From the Asylum Library: Jules Verne

NEW COLUMN ALERT! Now and again, as is true of most motion picture studios, The Asylum will look toward the world of letters for inspiration. The public domain offers an array of spectacular, action-packed, thrilling, and - most importantly - free works ripe for the updating. In this occasional column, I'll take a look at the literary giants from which The Asylum has borrowed. And whom better to start with than the man many consider to be the father of science-fiction: the inimitable Jules Verne.

Jules Verne was born in picturesque Brittany in the early part of the Nineteenth Century. As a young man, his love for travel and adventure beget an imagination that could transport him places life had yet to. This imagination would in time evolve into an innovative form of speculative fiction that became a telescope into our future. Submarines, hot air balloons, space travel and even the fax machine are among the mechanical realities that first saw description in the books of Jules Verne. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, From the Earth to the Moon, Mysterious Island, Paris in the 20th Century, A Journey to the Center of the Earth, Around the World in 80 Days - it's titles like these and dozens more that have made Mr. Verne, nearly two hundred years after his birth, the third most translated author in the world and the source of more than 130 films, including some of the earliest work in special effects from cinematic magicians like Verne's fellow-Frenchman George Melies. 

Though that moniker I mentioned above - "the father of science fiction" - is often shared with his somewhat-contemporary H.G. Wells, it's worth remembering that Monsieur Verne's first notable novel, "Five Weeks in a Balloon," was published three years before Mr. Wells was even born.

As far as The Asylum is concerned, Mr. Verne and his fertile imagination have spawned only two films so far, Journey to the Center of the Earth with DeeDee Pfeiffer and Greg Evigan, and 30,000 Leagues Under the Sea with Lorenzo Lamas, but his influence can also be felt in films like 100 Million BC and The Terminators, if you'll stretch with me. 

But oh the films they could make: as most of the bigger titles have been mined to death and are in fact just outdated - no matter how inventive you are, it's tough to update From the Earth to the Moon without replacing one or the other - the best place to mine I think would be the lesser-known fare like Journeys and Adventures of Captain Hatteras, In Search of the Castaways, Off On a Comet, Eight Hundred Leagues On the Amazon or dozens others. 

Verne's a proven money-maker, the original Philip K. Dick when it comes to sci-fi writers Hollywood loves to make and remake and remake again. But a run through his back catalog could do for The Asylum what Poe did for AIP. Or not. Either way, we'd get some rad movies out of it.


Something to think about.

observation notes: 100 Million B.C.

Another stand alone sci-fi epic from The Asylum, with slight ties to Godzilla, the Matthew Broderick version, and Cloverfield, though the latter film was still a year away, and would be later mockbusted by Monster. So then this one's neither here nor there, merely a time-traveling action flick with ties to the Philadelphia Experiment - electromagnetic tinkering undertaken by US scientists during WWII in which a wormhole through time was ripped open. 

The film opens with a Navy Search and Rescue team being briefed by a theoretical physicist (Michael Gross) and a Naval superior (Greg Evigan) on a quite unusual mission: rescue a team sent back in time in 1949 - a team that includes the physicist's brother (Christopher Atkins) - to the Cretaceous Period some 70 million years in the past. (that's the number they reference several times. i guess the title's just rounding up.) The obvious response from the (present) team is, well, if they were sent 70 million years back into the past 70 years ago, how they fuck are we even sure they're still alive? Cave paintings, that's how, recently discovered by amateur spelunkers that irrefutably come from a Twentieth Century hand, though carbon-dating says otherwise. How irrefutably? "Rita Hayworth as Gilda," and "Frank It Wasn't Your Fault." In English. Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty irrefutable.

To attempt this rescue, of course, the present team will have to undertake the same risk as the past team by traveling through the wormhole. They won't be alone however, as the physicist, racked with seventy years worth of guilt, refuses to let them go alone and insists on joining them. So back in time they go, via a stargate - not a stargate-looking thing, this is just a stargate, unapologetically - and arrive where, rather, when they wanted, smack dab in the middle of the Cretaceous Period, where they immediately begin their search for the past team.

