Undescribable Perfection

Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

In the year 1990, scientists from an American "space institute" translate a radio signal sent from a distant planet notifying Earthlings of an impending visit, but instead the intrepid aliens crash land on Mars and a rescue team is sent into space to find them. Another one of those B-grade American International products with poster art more creative and promising than the film being advertising. Still, writer-director Curtis Harrington isn't Ed Wood; he attempts to put on a colorful show, even though a great deal of the special effects footage has been lifted from two Soviet features, "Mechte Navstrechu" and "Nebo Zovyot". Actors John Saxon, Basil Rathbone and Dennis Hopper alternately look bemused and embarrassed. ** from ****

"Queen of Blood", a.k.a. "Planet of Blood", is a reasonably enjoyable low budget science fiction picture, executive produced by Roger Corman, and written and directed by Curtis Harrington ("Night Tide", "The Killing Kind", "Ruby"), who uses a fair amount of footage from two big budget Soviet productions, "Mechte Navstrechu" and "Nebo Zovyot", and writes his own story around it.In 1990, mankind makes contact with aliens who crash land on one of Mars' moons. A sole survivor is brought on board the humans' spaceship, yet she's decidedly deadly: a seductive blood sucker with green skin, a nice tall head of hair, and frightening eyes and smile. Ever engaging John Saxon is young hero Allan Brenner, pretty Judi Meredith his love interest Laura James. Basil Rathbone, in one of his final movie roles, is great fun as the exuberant Dr. Farraday. Dennis Hopper, who'd acted for Harrington in "Night Tide", is well meaning astronaut Paul Grant. Robert Boon as Anders Brockman and Don Eitner as Tony Barrata offer fine support, with a small role for none other than Forrest J. Ackerman as Farraday's aide.While the movie is ultimately a little too slow and talky for its own good, Harrington and a capable crew give this amusing B picture a pretty good look, doing appreciable things in terms of colour. It gets off to a nice start, with the opening credits slowly playing out over paintings by John Cline, and accompanied by eerie stock music composed by Ronald Stein (who's billed as Leonard Morand).All things considered, there are some effectively creepy moments to appreciate in "Queen of Blood", especially in the second half. Among the crew are Stephanie Rothman, director of drive-in flicks like "The Velvet Vampire" and "Terminal Island", as the associate producer, and Gary Kurtz, future producer of "Star Wars" and "The Empire Strikes Back", as the production manager. Best of all is the performance of Czech born actress Florence Marly in the title role, who has an incredible presence and makes a Hell of an impact without having to utter a word. The ending is also an interesting combination of being both somewhat happy and yet full of doubt, with a wary attitude towards the ways of scientists. Fans of the genre should find this an acceptable diversion.Seven out of 10.

The producers of this film owe thanks to the Russian film, Mechte navstrechu, for keeping costs down by providing critical footage.But, the sci-fi effects are dazzling, and the color is brilliant, especially for a film from the 60s. I wish our current astronauts wore suits as colorful as the ones in this film.It also features some good actors: John Saxon, Golden Globe nominee for The Appaloosa, the same year; two-time Oscar nominee, famous swashbuckler, and the definitive Sherlock Holmes, Basil Rathbone; a very young two-time Oscar nominee, Dennis Hopper; Mr. Science Fiction, Forrest J Ackerman, who is credited with creating the term sci-fi; and, of course, Florence Marly (in one of her last films) as the Queen of Blood.Interesting precursor to Alien.

Who says all the bad sci-fi movies were made in the 1950s? This film is proof that bad sci-fi knows no one decade! While this is not among the worst sci-fi films I have seen, it is pretty poor. The movie is actually a cheap attempt to recycle a Russian movie by slapping on segments of American-made film to create one coherent(?) story. So, most of the long shots are from the original film and the dialog sequences are new. Because of this, the film has a very odd tempo--with quite a few scenes that are static long-distance shots that seem to go on way too long. The American scenes are also, at times, pretty poorly done--featuring mostly low-budget actors (such as Basil Rathbone--who in the late 50s and 60s would appear in ANYTHING). The film also tries to skimp on production values (in particular, sets) by using bright green and red lights to practically blind the viewer into not noticing the cheapness of the film. The result, to put it bluntly, is "psychodelic crap".The plot is about a rescue effort mounted in the future (the 1990s). Earth is sending a ship to rescue aliens who crashed on Mars. Unfortunately, instead of being grateful, the sole alien survivor sees the male crew as a potential buffet--drinking the blood of most of them before they reach Earth. About the only thing interesting about this is seeing this evil space queen all painted up in green. Otherwise, it's all a big snooze. Not a terrible movie,...but almost terrible.