Touches You

The Worst Film Ever

Sadly Over-hyped

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

This film is often grouped with Gene Roddenberry's "Genesis II" and "Planet Earth." The big difference is that Roddenberry didn't participate in this film. For those who are not fond of Roddenberry rather campy style of writing, you'll find this film a more sober depiction of his imagination. This film completely lacks the campiness and bulges at the seems with seriousness. There's nearly zero humor in this film. The astronauts (except Saxon), and many of the characters they meet, maintain a stoic demeanor. The director's choice to hold shots during dialogue adds an additional layer of subtextual realism. The entire film maintains a sense of dis-ease. However, the first episode/story suffers from poor set and costume design. The second episode fares much better.

This weak attempt at a apocalyptic Earth premise was, IMHO, a thinly veiled rip-off of Gene Roddenberry's "Genesis II" / "Planet Earth" pilots, down to the name of the organization that ran the space station/hibernarium being the same, "Pax". They went so far as to cast John Saxon (perhaps not the greatest actor of his time, but would do very well in many other roles) in the lead, drawing cries of plagiarism from the sci-fi fan community. Gone, perhaps lost forever, if we're lucky!Many ask why Roddenb2erry didn't seek some legal recourse through the Writer's Guild against this painfully leeched premise? He probably didn't want to grant it any more attention than it already didn't deserve.

This was the third attempt to get a series from Gene Roddenberry's Genesis II concept, this time without any involvement from Roddenberry. The basic plot is similar to many SF series with returning astronauts traveling across a new Earth after some sort of cataclysm, searching for remnants of their civilization. As an example of what the regular series might look like, the pilot is broken into two separate stories. The first involving a culture who may have discovered the secret of immortality. But, at what cost? The second, more elaborate episode follows the astronauts into a battle for survival against a tribe of primitive forest dwellers. Well made and cast with well known actors, the pilot is action packed and interesting, but tired at the same time.

Possible spoilers (but unlikely).I saw this movie on TV in 1975. I don't remember much. All I actually remember is a shot of star John Saxon using a crossbow he made from an old automobile leaf spring. The premise of the film is similar to two previous TV movies written by Gene Roddenberry:Genesis II, starring Alex Cord as Dylan Hunt (1973)Planet Earth, starring John Saxon as Dylan Hunt (1974)I don't know whether Roddenberry had anything to do with this 1975 John Saxon film, or whether Saxon's character was Dylan Hunt. The IMDB database does not say. I suspect there was no official connection between this bad 1975 film and the film Saxon made in 1974 for Gene Roddenberry.