It isn't long before acid-spooging plants, looming brontosauruses and carnivorous marine life make their going a little tougher. They get some help, improbably, when 70 fucking million years in the past, a past where none of the geography resembles that of our era, somehow the present team stumbles upon the physicist's brother and his past team within an hour or two of arriving, and just in the nick of time to get their asses saved from raptors. I studied abroad one summer in England, and over the course of the 4th of July weekend I took an impromptu trip to Amsterdam with a friend. I wasn't twenty feet outside the train station when I bumped into a girl I dated in high school. That's coincidence. When I was 16, on a cross country road trip, I walked into a mall in Salt Lake City and bumped into the man who baptized me, sitting outside the food court McDonald's. That's coincidence. Bumping into your brother who you haven't seen in 70 years because you sent him 70 million back in the past? That's fucking providence, or incredibly accurate mathematics, at least. I digress.

So reunited and somewhat safe, the mission now becomes to get everybody back to the wormhole so they can return to the present (the present team's present, but the past team's future.) It's a short trip, relatively easy but for, you know, the dinosaurs, but just when you think getting everybody home is the solution, it turns out to be...you guessed it...an even bigger problem. Problem 1: someone has to stay behind in the past to close the wormhole, otherwise anything could just come trouncing through, and they don't want that. Problem 2: it has to be the physicist as he's the only one who knows how, and, racked with guilt even now, he's willing to sacrifice himself to get the past team home. Problem 3: he totally fucks it up, and not only bites it (the present version of himself, that is) but allows a quite large, already-pissed and now really-discombobulated dinosaur to enter the 21st Century. And we are surprisingly unprepared for it. 


"The threat is biological in nature, it is bipedal, and it is carnivorous...I repeat, it is bipedal and carnivorous...it's a dinosaur...I shit you not."

The above pretty much sums up the human response: humorously disbelieving, overwhelmed and clueless.The rest is spoilers but to say the third act is entirely metropolitan, and the ending is a mindbender, in terms of who's where, temporally.

100 Million B.C.was written by Asylum producer Paul Bales, who also wrote a score of other Asylum flicks including 2010 Moby Dick, Sherlock Holmes, Megafault and Killers 2, and directed by Louie Myman, which is really just a pseudonym for Griff Furst, the actor/director who's been mentioned here a few times for his work behind the camera on Lake Placid 3 and the upcoming Swamp Shark (as well as Asylum films I Am Omega and Universal Soldiers) and in front of it also in The Dunwich Horror (as well as Transmorphers and The Hitchhiker). Asylum regulars Mark Atkins and Nick Everhart edited the film, alongside David Michael Latt. Together, these men managed to craft an enjoyable, engaging sci-fi film, that if reminiscent of other films, intentionally or not, stands on it's own thanks to a spry script and strong performances.

Michael Gross ("Family Ties," the Tremors franchise) balances his performance with shades of brilliance, concern and guilt, though he's not at all believable as the age he's supposed to be (that's a compliment). It is his convictions and inner-turmoil that form the emotional center of the film and make him the most empathetic of our characters. Greg Evigan (6 Guns, Journey to the Center of the Earth) is largely contained to good-natured imperatives and salutes for the first 2/3rds of the film - though authoritatively charming as always - but in the third act his role really widens and he takes control with the ease of a seasoned wingman. But my favorite was Christopher Atkins (The Blue Lagoon, Shakma), who's essentially a younger, more awesome John Schneider (sorry, John) and here fills each scene with a  larger-than-life spirit; he plays the role as a pure adventurer - he could be a time-traveler or an astronaut, a pirate or explorer; his restrained zeal, his tempered (by peril) passion for the moment, is nothing less than infectious.

Other cast standouts include Geoff Meed as present team chief, Marie Westbrook as one of the female soldiers of the past, and Dean Kreyling as the chief of team past.

