Planet des Schreckens

I can still remember watching this film in the wee hours of the morning at about 13 yrs old; I wanted decadent, late night cable programming, and this one delivered. Twenty years later, I still remember it for one scene: a giant maggot raping a woman. It was a completely gross, bizarre, yucky, surreal moment in cinema, but unlike anything I had ever seen. I still can't get over how weird it is and how something like that made it into a film. The rest of the film contains a few other bizarre scenes but beyond this, the film is really just a waste of time. However, the production design (James Cameron) for this film was actually pretty original and well done for the time/budget (the planet the crew is trapped on has a kind of strangely dim lighting and claustrophobic feeling).

The film concerns about a team of astronauts assigned to save the outer space starship crew from a far planet . The astronauts become threatened by a weird , vicious life force as well as indiscreet , slimy aliens that embark upon a killing spree in the base and spaceship . They are unexpectedly devoured by hungry , vicious aliens intent on picking off the astronauts one by one . And an ominous monster in the form of a giant worm ; it is , in fact , a carnivorous , ominous maggot and is enormously spooky when the large slug eats a beautiful nude scream girl or when another young woman explodes . The picture contains an interesting twist at the ending.

It's a formula terror space film with tension , shocks , grisly horror , including some decent scares , graphic gore abounds and results to be quite entertaining . A lot of the special effects shots involving live actors combined with matte paintings and miniatures were done in camera . At the movie appears known actors with a future long career : The recently deceased Edward Albert (Butterflies are free) , Robert Englund (Freddie Kruger) , Zalman King (a notorious director of erotic films) , Ray Walston (famed comedy actor) and Grace Zabriskie (famous secondary actress) and Sid Haig (usual as baddie and blaxploitation genre) , the latter asked Roger Corman if he could play Quuhod as a near mute instead Corman agreed and let Haig portray Quuhod with almost no dialogue as Haig only says a single line in the whole movie . The visual production design by subsequently successful James Cameron creates a vivid sense of claustrophobic doom , enhanced further by the eerie musical score .

This disturbing and dark film was produced by Roger Corman with his New Word Pictures and tensely directed by B.Clark who managed to create shocks , generous violence and exciting horror sequences . According to Roger Corman , the film was budgeted at approximately $700,000 . The film went into production in the spring of 1981 at the Hammond Lumber Co. lot in Venice, CA, where New World's studio facilities were located. Additional sets , including the surface of the planet and the exterior of the pyramid , were built at a soon-to-be demolished Bekins Storage facility . David DeCoteau got his first Hollywood movie job working as a production assistant on this film , he was only 18 years old at the time. And followed by ¨Forbidden world¨ by Allan Holzman with Jesse Vint and Scott Paulin . It's a standard terror graphically gory, giving a paranoid dimension and turns out to be an ¨Alien¨ exploitation film , being a sloppy attempt to cash on this hit smash.

Following a failed voyage to the planet Morganthus, the spaceship Quest is dispatched from the Planet Xerxes for a rescue mission. Once there, the crew discovers the remains of the crew of the doomed voyage as well as a strange pyramid containing unspeakable horrors.

Galaxy of Terror is a 1981 sci-fi/horror film from producer Roger Corman. The film saw him attempt to cash in on the success of Alien much in the same way Battle Beyond the Stars was his answer to Star Wars. Once again using the talents of James Cameron who provided the impressively improvised effects, with Cameron hired as an art director and effects supervisor alongside Robert Skotak. The movie has carved quite a legacy for itself (one of infamy as well as curiosity) and while I can't say much for quality of its writing, from an atmospheric and technical perspective it's undeniably memorable.

Starting off, the writing of Galaxy of Terror is often very confused and muddled with the nature of elements such as Xerxes' "Master" or the borderline Darwin Award behavior of the some of the crewmembers making it pretty obvious plot is not this movie's strong suit. Rather than creating a streamlined narrative Galaxy of Horror is mostly a showcase of impressive effects work in both creature design and gore work and both the curiosity factor of seeing James Cameron's humble beginnings as well as the grotesque nature of the kills and creatures has given the film a lasting legacy (such as the forceful nonconsensual sexual escapades of a certain giant worm).

As far as Alien rip-offs go Galaxy of Terror is certainly memorable in its exploitation and nastiness value even though with its thin characters and borderline nonexistent story that's the only real selling point. Depending on what you're looking for Galaxy of Terror might satisfy those trashy cravings we all deny having in spite of our knowledge to the contrary.

I recently came across the Robert Englund and Sid Haig cult classic Galaxy of Terror (1981) on MAX. The story follows a spaceship crew that stumbles upon a vessel with a missing crew. As they investigate, hoping to find survivors, they instead encounter alien creatures that begin picking off the members of their own ship one by one.

The film also stars Erin Moran (Happy Days), Ray Walston (The Stand), and Edward Albert (Power Rangers), and is directed by Bruce Clark (Ski Bum and The Hammer).

It's clear that Galaxy of Terror was aiming to capitalize on the success of Alien, which had been released two years earlier. However, the special effects and action sequences here are far from the quality of Alien, and often come off as a bit cheesy. Despite being released in 1981, the film has more of a '70s sci-fi feel. Overall, it's an average to below-average entry in the sci-fi genre that might only appeal to diehard fans of Englund or Haig. I'd rate it a 5/10.

When i saw the trailer for galaxy of terror i knew it was going to be good,as a roger Corman produced b-movie it is a wild ride.sort of like alien on a lower budget.it stars Eddie Albert Jr.zalman king,Sid haig, ray walston(my favorite martian)Robert englund(nightmare on elm street) Erin Moran(Joanie on TV's happy days)and grace zabriskie(twin peaks) its bizarre science fiction horror about a group of space travelers on a rescue mission encountering terrors of all sorts,a women is raped by a giant worm,now thats bizarre.James Cameron was involved in the production.critics bashed this and it was one of the movies on the DVD 50 worst movies of all time,sorry i don't agree.its the best of the alien rip offs.7 out of 10