''Mutiny in Outer Space'' is a 1965
black-and-white
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independent
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* Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s
* Independ ...
American science fiction film, written, produced, and directed by
Hugo Grimaldi
Hugo or HUGO may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Hugo (film), ''Hugo'' (film), a 2011 film directed by Martin Scorsese
* Hugo Award, a science fiction and fantasy award named after Hugo Gernsback
* Hugo (franchise), a children's media franchise ...
and
Arthur C. Pierce, although Pierce was not credited as directing. It stars
William Leslie,
Dolores Faith
Dolores Faith Hedges (July 15, 1941 – February 15, 1990), better known as Dolores Faith, was an American actress. She is best remembered as the mute girl Zetha in the 1961 science fiction film '' The Phantom Planet''. Her brief career cam ...
,
Pamela Curran, and
Richard Garland
Charles Richard Garland Jr. (July 7, 1927 – May 24, 1969) was an American film, stage and television actor. He was known for playing the recurring role of Constable Clay Horton in CBS's television series ''Lassie'' from 1954 to 1956.
Life a ...
.
Space Station X-7 is overrun by a previously unknown but deadly alien fungus that originated in ice caves on the Moon and was inadvertently brought back by astronauts returning with lunar samples. In order to save the space station from destruction, members of the crew are forced to mutiny against X-7's commander, who is not in his right mind because of "space raptures".
In the US, ''Mutiny in Outer Space'' was theatrically released as the second film of a
double feature
The double feature is a motion picture industry phenomenon in which theatres would exhibit two films for the price of one, supplanting an earlier format in which one feature film and various short subject reels would be shown.
Opera use
Opera ho ...
with ''
The Human Duplicators
''The Human Duplicators'' is a 1965 American science fiction film by Woolner Brothers Pictures Inc. Produced and directed by Hugo Grimaldi and Arthur C. Pierce (the latter uncredited as director), the film stars George Nader, Barbara Nichols, ...
''.
Plot
Maj. Gordon Towers and Capt. Dan Webber are returning to Space Station X-7 after collecting geological samples and ice from newly-discovered ice caves on the Moon. Upon arrival, Dan collapses and is taken to the infirmary by Dr. Hoffman and Gordon is reunited with his girlfriend, Dr. Faith Montaine, a civilian biochemist.
Hoffman has difficulty diagnosing Dan, ruling out "space raptures" because they cause
hallucination
A hallucination is a perception in the absence of an external stimulus that has the qualities of a real perception. Hallucinations are vivid, substantial, and are perceived to be located in external objective space. Hallucination is a combinatio ...
s and not the high fever that Dan is running. Faith notices that a small welt on Dan's leg is growing rapidly into a large
fungus
A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately from th ...
. She says that the spores causing the fungus must have come from the Moon's ice caves. They put Dan into isolation.
Meanwhile, the commander of X-7, Col. Frank Cromwell, is behaving oddly. As a swarm of meteors approaches the space station, Cromwell is unable to give the order to take evasive action until prodded to do so by X-7's communications officer, Lt. Connie Engstrom.
Dan dies, his body horribly disfigured by the fungus. But when Cromwell looks at the body in the isolation chamber, he calmly says, "There's nothing unusual in there" and refuses to report to Gen. Knowland at Earth Control Center that the fungus has killed Dan. He insists that Dan's demise was caused by "pressure shock" and warns Gordon, Faith, and Hoffman to say nothing about the fungus because it might panic X-7's crew. Hoffman says that Cromwell is "on the verge of space raptures" and very sick.
Gordon decides that the situation is serious enough to remove Cromwell from command. But Gordon fails in his attempt, which Cromwell says is "mutiny". Cromwell orders Connie to send a message to Knowland about the mutiny and to say in it that Gordon held the crew at gunpoint until he was overpowered. Connie seemingly agrees, but Cromwell does not know that she has surreptitiously recorded the order. She transmits it to Knowland, who is immediately aware that something is amiss because weapons were outlawed in space in 1970, more than 20 years earlier. Connie also reports that the entire space station is being overrun by the fungus. Knowland tries to reply to X-7 but gets no response. He says that X-7 may have to be destroyed to prevent the fungus from reaching Earth.
Hoffman contracts the fungal infection and is very ill. However, he is able to tell Faith and Gordon that the fungus can be killed by cold. Knowing this, Gordon and the others make a second attempt to take control of X-7. Besides the danger from the fungus, Cromwell, now fully in the grips of space raptures, is trying to destroy X-7. They confine Cromwell to his quarters, but he escapes and sabotages the communications system, cutting off all contact between X-7 and the Earth. He is then recaptured.
Gordon knows that the only hope of saving X-7 is to lower its interior temperature to below zero degrees. The fungus inside X-7 dies, but it is now growing on the outside of the space station. No one can understand why the fungus is spreading on X-7's exterior until one of Knowland's staff officers says that it must be due to the "high temperatures generated by the unshielded blazing sun" beating down on X-7. This gives Knowland the idea of launching a rocket that will explode and form a huge cloud of ice crystals for X-7 to pass through.
