Blu-ray Review Earth II Blu-ray Review (1 Viewer)

[Josh Steinberg]

Earth II is an interesting space oddity movie-of-the-week from 1971.



Earth II (1971)



Released: 28 Nov 1971
Rated: G
Runtime: 100 min




Director: Tom Gries
Genre: Sci-Fi



Cast: Gary Lockwood, Scott Hylands, Hari Rhodes
Writer(s): Allan Balter, William Read Woodfield



Plot: When Earth II, an orbiting research space station, is menaced by a Red Chinese nuclear weapon, its 2,000 inhabitants take action to disarm and dispose of the missile without resorting to violence.



IMDB rating: 5.6
MetaScore: N/A





Disc Information



Studio: MGM
Distributed By: Warner Archive
Video Resolution: 1080P/AVC



Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audio: English 2.0 DTS-HDMA



Subtitles:...

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[Flashgear]

Well done on the review, Josh. Impressively thorough, and I think a well-reasoned assessment of Earth II's creative and technical virtues. I agree, it needed a more plausible story with less revisited tedium along the way, especially to sell it as a prospective series for Garry Lockwood who deserved far better. And Tom Gries was such a great action director! What the hell? I have the old WAC DVD.

The fearful notion of secret orbital nuclear weapons platforms by the Soviet Union were much in the news back then as I remember (the USAF had a top secret parallel space program for a military space station too, the MOL or Manned Orbital Laboratory, cancelled by Nixon). Interesting that Earth II chose to make the threat one from Communist China (who had a relatively primitive space program at the time and were lucky to launch a single Sputnik-style satellite the previous year of 1970). Maybe because the SALT nuclear weapons treaty with the USSR was close to signing at the time? And then Nixon shocked us with a trip to China in 1972 anyway. And no surprise that Earth II laid on the heavy and tiresome pacifism and tortured introspection during the late stages of the Vietnam War, TV's dreaded 'Relevance' era.

I of course watched Earth II on it's original NOB. Even as a 15 year old, I was mostly unimpressed and bored. But I held nearly all of that era's TV Movies of the Week with disdain, although I watched nearly all of them NOB. I liked more of the SF/Horror TV movies better, but also remember fondly some of the action thrillers, crime/suspense and social commentary/human interest TV movies of the late '60s/early '70s. Looking back and viewing a lot of them as an adult, I find that my teenage self was far too strident in my disdain, and I enjoy most of them far better now as a senior.

No tiresome and pie-in-the-sky wish-list, but I think that whole TV movie era circa 1966-75 and beyond for some select titles represent a motherlode of highly desired stuff that I'd dearly hope to see more of on disc and streaming today. I'll be picking up Earth II, and hope that WAC, KL and Imprint can find a way to give us more of these highly desired TV movies on Blu.

 

[Wayne Klein]

Watched it when it first aired back in the day. I remember finding it lacking suspense but having some cool visuals and some underwritten parts. I’ll probably pick it up as Imdid enjoy it despite its flaws. There wasn’t much Science Fiction on TV at the time special a TV movie with a bigger budget than most.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Visually, it’s fantastic. Watching it now, it felt like they put all of their efforts into designing how it would look and far less into what it would actually be about.

The characters are so underwritten. Lockwood does the best he can, but he’s written very passively and the design of the politics that govern the station put his character in this odd position where no matter what happens, all he can say is things like “I disagree with that idea and it goes against our whole reason for being here, but all ideas are equal so I respect your right to say it and we’ll vote on it” - it just gives no room to maneuver. His adversary on the station (said to be a genius) feels very much like a walking plot function rather than a person. They write that adversary’s wife so terribly. At one point, she disagrees with her husband’s desire to establish nuclear weapons onboard the station, so far so good, but then the writers have her throw the nuke out the window that faces the sun, as if that’s how space or physics work. But no, it’s not that the writers are that dumb, just the character, because then they have all of the male characters stop by to explain to her that’s not how space works. And then at the end, without anything really changing, the adversary goes back to Lockwood and says “you were right, let’s do it your way from now on”. I just don’t know how they thought they could move forward with a series with those kinds of characterizations. How can you have a main character that dumb and write to that each week?

