The Visitor (1978)

Nothing to do with the movie. 

The Visitor is getting a lot of buzz as they've recently re-released it to theaters, which is where I saw it and it was AWESOME. Seeing something like this on the big screen is just indescribable.

Let me describe it for you.

There are very few films like The Visitor. First of all, just take a look at the cast: Mel Ferrer, Glen Ford, Lance Henriksen, John Huston, Joanne Naill, Sam Peckinpah, Shelley Winters and Franco Nero as space-age Jesus Christ.

Shocked speechless by basic information for the rest of the movie.

That's right. Django himself. As the savior of mankind. In space. 

Kardashians got nothing on Katy.

John Huston stars as some kind of galactic warrior who, along with his often misplaced theme music, tracks down the evil children (indirectly?) spawned by some space criminal who sowed his seed all over the universe. He is locked in combat with an eight-year-old Earth girl (played by 12 year old Paige Connor) and her evil pet falcon. How does he conduct this combat, you ask? By going up on a skyscraper roof top, where interpretative dancers cast their shadows on white sheets, and lights dance around like a low budget Close Encounters. In the psychedelic world, he turns her into popcorn or something.

This little girl spends most of her time wreaking havoc at basketball games, gymnastics meets, ice rinks and any other sporting event she manages to attend or compete in. She also cusses out old cops (who seem to be incapable of applying the breaks of their cars when blinded) and generally sasses baby sitters, house keepers and anyone else who can't escape her insidious presence. She's a low budget Damien.

John Huston as Obi-Wan Kenobi.

There's a weird cabal of rich white stuffed shirts who, for no reason ever fully explained, want to control the sex life of the evil girl's mom, using young Lance Henriksen to impregnate her and bring forth a boy child... for no reason every fully explained. They even resort to hiring evil futuristic football players with no faces to kidnap her and implant something in her womb. (SPOILER: It's a baby.) This gives her a great opportunity to reconnect with her ex-husband (Sam fucking Peckinpah) by seeing him for an abortion.

Hint: This is not a homoerotic incest scene.

Then, it sort of turns into The Birds. Birds were apparently the weapon the good aliens used to kill that space criminal guy, "fatally wounding him, in the brain."

Add together the Birds, Close Encounters and the Omen II... and throw in an Italian space Jesus.. and you've got The Visitor.

This movie is full of beautiful, arty, psychedelic scenes that make no sense whatsoever. The plot is so convoluted that it's brilliant. And the dialog... just see this damn thing, already. Or you'll never forgive yourself.

RATING

Barbarella

Barbarella is hardly a secret. You probably saw the box a million times at the video store when you were a kid. A lot of people think they've seen this movie, or claim to have seen it, when in reality they've only actually watched a couple of scenes on Saturday Matinee, edited for TV. Still other people are aware that this movie has Jane Fonda in it, and she gets naked no less, and for some reason this makes them want to NOT take the movie seriously and NOT watch it right away.

Ms. Fonda in a million sexy outfits alone is enough reason to see Barbarella, but for those of you who need a little more convincing....

 

 

Okay, Barbarella: Queen of the Galaxy takes place super far in the future when love rules and there's no violence of any kind in the "civilized" universe. Everybody has sex with everybody all the time, only you find out that "civilized" people screw by taking a pill and putting their palms against those of their partner, which is a total let down. Luckily Barbarella discovers old fashioned sex with a man who hunts feral children. This hunter wears sort of a bearskin cloak, and you can't tell when he takes it off. That's how hairy he is (Italian). They have sex on some kind of a wind-powered sled, and Barbarella is never the same again.

 

Barbarella is like the female James Bond of the superfuture and is sent on a mission to find Duran Duran, a renegade scientist who shares his name with the best rock band of the 80s. He's supposedly hiding out on an outlaw planet, so all that stuff about no violence anymore doesn't apply. Not only does Barbarella wear a million different sexy outfits, she also wields a million different super-cool, ultra-retro ray guns.

As can be expected, she doesn't just go from point A to point B with no space ship malfunctions.  Without getting into any sci-fi technical details (because the movie really doesn't), her flying saucer busts up, stranding her on the planet of the feral children. All the feral children are twins and they, of course, tie up Barbarella and sic their evil dolls with nasty, pointy teeth on her to rip at her sexy clothing, especially her stockings.

Luckily she is saved by the hairy guy who I told you she has regular sex with. He likes her because he can see that even with ripped stockings, Barbarella is a woman of class. Accompanying the gent are a couple of Black Guards, who are apparently made of leather shells and are hollow. At any rate, they can whip you real hard and they are pretty scary. They round up the kids in nets and drag them to the city, where they will be put to work doing... (plot hole).

 A whole bunch more stuff happens, like this:

Long story short, it's crazy, psychedelic, nonsensical and sexy. There's really nothing else for a film to be.

RATING: