Lust In Space - FORBIDDEN WORLD

The late ‘70s and early ‘80s were a magical time for Roger Corman’s New World Pictures.  The summer blockbuster was still a new, exploitable beast and no one exploited like Corman.  He knew what people wanted and he would give it to them cheaper, faster, and trashier.  The fun of New World’s rip-offs was that they were rarely straight copies of popular movies.  They seemed straightforward, but actually diverged in weird, wonderful ways creating mad scientist mash-ups like; BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS (STAR WARS + THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN + The Waltons), STARCRASH (STAR WARS + BARBARELLA + Italy), GALAXY OF TERROR (ALIEN + acid trip).  Perhaps the sleaziest, cheapest, and most ridiculous of Corman’s chimeras was FORBIDDEN WORLD (ALIEN + STAR WARS + softcore porn).  

The Capsule:

Intergalactic Troubleshooter and space Lothario, Mike Colby (Jesse Vint) is sent to Xarbia to help some panicking scientists.  It seems they have accidentally created a bloodthirsty mutant organism, as scientist tend to do.  Sexy Dr. Glaser (June Chadwick) seems really glad to see Mike; Dr. Hauser (Linden Chiles) and sweaty security chief Richards (Scott Paulin) less so.  While Mike gets better acquainted with the lady doctor, Subject 20, the mutant in question, grows larger and starts taking out the more dim members of the compound.  Conflict builds between Hauser, who wants to protect his deadly wonder of science, and Mike who wants not to be eaten.  Rapidly gaining intelligence, Subject 20 has a plan of its own that no one will like.  

Directed by Allan Holzman, FORBIDDEN WORLD is not to be confused with FORBIDDEN PLANET, though that was obviously Corman’s intent, because the title makes no sense, otherwise.  The only thing forbidden on this world is common sense.  It is also known as MUTANT, which is more appropriate since it is about a mutant, but should not to be confused with MUTANT from 1984, which stars Wings Hauser and is about zombies.  

The movie slams out of the gate with a dizzying open that ambitiously rips off ALIEN, 2001, and STAR WARS all at the same time.  Mike is awakened from hypersleep by his trusty robot sidekick, SAM-104 (Don Olivera)—who sounds and looks like an eleven year-old boy in a homemade stormtrooper costume—to find his ship is under attack by, um, pirates?  It’s hard to discern because like all Corman’s sci-fi movies of that period, it repurposes the space battle scenes from BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS (that footage cost a ton of money, damn it).  It cuts from unrelated spaceships blasting lasers to Mike and SAM pushing buttons on a set while a view screen—which is behind them—shows random explosions.  Some of the explosion happen on the surface of a planet, so maybe it’s a screensaver.  

Once we get to the forbidden planet world of Xarbia, the mood abruptly switches tracks from sci-fi action to sci-fi porn.  Studly Mike is greeted—and eye fucked—by Dr. Glaser, slinking around in her low-cut jumpsuit.  It is so close to parody that I’m surprised they didn’t make Mike a space-pizza delivery boy rather than a troubleshooter.  Seriously, what kind of deep space science facility has a sauna?  When Mike stumbles in on clothing averse Tracy (Dawn Dunlap), her reaction is predictable.  “How dare you? Get out!  Wait, since you’re already here, we might as well have sex.”  Paraphrasing, but not by much.  And this is after he has already bedded Dr. Glaser.

The most egregiously porn-set scene comes after a traumatic death of one of the stupid, stupid crew members.  Dr. Glaser comforts the distraught Tracy in the way all professional colleagues do, by giving her a backrub as they both stand naked in the sauna.  This is only a guess, but I’d bet that was a script note from Roger.  “Heavy exposition scene.  Recommend boobs.”

Not everyone lusts after Troubleshooter Mike, some just resent him.  Head scientist Dr. Hauser is ruffled to find he is no longer the cock of the walk as far as eligible space bachelors go.  Richards, the security chief, is understandably grumpy since the monster got his girlfriend Annie just before Mike arrives.  Of course, the twitchy perv blows all inherent sympathy by watching Mike and Dr. Glazer go at it on the security monitor.  The monster might have done Annie a favor in that situation.

