a single actor. Despite its length, it never becomes tedious, mostly due to the inventive script that finds new challenges for Hobson.

The entrance of Joanne and eventually, Api, a Maori, begin the second and third acts and alter the dynamics of the action, setting up a duel motivation of jealously and struggle for control. It is somewhat disappointing and rather banal after the first two thirds of the movie.

Cinematic images of ruined, deserted cities are charged with an unsettling ambiance. The early scenes in Target Earth, the breakdown of civilization in The Day the Earth Caught Fire, the empty streets of New York City in The World The Flesh And The Devil (a kindred spirit of The Quiet Earth) and the final images of On the Beach are often all that remain in memory.

Some of the photographic effects are striking. When Hobson visits his job at the scientific lab where he works, he is bathed in an eerie blue light. Later, at the height of his madness, he eschews his own clothing for the comfort of a woman’s slip and gathers together an audience of manikins to which he delivers a speech from the balcony of a mansion, augmented by recorded cheers. In a truly bizarre sequence, Hobson enters a church waving a rifle and looking for God for some answers. Striding up to a statue of the crucified Jesus, he demands, “Come out or I’ll shoot the kid,” then proceeds to blow away the statue, the ultimate blasphemy of a man who has lost all reason. It is at this brink that he pulls himself together, dives into the ocean and emerges baptized and reborn. Maybe God answered him after all, even if somewhat belatedly.

There is a haunting moment when Joanne visits a deserted hospital with rows of empty baby cribs and another when she and Api jog along a country road shrouded in a blue mist that is almost liquid in consistency.

The movie leaves us with more questions than answers.

There are indications that others were alive after the disaster. Hobson discovers the disfigured body of a co-worker in the lab. At one point, he samples a cherry on a cake he finds in a deserted store and later finds the bodies of two people beside the road. However, these events take place days, perhaps weeks after he wakes into the deserted world, yet the cake and cherry are still edible with no signs of decay and the bodies appear to have died only a short time before discovery.

Each character is given a brief flashback as they attempt to reason the situation. Api is attacked by an unknown assailant and wakes in the middle of a stream to see an unusual light in the sky. Joanne appears to have been electrocuted while using a hair dryer. Hobson wakes from sleep and we see a medicine bottle on the shelf with a warning about over use.

So, where are they in time and place? Is this Hobson’s dying hallucination? Are these his final desires, fears and prejudices exploding like some psychological Big Bang in his brain? Or, do they all really exist, trapped in some purgatory, waiting to be transported to another existence? Is this some form of hell in which they are eternally shunted to an infinite number of planes, each with their own set of inscrutable laws?

The final famous image leaves us with no clue.
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What Is Essential Is Invisible

[Krel]

I haven't seen the film since it was released, so my memories of the film are a bit faded. But here is my take, on what I remember.

This will have spoilers.

Those left on Earth were at the point of death when the event happened, and so were not transported. I assume that the bodies found died before the event, indicating that only the living were transported.

All people, animals, insects and bacteria were transported. My reasoning is that there is no decay seen. You hear no animal or insect sounds, and the dead bodies had not been fed upon.

Anyone left on earth is DOOMED! DOOMED, I tell you. Any bacteria will have to come from those left. There are no birds, or insects to pollinate the crops, plants and trees. There are no animals. Within a decade or so, food may be in short supply. It depends if the canned food is also free of decay. Even if the canned food is safe, it does not bode well for any children they may have.

It is unknown if the vegetation has survived the event.

Any way you look at it, Earth will be a dead planet until the bacteria in the people that are left go to work. So in a few million years, Earth may once again have animals, and insects.

The only hope is the sea. If the sea life was insulated from the event, then there is some hope for those left behind. If not, then...DOOMED!

At the end, was he transported to where the population of Earth was transported? If yes, then he may survive. Unless he gets eaten by a native, or Earth animal.

Ain't I a ray of sunshine?

David

[Bud Brewster]