And then there’s the plotting - that China sent up a nuke up to orbit next to the station, and the debate is “on one hand we don’t want to be violent, on the other hand asking for a nuke not to be near us would make us just as bad as the people that sent the bomb”? It’s just so academic and so full of straw men, trying to seem hip and political without committing to a real belief. There’s got to be half an hour of debate over whether bluffing is smart and they invoke the Cuban Missile Crisis a lot, but it’s all fairly hollow stuff. How would they have sustained that as a series?

What would the weekly stories have been about? That’s something that this pilot movie just fails to answer and that’s really the only question that a pilot is meant to answer. I would have loved to have seen a series that kept Lockwood, ditched the rest of the cast, kept the sets and effects crew, but reimagined what to do with them. Visually, as a 1971 tv production, it’s amazing. It’s just not really about anything.

 

[Wayne Klein]

Visually, it’s fantastic. Watching it now, it felt like they put all of their efforts into designing how it would look and far less into what it would actually be about.

The characters are so underwritten. Lockwood does the best he can, but he’s written very passively and the design of the politics that govern the station put his character in this odd position where no matter what happens, all he can say is things like “I disagree with that idea and it goes against our whole reason for being here, but all ideas are equal so I respect your right to say it and we’ll vote on it” - it just gives no room to maneuver. His adversary on the station (said to be a genius) feels very much like a walking plot function rather than a person. They write that adversary’s wife so terribly. At one point, she disagrees with her husband’s desire to establish nuclear weapons onboard the station, so far so good, but then the writers have her throw the nuke out the window that faces the sun, as if that’s how space or physics work. But no, it’s not that the writers are that dumb, just the character, because then they have all of the male characters stop by to explain to her that’s not how space works. And then at the end, without anything really changing, the adversary goes back to Lockwood and says “you were right, let’s do it your way from now on”. I just don’t know how they thought they could move forward with a series with those kinds of characterizations. How can you have a main character that dumb and write to that each week?

And then there’s the plotting - that China sent up a nuke up to orbit next to the station, and the debate is “on one hand we don’t want to be violent, on the other hand asking for a nuke not to be near us would make us just as bad as the people that sent the bomb”? It’s just so academic and so full of straw men, trying to seem hip and political without committing to a real belief. There’s got to be half an hour of debate over whether bluffing is smart and they invoke the Cuban Missile Crisis a lot, but it’s all fairly hollow stuff. How would they have sustained that as a series?

What would the weekly stories have been about? That’s something that this pilot movie just fails to answer and that’s really the only question that a pilot is meant to answer. I would have loved to have seen a series that kept Lockwood, ditched the rest of the cast, kept the sets and effects crew, but reimagined what to do with them. Visually, as a 1971 tv production, it’s amazing. It’s just not really about anything.

Agreed. If it would have been a series the only way it would work is with more conflict. The film isn’t dramatically inert but, when it comes to characters, it largely is. That was also a flaw with Roddenberry’s early seasons of “Star Trek: The Next Generation”; drama only works with interpersonal conflict and external conflict. It works best with both.

 

[Jack P]

Gary Lockwood as an astronaut named "David Saville." I still don't get that (I won't repeat the joke I made in another thread).

Mariette Hartley I love, but this was not one of her finer efforts. Funny how she was in this and "Genesis II" which I can imagine a lot of people mix up with this film.

Still, I'm getting it anyway to upgrade my old DVD copy.

 

[John Maher_289910]

Back in the late 60s/early 70s, my favorite night for television was Tuesday - 7:30 - 8:30 Mod Squad; 8:30 - 10:00 ABC Tuesday Movie of the Week; 10:00 - 11:00 Marcus Welby, MD. I never missed them. ABC add a Wednesday Movie of the Week, as well. I never missed any of those made-for-television films. Space settings are my least favorite for a film, along with Vietnam and post-apocalyptic earth. Still I remember Earth II, pretty well. It aired on a Sunday night, instead of the normal Movie of the Week nights. It was watchable, but, like almost all movies set in space, fairly dull. Still, I may purchase it, just to support more and more made-for-television films being released. My most-wanted, Women in Chains!

 

[Wayne Klein]

Gary Lockwood as an astronaut named "David Saville." I still don't get that (I won't repeat the joke I made in another thread).

Mariette Hartley I love, but this was not one of her finer efforts. Funny how she was in this and "Genesis II" which I can imagine a lot of people mix up with this film.

Still, I'm getting it anyway to upgrade my old DVD copy.

So did he have Chipmunks for children? Hartley was also badly served by an underwritten role and one that just had her character do dumb stuff.