Buck Rogers in the 25th Century -- though designed as a TV series -- actually had its premiere in American movie theaters on March 30th, 1979. That's 40 years ago, today!
The film, originally a pilot called "Awakening" quickly provided a remarkable return on Universal’s investment. It was produced for a little over three million dollars (or one-third of Star Wars’ budget, essentially, in 1977) and the movie grossed over twenty-one million dollars in American theaters alone.
Perhaps
even more surprisingly, the film was generally well-received by critics, despite
its TV origins. Vincent Canby at The New York Times belittled the film as
“corn flakes” while simultaneously comparing it to the big boys: Star
Wars and Superman: The Movie. He
also noted (with grudging admiration) the ingenuity of the film’s makers.
I
remember seeing Buck Rogers in the 25th Century in theaters and enjoying it tremendously, unaware
that it had been conceived and shot as a TV series pilot and then kind of exploded into becoming a
full-fledged feature film. In 1979, the
special effects held up on the big screen beautifully (particularly the moments
in Anarchia, a ruined 20th century city inhabited by mutants…), and
the film, overall, was very entertaining. It moved at a fast clip, showed knowing good humor about its world, and was flashy in visual presentation
Today,
however, it is not difficult to detect some of the “growing pains” of this
production as it stretched from being, essentially, a kid-friendly TV pilot to
a more adult-oriented, “big” event movie.
What began as a relatively straight space adventure inched closer to a
nifty and ingenious paradigm: James Bond in Space.
This
shift in premises is best exemplified by an opening credits sequence which
features Buck romancing scantily-clad women of the 25th Century, who
pose and preen on the over-sized letters of his “name” while a Bond-like ballad blares on
the soundtrack. It’s a little bit
ridiculous, and a little bit cheesy, but it definitely captures the 007 aesthetic:
sexy women and a catchy pop-tune.
The Women of |
The women of Buck Rogers #2 |
The Women of Buck Rogers #3 |
The Women of Buck Rogers #4 |
The Women of Buck Rogers #5 |
Other moments are more clumsily folded into the narrative than the enjoyable Bondian-opening.
Late in the film, aboard the Draconia, for instance, Ardala declares she wants Buck to take her father’s “seat” on the throne. Suddenly, the film cuts to a shot of Buck -- obviously shot at some later date, on a different set -- declaring that her father’s “seat” is the furthest thing from his mind (implying it’s her seat – her buttocks – that interests him).
Thus sexual double-entendres were ham-handedly added to the production
when the shift in venue was broached. Other innuendos work a little better than this one because they arrive via the auspices of ADR or looping, and therefore we don’t get the
chance to visually note the
inconsistencies.
Another not-entirely successful addition to the original pilot sees Buck going mano-a-mano with Tigerman,
Princess Ardala’s hulking bodyguard and the film’s equivalent of Oddjob, or Jaws…a
so-called soldier villain.
There’s nothing wrong with the climactic physical confrontation between Buck and Tigerman, except that Buck faces a different Tigerman here, not the one seen throughout the film. This discontinuity is left unexplained, but Derek Butler plays the character throughout the film, and H.B. Haggerty (who returned to the role in “Escape from Wedded Bliss” and “Ardala Returns”) plays him for the fight sequence.
The two men are both imposing, but boast very different looks in terms of muscle-mass and body-type. Honestly, I didn’t notice the substitution as a kid, but the switch is impossible to miss now.
These
last minute additions to the enterprise feel somewhat jarring, even if they
add to the James Bond mystique of the thing.
A more significant problem, however, involves the thematic approach to
the material. Buck -- in both the film and the series – is raised
up as some kind of paradigm for Earth’s future, the ideal man. A professor and friend at Hampden-Sydney
College called the idea “American Exceptionalism in Space,” and he was right.
There’s nothing wrong with the climactic physical confrontation between Buck and Tigerman, except that Buck faces a different Tigerman here, not the one seen throughout the film. This discontinuity is left unexplained, but Derek Butler plays the character throughout the film, and H.B. Haggerty (who returned to the role in “Escape from Wedded Bliss” and “Ardala Returns”) plays him for the fight sequence.
The two men are both imposing, but boast very different looks in terms of muscle-mass and body-type. Honestly, I didn’t notice the substitution as a kid, but the switch is impossible to miss now.
