Lifeforce
1985 Directed by Tobe Hooper
Synopsis
In the blink of an eye, the terror begins.
A space shuttle mission investigating Halley's Comet brings back a malevolent race of space vampires who transform most of London's population into zombies. The only survivor of the expedition and British authorities attempt to capture a mysterious but beautiful alien woman who appears responsible.
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Part of Dastardly Difficult December: film nr.40
Space Vampires, Umbrella shaped spaceship with bat wings, Captain Picard, Naked Female Vampire, worst acting ever (honestly they look like they need to go to the toilet really badly for the entire running time, looking all urgent. AND THEY SHOUT A LOT!!), really crappy special effects, zombie vampire zombies, blue electricity shooting all over the place, Naked Female Vampire with clothes (for a bit), MORE SHOUTING AND PEE INDUCED URGENCY, some shit with a sword........the end.
Yep. I dig it.
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OK, I admit it, I'm a fan of Lifeforce, and it's not just because of the vast swathes of nudity.* Not that I can't see the flaws - this is after all a film that (ahem) climaxes with a man able to save the earth by having sex, in fact he's so good at sex that he sends himself and his partner flying up into the air - but it is also fun, ambitious, scary and dare I say it metaphysical. It's also stubbornly British, a brilliant mix of Dracula, Quatermass, Who and Benny Hill. Much misunderstood, I honestly believe this is a lost classic.
I'm pretty certain you could argue that despite its exploitation tendencies (of which there are…
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The pitch "space vampires plus 30 straight minutes of full frontal nudity" probably won't get your movie made anymore. Maybe if the pitch was "sexy-but-chaste teen space vampires plus 30 minutes of musical montages set to Muse" you could get that sucker sold. And that's a shame.
Being that this was Tobe Hooper's follow-up to Poltergeist and has a writing credit from Dan O'Bannon (Alien), I could see why audiences were confused and disappointed when this was released. But once I realized that it was just a drive-in B-movie updated with some 80's sleaze, I got it. Oh, I got it real good.
The movie is certainly goofy, but no more so than the sci-fi films to which it's paying…
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Naked. Space. Vampire.
Ok, if for some reason you still need a reason to watch this film, let me put it another way.
NAKED. SPACE. VAMPIRE.
Still more?
How about reassuringly old-school special effects, defiantly unglamorous English locations, a possessed Patrick Stewart, dodgy 80s sexual politics, FACE BLOOD!, one of the great reaction shots in cinema history (Peter Firth, near the end, when you see it, you'll know it), underwhelming zombies, "a Golan Globus production"...
Did I mention the NAKED SPACE VAMPIRE?
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Exactly the kind of straightforward, no-bullshit, no-Kat-Dennings-figure-making-fun-of-the-movie-as-it-happens genre film that they should be making once a week over there in H'Weird. Seeing it in a gorgeous 70mm print, what popped even more than the gleefully straight-faced tone were the ridiculously detailed special effects and the downright Kubrickian anti-gravity camerawork during the scenes set in outer space.
It's not the perfectly paced rollercoaster that, say, Alien is - but it does get off to a rollicking start with a title sequence that seems to pick up in the middle of some lost Jack Kirby comic book about space vampires and keeps going from there. And until the last act, director Tobe Hooper and company mostly eschew the traditional vampire imagery which brings what actually makes vampires scary into sharp relief.
And that final shot? I don't want to spoil anything so I'll just say godDAMN - it immediately became one of my favorite horror movie endings ever.
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Following critical accounts of director Tobe Hooper overwhelmed by Steven Spielberg on the hit Poltergeist, Hooper rebounded by teaming with 80s exploitation stalwarts Cannon Studios for two big-budget sci-fi / horror genre extravaganzas. Lifeforce - about cosmic vampires releasing a plague which truly looses anarchy in the UK - is the best of the duo, the other being Invaders from Mars.
Although genre fans will undoubtedly revel in what might be termed "naked space zombie vampire chicks" the film carries an urgency that adds surprising social context to its genre fiction. Made at the outset of the AIDS crises, the vampire plague and constant sexual coupling in the film suggests the movie is a parodic response to moral panic and…
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Weird mixture of genres (Alien-like sci-fi, Body Snatcher-like invasion movie and a Zombie finale) with great masks and terrible acting. Still the entertainment factor is pretty high.
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Not a bad little 80's horror/sci-fi from Tobe Hooper. It has its problems (horrible acting, cheesy dialogue, and it runs a little too long) but it is pretty fun and unique. The concept is something I haven't really seen before. Pretty awesome practical effects for the time! Definitely gonna pick this bad boy up on Blu when Scream Factory releases it!
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Naked. Space. Vampire.
Ok, if for some reason you still need a reason to watch this film, let me put it another way.
NAKED. SPACE. VAMPIRE.
Still more?
How about reassuringly old-school special effects, defiantly unglamorous English locations, a possessed Patrick Stewart, dodgy 80s sexual politics, FACE BLOOD!, one of the great reaction shots in cinema history (Peter Firth, near the end, when you see it, you'll know it), underwhelming zombies, "a Golan Globus production"...
Did I mention the NAKED SPACE VAMPIRE?
-
OK, I admit it, I'm a fan of Lifeforce, and it's not just because of the vast swathes of nudity.* Not that I can't see the flaws - this is after all a film that (ahem) climaxes with a man able to save the earth by having sex, in fact he's so good at sex that he sends himself and his partner flying up into the air - but it is also fun, ambitious, scary and dare I say it metaphysical. It's also stubbornly British, a brilliant mix of Dracula, Quatermass, Who and Benny Hill. Much misunderstood, I honestly believe this is a lost classic.
I'm pretty certain you could argue that despite its exploitation tendencies (of which there are…
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A film that involves sexy naked space vampires shouldn't be this dull. It has all the makings of a suspenseful Quatermassy sci fi thriller but it somehow just winds up being a raggedy, plodding mess with story logic that would make Argento wince.
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This is my Second review for this film on this site, but the reason being is that this was the completely different American cut. The Distributor, Tri-star, cut the film for US audiences thinking that we weren't intelligent enough to get the nuances of O'Bannon and Jakoby's script. The final product is less interesting and scenes seem to come from nowhere but it does move along quicker, so I'll give them that. Among the glaring cuts are the opening titles with Henri Mancini's amazing theme and Larroquette's narration, most of the scientific explanation of the aliens and their lore and the great performance by Michael Gothard as the head of the SRC. Gothard played one of my favorite silent Bond…
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What the hell did I just watch?
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At around the 1 hour 20 minute mark I realised that I had no clue what was going on in this film. This continued on for the remaining half an hour. There's something about a nudey lady space vampire and every cast member shouts about her a lot, but other than that...
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Slightly dated but nevertheless entertaining film based on the Colin Wilson novel - The Space Vampires
Starring Steve Railsback, Peter Firth, Frank Finlay and Patrick Stewart although the star of the show is undoubtedly the beautiful and completely naked ( throughout the majority of the film ) Mathilda May!!!! Schwing!!!!!!