The facility roster isn’t exclusively horn-dogs.  Engineer Beale (Ray Oliver) is happy to just chill and play his space flute.  Then there’s obsessive Dr. Timbergen (Fox Harris, the loon in the radioactive Chevy Malibu from REPO MAN), who has no time for hygiene, much less love.  He comes to lunch still wearing his blood-stained lab coat and scoops up a biological sample with his fingers.  If this were a cop movie, he would be the coroner who does an autopsy while eating a sandwich.  

Of course, the one thing the residents of this interstellar Club Med lack more than inhibitions is any hint of self-preservation.  When Mike arrives, the scientists nonchalantly walk him through a lab literally dripping with blood and test animal guts to show him Subject 20, which is now cocooned in a plastic, completely unsecured incubator.  After explaining how dangerous it is, everyone leaves it in the care of the janitor, ironically named Jimmy Swift (Michael Bowen). Swift manages to do one better than ALIEN’s Kane by sticking his head directly underneath the cocoon as it undulates and leaks goo.  Cut to security footage of Swift flailing around with a giant black loogie dissolving his face, smashing into every piece of glass in the lab and spraying blood onto the camera, which no one is paying any attention to.  

I enjoy how Mike, who "does not know a gene from a jelly bean” is belittled by the scientists for wanting to destroy the creature.  Dr. Hauser is adamant about protecting their scientific accomplishment, even though it is actively killing his co-workers, and defends his position until the end.  His end, at least, which isn’t long.  Dr. Glaser is keen on communicating with it, hoping to use a computer link to ask it questions like, “Why do you enjoy killing humans so much?” and “Is there any chance we can persuade you to not eat us?”  Her efforts are rewarded by being shish kabobbed on a mutant tentacle.  

Of course, the scientists' most shortsighted endeavor was creating the mutant in the first place.  It could less be described as an accident than as a thoroughly intentional, highly complicated experiment in mass suicide.  First, they develop a fast replicating virus that instantly mutates any life form it touches, then for kicks, they spice it up with human DNA, inject it into a fertilized egg, and implant it—completely voluntarily—into one of the scientists.  Who could possibly have foreseen any complications?  This group would reject Wile E. Coyote as a member for being too risk averse.     

The fully grown Subject 20 is an imposing ALIEN knock-off, or it would be, if it was anything more than a completely immobile plastic statue.  Early on, it has two modes of attack, sitting completely still and waiting for someone to lean close to its mouth, or getting shoved off something by the film crew to simulate motion.  Later, it develops spiky tentacles and the ability to open its mouth, making it more dangerous.  Plus, it provides the opportunity to use a POV shot from inside its chomping jaws.  Having eyes inside your mouth seems disadvantageous, but the mutant makes it work.

I should note that, according to the stories, the substance invented for the mutant’s acid blood actually was caustic to flesh, making the prop more dangerous in real life than on the screen.

As I mentioned in my reviews of GALAXY OF TERROR and HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP, New World was where a young Jim Cameron spent his formative years, working in production and art design for their sci-fi films before becoming the director of the illustrious PIRANHA II: THE SPAWNING.  Even as trashy and ridiculous as these movies are, it’s fun to catch all the quick shots and setups that made their way into Cameron’s undisputed masterpiece, ALIENS. For instance, Mike is unable to use his laser in the mutant’s lair because it has coiled around the life support system, which echoes the Colonial Marines having to sling their heavy weapons in the xenomorph nest for fear of hitting the reactor’s coolant system.  And SAM the robot’s being ripped in half by the end stage mutant echoes Bishop’s fate at the hands of the Alien Queen.  I’m sure these were just subconscious inspirations, I don’t recall ALIENS having a space sauna.  Not in the final draft, anyway. 

The golden days of New World are long gone, as are its cheap, crazy mashup B movies.  It’s about time someone got those going again.  Who wouldn’t want to see CAPTAIN AMERICA + A QUIET PLACE + 50 SHADES OF GREY?  On second thought.

C Chaka