So Bad They're Good

With film, there are good movies, and then there are movies that are so bad, they're a special kind of good. In the second case, their very badness makes them so ridiculous that gawping at them in disbelief and outrage, followed by a satisfying session in which one rips them to shreds with a critical eye, brings the greatest delight.

When it comes to science fiction films and television shows, the ridiculously bad category is actually usually more fun than the good movie category. Sure, there are classic science fiction films done so well that their cleverness, artfulness, innovation and insight stand out and inspire admiration: Alien, Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey, the excellent new film Moon with Sam Rockwell, Minority Report, Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back are exciting, innovative, even moving films that transcend the limitations of their genre to appeal even to people who don't usually enjoy consuming science fiction stories.

The wide and lovable middle ground features classics that are enjoyable, tell good stories, make people think and have staying power but still have a pleasing element of campiness to them. This large batch of movies includes one of my favorite television series of all time, the original Twilight Zone series of the early 1960s (how I do love Rod Serling), as well as fun-to-watch films like the original version of The Day the Earth Stood Still ("Klaatu barada nikto!"), Logan's Run, the original Godzilla, and the original Planet of the Apes. Charlton Heston's character is such a complete jerk in Planet of the Apes that one rather enjoys his comeuppance, but you have to love his delivery when he shouts "Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!" And yes, it does have one of the greatest final scenes in film history. If you want some fun surprises with your science fiction, check out the assortment of television and movie stars who gave memorable performances in episodes of the Twilight Zone, some toward the ends of their careers, others (including Robert Redford, Robert Duvall, Burt Reynolds and William Shatner) in their younger years before they became household names.

The Godzilla film empire is one of the largest and longest running in movie history. The first Godzilla movie was actually titled something closer to Gojira in Japanese. Godzilla is the name given to the Westernized version of the film to which unnecessary narration and scenes with Raymond Burr were added to try to appeal to non-Japanese audiences. Apparently rendering the Japanese name into Roman alphabet characters as "Gojira," as is usually done, isn't exactly correct either; the proper pronunciation, as demonstrated here, sounds more like "Gozira."

There is a serious political undercurrent to the first Godzilla film. Created in 1954 at the height of the Cold War and just nine years after the U.S. dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Godzilla is an allegory about the destruction caused by nuclear war and the frightening and, it was feared, unstoppable menace caused by nuclear radiation. Though supposedly a prehistoric creature, Godzilla's monstrous size and power were said to have come from modern exposure to nuclear radiation.

Below this middle section of cheesy but relatively well-made science fiction and fantasy films is the wonderfully deep and wide basement where one finds such delights as The Creature from the Black Lagoon, Teenagers from Outer Space, The Brain that Wouldn't Die, and the assorted Hercules and later Godzilla sequels with their rubber swords, rubber suits and laughable dubbing jobs. Much as I appreciate Ridley Scott's fine direction and Harrison Ford's intensity, the classic movie Blade Runner doesn't make me laugh myself weak the way watching oiled musclemen in teeny-tiny togas wrestling with people in foam suits who are supposed to be volcanic-rock-clad moon-men does. Godzilla being challenged for dominance by a giant moth around whom two tiny fairies fly and speak in unison? Priceless. A nearly-dead Bela Lugosi embarrassing himself in Ed Wood's horrendous Plan Nine from Outer Space? Jaw-droppingly laughable. Like a car wreck, it's hard to turn away when something that awful plays out before one's unbelieving eyes.

Of course, these baaad movies are awful on their own, but are rendered even more outrageously funny when snarky commentary is added, hence the success of the delightful Mystery Science Theater 3000 television series, which ran from 1988 to 1999. This cult classic show featured a man marooned in space and forced to watch terrible movies with no company except his robot buddies while his brain is monitored by mad scientists. Over a hundred awful movies and short subjects were skewered by the hosts and robots of MST3K, who make fun of the films with voice-over commentary in real time as we watch along with them. There were two hosts over the course of the series, and while Mike Nelson did a good job, nothing can match the deadpan wit of the original host and series creator, Joel Hodgson. Each episode intermingled skits (some lame, some wildly funny) interspersed with the movie footage, including a number of special songs and outrageous inventions. This is the sort of low-budget hilarity that cable access TV was invented for.

I grew up in an era of laughably low-budget science fiction television shows. Watching and enjoying them anew with my teenage daughter evokes a special, twisted nostalgia. Ah, yes, I remember the days when television production companies could get away with reusing the same bad papier-mache rock outcropping in every single episode of a series, as they did in Lost in Space (a series which features my favorite fictional robot of all time). It wasn't that long ago when female spaceship officers of the future were revealed to be wearing scary polyester panties in fabrics that matched their tiny tunics, so short were their sexy little uniforms (and yes, I'm talking to you, Lieutenant Uhura). Thanks to the SyFy channel, DVDs of MST3K and the easy access to endless classic (and classless) science fiction films provided by Netflix, we can introduce the joys of badly acted, badly cast, badly dubbed, badly directed, underfunded and horribly scribed stories of foam-rubber monsters and space travel gone awry to a whole new generation. Look into it: it's full of stars.