Captive Women

As I have stated elsewhere in this forum, film firsts should be noted and applauded even if the films they appear in are otherwise unremarkable. The vaguely titled CAPTIVE WOMEN is set in a post nuclear holocaust world where three warring tribes, "The Norms", "The Mutates", and "The Upriver People" battle each other for supremacy in and around the ruins of New York City and its environs in the year 3000. CAPTIVE WOMEN is the first film about the long term effects of nuclear war and how a nuclear war would drastically alter human society. ROCKET SHIP XM (1950) touched on this slightly, with it's nuclear war destroyed Mars and it's remaining Martians reduced to savage cavemen. In 1951 there was FIVE, but all that happened in that film was that a nuclear war reduced the number of people down to five. The plot of a nuclear war resulting in mankind being reduced to warring tribes turns up often in many later post nuclear war films, so often that it has become a cliche. Think of MAD MAX and its countless sequels and imitations. This plot was first introduced here.

However, the premise, new to films at the time, is really the only main point of interest. This story of warring tribes is rather slow going, even at a scant 64 mins. The cast looks want of direction, and most of the performances are over the top. The film is talky. The dialog is stilted and pretentious. Most of the film seems to take place at night, probably to hide the inadequate sets. The producers of this film also made THE MAN FROM PLANET X the year before on the same budget level as this, and cast some of the same people from that film. However, instead of bringing back Edgar G. Ulmer as director, they hired Stuart Gilmore, who seems to show little signs of pictorial imagination. The only interesting scene is a brief shot of the twisted, destroyed ruins of NYC. The only other point of interest is the presence of a very young Ron Randell as Riddon.

Before this film was purchased by RKO, it was titled 1000 YEARS FROM NOW, and was called 3000 A.D. in England. RKO studio head Howard Hughes dreamed up the title CAPTIVE WOMEN, which to me conjurs up images of some tawdry women in prison film and not a science fiction. Perhaps Howard thought his title had more pizzazz or something.

One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Stuart Gilmore; Written and Produced by Jack Pollexfen and Aubrey Wisberg for Albert Zugsmith Productions. Released by RKO Radio Pictures. Photography by Paul Ivano; Edited by Fred Feitshans Junior; Music by Charles Koff; SPFX by Irving Block & Jack Rabin. Starring: Robert Clarke, Margaret Field, Gloria Saunders, Ron Randell, Stuart Randell and William Schallert.

An original post-Nuclear War opus. It's mutants versus the good guys as World War III's radioactive fallout has reduced mankind to a handful of survivors living in and around the New York subways, in this science fiction-horror combo, set in 3000 A. D.

In the year 3000, the Norms, the Up-River Men, and the Mutates fight each other in, and under, the bombed-out ruins of New York City. Made less than seven years after the bombing of Hiroshima, this is one of the earliest movies to depict a 'Western' city destroyed in an atomic war. The opening images of the ruined skyline, and a later shot of a collapsed Brooklyn Bridge, are good (for the time and budget) and the plot, although simplistic, is quite compelling. The world of 3000 is intriguing: the mutates, who live on the surface, carry the marks of the "dark century" (presumably the 20th) and are shown as scarred and deformed (there is an early reference to extra fingers), and are desperately trying to breed out the problem by raiding the Norms for 'normal' women with which to mate. The Norms and the Up-River men (apparently 'normal' as well) despise the mutates and torture and kill them, both as punishment for the raids and because they think the Mutates inferior and unclean. The look of the future civilisations is standard Hollywood faux-classical/medieval and the script/delivery pseudo-Shakespearian (at one point, a mutate elder delivers a Shylockian plea for understanding when describing his people "Are we not flesh and blood? Do we not love and hate? Are we not born as you, die as you? Have we souls that are less than yours because our bodies are cursed?"). Oddly, the post-apocalyptic world seems a bit more real because, despite the mediaeval trappings and Elizabethan delivery, the characters have names like 'Rob' and 'Gordon'. The religious aspects of the film are also odd. The opening voiceover refers to "a true religion" as a legacy of the 20th century but the Norms rejected God in the aftermath of the war and are apparently now devil-worshipers while the Mutates remained Christians. Both the Norms and the Mutates know the story of the parting of the Red Sea, but the Norms as ancient myth, the Mutates as a story from the Good Book (the latter setting up the film's neo-biblical climax). 'Captive Women' is an odd title (alternate titles are '3000 A.D.' and '1000 Years from Now') and may be another biblical allusion: "When you go forth to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God has delivered them into your hands, and you have taken them captive, and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and desire her, and take her for a wife" (Deuteronomy 21:10-14) (or maybe as Bill Warren suggests, because RKO president Howard Hughes liked 'Captive Women' more). Despite the budget production values and pedestrian acting, 'Captive Women' is an interesting and watchable example of 'Atomic Bomb cinema': a cinematic relic from the earliest days of the Cold War and American nuclear paranoia.

A thought-provoking morality tale involving the dangers of atomic power, the thin veneer of civilization, and the pitting of good forces vs. bad ones. The apocalyptic glimpses of New York City in ruins (courtesy of matte painter Irving Block) and the quasi-Medieval/ancient Mediterranean costumes were definitely inspired by the science fiction pulp magazines of the 1940s, as well as the script. Acting fairly good, especially by Margaret Field (mother of Sally). The action moves swiftly, the sets are imaginative (especially the sewers where the Norms live and the tunnel that is beneath the river) and the film has a mood of haunting sadness that stays with one. A fairly expensive-looking production from producers Pollexfen, Wisberg, and Zugsmith, certainly costing more than Pollexfen and Wisberg's previous Sci-Fi classic, The Man from Planet X.

This post apocalyptic plot is not as good as THE WORLD THE FLESH AND THE DEVIL nor even LAST MAN ON EARTH but it is still worth, considering it is made by Stuart Gilmore, the former Howard Hawk's editor...he gave us some westerns, this small budget science fiction film and even a B western strarring Tim Holt. It is very short, so you won't have any excuse to despise it because of the length. It is a curiosity, but not more, let's be fair. I am not sure many audiences remind this one. For the period, it is daring, it deserves to be seen. It's not a bad film, there has been far worse. Far far worse.