Knowland's idea works and the fungus on the exterior of X-7 is killed. Gordon uses the repaired communications system to request a relief ship. Knowland tells him that it will arrive at X-7 in three hours and concludes his message by saying, "Don't lose your faith". Faith and Gordon look at each other and smile now that the crisis is over.
Cast
*
William Leslie as Maj. Gordon Towers
*
Dolores Faith
Dolores Faith Hedges (July 15, 1941 – February 15, 1990), better known as Dolores Faith, was an American actress. She is best remembered as the mute girl Zetha in the 1961 science fiction film '' The Phantom Planet''. Her brief career cam ...
as Dr. Faith Montaine
*
Pamela Curran as Lt. Connie Engstrom
*
Richard Garland
Charles Richard Garland Jr. (July 7, 1927 – May 24, 1969) was an American film, stage and television actor. He was known for playing the recurring role of Constable Clay Horton in CBS's television series ''Lassie'' from 1954 to 1956.
Life a ...
as Col. Frank Cromwell
*
Harold Lloyd Jr.
Harold Clayton Lloyd Jr. (January 25, 1931 – June 9, 1971) was an American actor and singer.
Career
The third child and only son of the silent film comedian Harold Lloyd and former actress Mildred Davis, Lloyd made several B-movies in the 1950s ...
as Sgt. Andrews
*
James Dobson
James Clayton Dobson Jr.
(born April 21, 1936) is an American evangelical Christian author, psychologist, and founder of Focus on the Family (FOTF), which he led from 1977 until 2010. In the 1980s he was ranked as one of the most influentia ...
as Dr. Hoffman
*
Ron Stokes Ron is a shortening of the name Ronald.
Ron or RON may also refer to:
Arts and media
* Big Ron (''EastEnders''), a TV character
* Ron (''King of Fighters''), a video game character
*Ron Douglas, the protagonist in '' Lucky Stiff'' played by Joe ...
as Sgt. Sloan
*
Boyd Holister Boyd may refer to:
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* Boyd Conservation Area, a conservation area located northwest of Toronto, Ontario
* Boyd Lake (disambiguation)
United States
* Boyd County (disambiguation)
* Boyd, Indiana
Boyd is an unincorporated communi ...
as Maj. Olsen (in credits as Robert Palmer)
*
Gabriel Curtiz
In Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam), Gabriel (); Greek: grc, Γαβριήλ, translit=Gabriḗl, label=none; Latin: ''Gabriel''; Coptic: cop, Ⲅⲁⲃⲣⲓⲏⲗ, translit=Gabriêl, label=none; Amharic: am, ገብር ...
as Dr. Stoddard
*
Glenn Langan
Glenn Langan (July 8, 1917 – January 26, 1991) was an American character actor on stage and films.
Early years
Born in Denver, Colorado, Langan was the son of Thomas Langan and Kate Quinn Langan. He attended schools there. His early training ...
as Gen. Knowland (in credits as Glen Langan)
*
H. Kay Stevens as Sgt. Engstrom
*
Francine York
Francine York (born Francine Yerich; August 26, 1936 – January 6, 2017) was an American actress and model. She also used the name Francine Yerick.
Early life
Francine Yerich was born to Frank and Sophie Yerich in the small mining town Aurora ...
as Capt. Stevens
*
Joel Smith
Joel Smith (born 3 May 1977) is a former Australian rules footballer.
Beginning his career in 1995 as a bright young prospect for St Kilda, Smith was touted as the future of the club.
Smith played in St Kilda’s 1996 AFL Ansett Australia ...
(unnamed character)
* Carl Crow as Capt. Dan Webber
*
Robert Nash (unnamed character)
Production
''Mutiny in Outer Space'' was filmed in six days at
Producers Studio
Producer or producers may refer to:
Occupations
* Producer (agriculture), a farm operator
*A stakeholder of economic production
*Film producer, supervises the making of films
**Executive producer, contributes to a film's budget and usually does no ...
in Hollywood, beginning on March 18, 1964. The film's budget was approximately $90,000.
The production companies were
Hugo Grimaldi Film Productions
Hugo or HUGO may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Hugo'' (film), a 2011 film directed by Martin Scorsese
* Hugo Award, a science fiction and fantasy award named after Hugo Gernsback
* Hugo (franchise), a children's media franchise based on a ...
and
Woolner Brothers Pictures. ''Space Station X'' and ''Invasion from the Moon'' were the film's working titles.
Although it was filmed in the US, British film critic Phil Hardy lists it in ''The Overlook Film Encyclopedia: Science Fiction'' as an Italian-American co-production. ''Mutiny in Outer Space'' is "one of a pair" of such co-productions "directed in 1965 by Grimaldi (the other being ''
The Human Duplicators
''The Human Duplicators'' is a 1965 American science fiction film by Woolner Brothers Pictures Inc. Produced and directed by Hugo Grimaldi and Arthur C. Pierce (the latter uncredited as director), the film stars George Nader, Barbara Nichols, ...
'')."