Tigerman #1 (Derek Butler) |
Tigerman #2 (H.B. Haggerty) |
The
only problem, of course, is that Buck is from the very age on Earth that
brought about the devastating nuclear holocaust. His generation, in essence, destroyed everything. It seems strange and counter-intuitive, then,
to deride the sincere 25th Century folks -- just climbing out of a five hundred year economic and cultural hole, as
it were – for depending on computers, since the episode makes plain the
notion that ungoverned emotions and passions were what brought about the end of
20th century mankind.
These benevolent robots, acting dispassionately but helpfully, instead rely on logic and rationality. As Dr. Huer notes, they saved the Earth from "certain doom" and have been "taking care of areas where we made mistakes, like the environment."
These benevolent robots, acting dispassionately but helpfully, instead rely on logic and rationality. As Dr. Huer notes, they saved the Earth from "certain doom" and have been "taking care of areas where we made mistakes, like the environment."
So…would
you really want to go back to the approach that led to Earth’s ruin? Would you lift Buck up as a role model, or see him as a backward man
from a much more primitive time? To champion Buck, in some sense, is to champion irrationality and emotions over science and reason. This is the last thing a slow-recovering planet needs, a throwback to the violent past.
It
would be one thing if the movie noted that some balance between approaches -- logic and emotion -- needed to be struck. But the 25th century characters
are treated, in broad strokes, as gullible fools who can’t even pilot their own
star-fighters (even though those ships are built with very prominent joy-sticks designed for manual control).
It’s all a little bit…incoherent. Yet the film gets away with it because, again, of the James Bond comparison. We all know that James Bond is irresistible to all women, best in a fight or shoot-out, and supreme exemplar of style and taste. Nobody does it better, right?
Here, Buck Rogers seems to have the same magic touch. We accept the premise, in short, because we recognize it from that other franchise. But in context, the story doesn't make sense.
It’s all a little bit…incoherent. Yet the film gets away with it because, again, of the James Bond comparison. We all know that James Bond is irresistible to all women, best in a fight or shoot-out, and supreme exemplar of style and taste. Nobody does it better, right?
Here, Buck Rogers seems to have the same magic touch. We accept the premise, in short, because we recognize it from that other franchise. But in context, the story doesn't make sense.
Despite
such flaws, the movie vets an intriguing premise involving the Draconian “stealth”
attack (a kind of Trojan Horse in Space dynamic), and features at least one authentically
great sequence set in Anarchia, or “Old Chicago.” Here, Buck goes in search of his past, and
finds it…in a grave-yard.
This
scene in Anarchia is particularly well-shot, acted, and scored, and adds a significant human
dimension to the film’s tapestry. We are
reminded that Buck has lost everything.
Not just his family…but the world he knew.
Here, Buck Rogers harks back to a 1970's movie tradition earlier than Star Wars: the dystopia or post-apocalyptic setting of such efforts as The Omega Man, Logan's Run or Beneath the Planet of the Apes. I’ve always wished that the ensuing TV series had followed up on this plot-line a little more sincerely. There were many stories to be vetted in Anarchia, but in its two-year run, Buck never returned there (that we know of).
Here, Buck Rogers harks back to a 1970's movie tradition earlier than Star Wars: the dystopia or post-apocalyptic setting of such efforts as The Omega Man, Logan's Run or Beneath the Planet of the Apes. I’ve always wished that the ensuing TV series had followed up on this plot-line a little more sincerely. There were many stories to be vetted in Anarchia, but in its two-year run, Buck never returned there (that we know of).
I
should add, the special effects visualizations of New Chicago and Anarchia are
nothing less-than-spectacular, even today. Again, it’s difficult to reckon with just how cheaply this movie was made because
it features extensive, highly-detailed matte paintings, numerous space
dogfights, and huge sets (like Ardala’s throne room…replete with Olympic-size
swimming pool).
Finally,
I would be remiss without mentioning Buck Rogers’ other great “visual.” Vincent Canby writes: “Pamela Hensley is the
film's most magnificent special effect as the wicked, lusty Princess Ardala, a
tall, fantastically built woman who dresses in jewelry that functions as
clothes and walks as if every floor were a burlesque runway.”
There’s probably a case to made that Hensley is
one of the Best Bond femme fatales ever…except that she’s not technically in a
Bond film, of course. Still, the
material is close enough, and boy does she have a sense of…presence. I can't think of many actresses who could pull-off that "boogie" scene with Buck Rogers here. But Hensley disco dances with the best of them, retains her character's regal sense of dignity, and is awfully sexy...
Pamela Hensley as Princess Ardala |
I liked this 1979 pilot movie better than the changes in the series season one and radical changes in season two.
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