The FX are okay so long as they're not onscreen with actual people, in which case they look totally fake (a few shots are used a few times, pretty obviously). The main dino looks like some sort of zombie dino: it's hide is red with refined musculature as though it's been skinned. Gross (And not Michael). Even the Mega Shark moment - you'll know it when you kinda see it - relies more on your imagination than any actual FX. The city scenes are okay, though too deserted; as long as your CGI-ing the shit out of things, toss in some dying crowds.

Overall, it's a neat adventure story, although a little too reminiscent - for me - of Journey to the Center of the Earth but with less hot chicks (not less-hot, the women here are comparably hot, there are just fewer of them, I mean) and The Land That Time Forgot, but maybe that's a compliment, because if it had popped up that this story was based on another by the likes of Jules Verne or H.R. Haggard, I would have totally bought it. So definitely worth a watch if you enjoy films of that ilk.


One thing got me, however: where, in the Cretaceous Period, did 1940's female soldiers find form-fitting halter-tops? Another mystery for the ages, I suppose

Birthday Wishes!!

...are extended to day to Greg Evigan - star of Asylum features Journey to the Center of the Earth, 100 Million B.C. and 6 Guns - who turns a cruel 57 years old today (Cruel because at 57 he looks better than most of us did at 27. You attractive bastard, Evigan.) There's nothing at present in Evigan's filmography linking him to The Asylum, but talent like this won't lay dormant for long. Many happy returns of the day, Greg!

observation notes: 6 Guns

6 Guns is the first out-and-out western by The Asylum, and as straight-to-DVD films of such a genre go, it's a success.

The story, written by Geoff Meed (Universal Soldiers, I Am Omega), concerns a family of homesteaders - Pa, Ma and two boys - whose domestic bliss is shattered by a pack of vigilantes come to enact vengeance for the death of their leader(also Geoff Meed)'s father, killed by Pa back when he was a quick-drawing lawman. Long story short, the men folk are killed and Ma is assaulted multiple times and left for dead. Big mistake.

At this point the film becomes a kind of feminist take on the Randolph Scott/Budd Boetticher revenge classic 7 Men From Now, here with Sage Mears as the wife substituting for Randolph Scott's grieving widower, seeking to enact a vengeance of her own.

(This follows an extended dance between Wifey and the bottle that at last comes to an end when she meets Bounty Hunter Extraordinaire Barry Van Dyke, who she asks to take shootin' lessons from, the training she needs for the recently-mentioned mission of vengeance. This is a pretty big plot point to be a parenthetical, I know, but this is how things got structured in my head, so here we are.)

Said training is finished just in time, fortunately enough, for the murderous vigilantes' return to town. From here there be spoilers, so let's just leave it at, the third act is the best, bringing to fruition all the lingering questions of character raised in the films 1st 2 3rds. One leaves the film fulfilled, if not a little uneasily hopeful, which I suspect was Meed's intention. Real nice resolution, and just a fine tale all around, well-executed.

Barry Van Dyke ("Diagnosis Murder," "Airwolf," "Galactica 1980") carries the film on his reserved grizzled-ness, his performance that of a calmly tortured, conflicted anti-hero of the sort westerns are supposed to have. Sage Mears is equally sweet and sour, soft and rigid, believable as both a victim and an avenger, as a woman ripped from her cocoon of happiness and hardening to the ways of a new world she finds herself navigating alone. Here's hoping this is only the first of Ms. Mears' collaborations with The Asylum.

And I can't forget the always-great Greg Evigan (100 Million B.C., Journey to the Center of the Earth), who shows up in this one as the local peacekeeper, endearingly played as amiable yet stern, a man long in his position and perhaps too comfortable as such, performing his duties with relaxed aplomb and a false sense of security.