Release
''Mutiny in Outer Space'' was theatrically released in the US as the bottom half of a double feature with ''The Human Duplicators''. It was released on March 3, 1965 and premiered in Los Angeles on May 12, 1965 and opened in the UK and Mexico at unspecified dates that year, in West Germany on November 11, 1966, and at an unspecified date in Italy. The film was titled ''Motin en la Nave Espacial'' in Mexico; ''SS-X-7 Panik im All'' in West Germany; and ''Ammutinamento nello spazio'' (also known as ''Gli Ammutinati dello spazio'') in Italy.
In the US, the film was distributed by
Woolner Brothers Pictures and in the UK by
Regal Films International, both during 1965. In 1966,
Allied Artists took over US theatrical distribution, the same year that
Goldeck-Filmverleih distributed it to theaters in West Germany.
Home media
VZ-Handelsgeschellschaft released the film on DVD in Germany in 2013.
International Film Distributors in Canada hold the all-media distribution rights.
''Mutiny in Outer Space'' is also included in ''Shiver & Shudder Show'', a 2002 video released in the US by
Something Weird Video
Something Weird Video is an American film distributor company based in Seattle, Washington. They specialize in exploitation B to Z films, particularly the works of Harry Novak, Doris Wishman, David F. Friedman and Herschell Gordon Lewis.
Ins ...
. It features segments from 47 science fiction and horror films from the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s.
Reception
Writing on May 12, 1965, "Whit," a reviewer for
''Variety'', said that ''Mutiny in Outer Space'' "stacks up as a suitable minor entry". But he went on to praise "Grimaldi's direction of the Arthur C. Pierce script" and said that the film was "deftly lensed" by cinematographer
Archie R. Dalzell and that "
George White George White may refer to:
Politicians
* George White (died 1584) (c. 1530–1584), MP for Liverpool
* George White (Liberal politician) (1840–1912), British Liberal member of parliament, 1900–1912
* George E. White (politician) (1848–1935), ...
's editing is a plus".
Modern American film scholar
Gary Westfahl
Gary Wesley Westfahl (born May 7, 1951) is an American scholar of science fiction. He has written reviews for the ''Los Angeles Times'', ''The Internet Review of Science Fiction'' and Locus Online. He worked at the University of California, River ...
praises the film for making "important points about the dangerous effects of prolonged life in space". However, he writes, it better "recalls more fanciful films", such as ''
The Green Slime
is a 1968 tokusatsu science fiction film directed by Kinji Fukasaku and produced by Walter Manley and Ivan Reiner. It was written by William Finger, Tom Rowe and Charles Sinclair from a story by Reiner. The film was shot in Japan with a Japane ...
'', than it does the more documentary-like 1950s films ''
Project Moon Base
''Project Moonbase'' (a.k.a. ''Project Moon Base'') is a 1953 independent film, independently made black-and-white science fiction film, produced by Jack Seaman, directed by Richard Talmadge, and starring Ross Ford, Donna Martell, Hayden Rorke. ...
'' and ''
Conquest of Space
''Conquest of Space'' is a 1955 American Technicolor science fiction film from Paramount Pictures, produced by George Pal, directed by Byron Haskin, that stars Walter Brooke, Eric Fleming, and Mickey Shaughnessy.
The film's storyline concern ...
''. He says that ''Mutiny in Outer Space'' is reminiscent of "
Specimen: Unknown," a February 1964 episode of the TV series ''
The Outer Limits'', which he also placed in his "fanciful" category.
Like Westphal, Bryan Senn, an American film critic, sees both good and bad in ''Mutiny in Outer Space''. He writes that "Richard Garland gives a good performance as the stressed-out space skipper" and refers kindly to the rest of the cast as "overworked
ndpresumably underpaid". On the other hand, Senn calls the film a "mishmash" that suffers from "shoddy black-and-white production values and substandard special effects" and says that "scenes aboard the X-7 are shot in gloomy darkness, adding to the film's unmistakable look of cheapness".
An anonymous reviewer in ''
TV Guide
TV Guide is an American digital media company that provides television program
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or t ...
'' sees the film as more-or-less of a historical failure, writing that "By the time of the film's release, space travel was less mysterious than it had been in the genre's heyday 10 years before. Thus this routine fare, with standard production values and acting, was simply too late to stir up much interest".
However, more recently, ''Mutiny in Outer Space'' was revived specifically for
Women's History Month
Women's History Month is an annual declared month that highlights the contributions of women to events in history and contemporary society. It is celebrated during March in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, corresponding with ...
. The film was chosen for its unusually high number of women cast as astronauts aboard X-7 and as military personnel on Earth. It was shown on March 17, 2017 as part of a 16 mm film series at The Newman Center in Plattsburgh, NY.
See also
*
List of films featuring space stations
There is a body of films that feature space stations. Science fiction films have featured both real-life space stations such as the International Space Station and ''Mir'' as well as fictional ones such as the Death Star and the Satellite of Love. ...
References
External links
*{{IMDb title, 0059486
Films about astronauts
1960s science fiction films
American science fiction films
1960s English-language films
1960s American films