Other standouts include, of course, screenwriter Meed as the mirthfully ruthless vigilante leader Lee Horn, a grade-A sociopath, Jude Gerard Prest (Mega Piranha) as the bartender/ whoremaster, and Shane Van Dyke (Barry's son, writer/director/star of Titanic II and the director of this here fine film as well) as a member of the vigilante pack. 6 Guns marks the third film Mr. Van Dyke the younger has directed for The Asylum, and the first time he's directed his father. The look of the film isn't typical of The Asylum, it feels a little cleaner, a little more cable-ready, a little more accessible. There's been a boom in direct-to-DVD westerns in the last three or four years, and this film feels like a wading-job by The Asylum, a test to see how warm the waters are. And like wading in murky water, it's tense fun. The script is tight, true to western themes, and cognizant of the cruelty and brutality that typified this often-glamorized era of American history. There are a few stereotypes present, but each is performed beyond that level by a confident and capable cast. The end result is a fine film, tense and thrilling, engaging and unnerving in parts, in short a quality western, roped together and hog-tied by Shane Van Dyke, who, along with his work on Titanic II has proven himself - if ever there were any doubters - as more than just a legacy; the guy's got genuine talent. Looking forward to a lot more from him, on both sides of the camera.

This one gets high marks all around. I'd love to see more films in this vein.

inmate profile: DeeDee Pfeiffer

I am fully aware there are other women who have worked for The Asylum more often than DeeDee Pfeiffer, which I am also aware makes her somewhat of an odd choice for the first female inmate profile. But look at her: sassy, sexy, innocent and sultry; how can I resist?

So much more than Michelle's little sister, DeeDee has been working consistently in film for nearly 30 years, from comedies like Moving Violations and The Allnighter to more serious fare, venturing lately into the sci-fi/adventure/horror realm via films like Blue Demon and her work for The Asylum.

As mentioned, DeeDee has starred in two films for The Asylum thus far, as Greg Evigan's ex and a tectonic driller in Journey to the Center of the Earth and opposite great American hero William Katt in Alien v. Hunter. She brings frazzled beauty and sarcasm-next-door to each role, proving herself a unique and viable leading lady - sexy whether glamorous or not, strong, independent, fiesty and endearingly vulnerable. For my money, I'd watch DeeDee before Michelle seven days a week, and I always would have. Here's hoping she visits The Asylum again soon.

observation notes: Journey to the Center of the Earth

One of three adaptations of the Jules Verne classic to come out in the same 18-month period - the other two being the Brendan Fraser 3D event and the Ricky Schroeder non-event - The Asylum gives it their own special twist.

Okay, so, here we go: Greg Evigan is some kind of stargate scientist or something, and in the process of beaming an elite military unit composed entirely of hot chicks, somehow the calibrations go wrong and they end up in the center of the Earth, a lush, prehistoric landscape. So Evigan has to track down his ex-wife, the delightful DeeDee Pfeiffer, who just happens to be developing a miracle laser-digger. As if this string of coincidences wasn't enough, one of the members of the hot-chick military unit is DeeDee's sister (who in real life is Evigan's daughter!!)! Da-da-dummmmmm!

Fast-paced, exciting and endearing thanks laregly to the two leads. Greg Evigan hasn't aged a day or lost an ounce of charm since "My Two Dads," and DeeDee Pfeiffer, as usual, showcases the same comedic/dramatic skills that made Cameron Diaz a star, with a dash of frenetic obsessiveness that made Crispin Glover so creepy. How's that for a mash-up? Notable among the hot chicks are the aforementioned Evigan daughter, Vanessa Lee (other daughter Brianna is of Step Up 2, S. Darko and Sorority Row fame) and Caroline Attwood, the female reporter from Death Racers, who thankfully gets a lot more screen time here (she's kinda hot is why the "thankfully").

Two quotes best sum up this experience, which truthfully I enjoyed more than the big screen epic, and certainly more than the Ricky Schroeder shit-bomb:

"Wait a minute; why would a tyrannosaurus be here in the first place?"

AND

"All right you bitch hag, let's do this...AAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!"