The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)

"Would you look at Lumpy! He's sure grown, huh? And I think his voice is changing."

The buzz for Star Wars in '78 must have still been quite high; no doubt it was still showing in theatres, with kids desperate to catch another glimpse of that George Lucas magic in the days before VHS players allowed them to rent the film or own it for themselves. Then what better way to capitalise on the films success? A TV special, of course. Airing just in time for Thanksgiving, it seemed like not only the perfect way to sell TV advert space, but to reinforce the brand in the young viewers minds. Irregardless of intentions, something went drastically wrong somewhere, and the 'Holiday Special' has gone down in film history as one of the biggest missteps for a well-loved franchise. But is it really that bad? Does it deserve the endless ridicule it gets?

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King Kong Lives (1986)

"What the hell is this? 'Deliverance'?"

For years I had forgotten that this film even existed. I had clearly seen it a few times as a kid, probably when it landed on VHS, but then it somehow got pushed away into the dusty parts of the Attic, bar a few scenes that stuck with me that I somehow attributed to the 1976 remake. So by the time I got around to re-visiting Dino De Laurentiis' re-imagining of the 1933 classic, I was surprised to see the film didn't involve Kong having open heart surgery at some point. After digging around, I was surprised to see that there was indeed a sequel to that film, as final as it seemed in its conclusion, and I had in fact seen it. Time does funny things with memories, but are these films sometimes best left forgotten?

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King Kong (1976)

"There is a girl out there who might be running for her life from some gigantic turned-on ape."

Updating King Kong for a modern audience was never going to be an easy task, especially not in the 70's.  The original film was lodged in audiences memories for a multitude of reasons, but what endured was the heart and drama of the story, and the truly excellent special effects by stop motion pioneer, Willie O'Brien. Preserving, or indeed, improving upon the soul of the original wouldn't be the hardest task. No, the toughest part of this re-boot was going to fall on the special effects team; just how do you film a giant, "Neither beast nor man" creature in a way that would convince the more 'sophisticated' cinema fans of 1976. The challenge was going to lie in the fact that special effects hadn't really changed all that much in terms of technique since the original film in 1933; there were no computer assisted creations, and it was all going to have to be done 'in camera', meaning either stop motion or animatronics. Would the production team have the creativity and, let's be honest, madness to pull this off?

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Dragonslayer (1981)

"When a dragon gets this old, it knows nothing but pain, constant pain. It grows decrepit... crippled... pitiful. Spiteful!"

Despite a reputation for making 'safe' kids films for all the family to enjoy, there was a point in the late 70's and early 80's when Disney pushed the envelope for what many would consider to be 'children's entertainment'. It was an unusual time for it, too, as in the USA at this point the important 'PG-13' rating had yet to be invented, and would only come into existence after Spielberg terrified one-too-many children with the likes of Poltergeist, Gremlins and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. In the UK, there were similar issues, with films either receiving the rating of 'PG' or '15'. It's important enough to understand that the difference between a 'PG' in the UK and USA mean quite different things; in the States, "Parental guidance strongly suggested – most material may not be suitable for children". Whereas in the UK, " This means a film is suitable for general viewing, but some scenes may be unsuitable for young children". So basically, it meant that there were tougher guidelines for what could be shown in a PG film in the UK, resulting in many films getting a re-classification to a 15 cert (such as Poltergeist, Sixteen Candles and Gremlins getting bumped up to a '15') or else they got cut by distributors to omit offending imagines to maintain the important 'PG' rating.

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Supergirl (1984)

"Such a pretty world. I can't wait until it's all mine"

Some films get saddled with a reputation so early on in their release that any hope of success is scuppered right away. Over inflated budgets, re-shoots and terrible scripts can all lead to dreadful advanced word-of-mouth and a box office fiasco.The 1980's had its fair share of disasters, with Heavens Gate kicking off the decade in spectacular fashion with a 44 million dollar flop. The George Lucas produced Howard the Duck wallowed in 35 million loses. Ishtar came in at a mind boggling 51 million, and barely made back Warren Beattys catering bill in box office receipts. 

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The Ice Pirates (1984)

"I hope no one minds, but I have no intention of facing this sober"

Star Wars has a lot to answer for, with the glut of less-than-spectacular sci-fi films that followed it in the late 70's through to the mid 80's. With George Lucas' surprise hit, suddenly the space adventure was the biggest cash vehicle again, and studios quickly grasped at whatever scripts they could get their hands on. It was bad news for fans of serious science fiction, but the best news possible for those of us young enough to get maximum enjoyment from the wave of knock offs and wannabes. Derivative plots and themes? Who cares, just make with the laser fights and warp tunnels already!

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Cloak and Dagger (1984)

"Jack Flack always escapes"

When we were kids, the world really was our playground. Even walking to the shops with your mam could have been an adventure. Rotted old sticks became swords in our hands, cars became monsters to be slayed, roads became treacherous rivers to be crossed. Sadly, most of us grow out of the ability to totally immerse ourselves in our own creations. Well, maybe not all of us. Take the likes of 'Dungeons and Dragons'. You create your own fantasy character; a role of the dice is the difference between left and right or alive and dead, and is all played out on a fairly plain board with only your 'Dungeon Master' to keep everything in check. It seems to be hugely popular, and is played by children and adults alike. I've never played it, but I always felt it would take a lot more mental capacity than I was willing to hand over to fully benefit from the game. It was also confusing looking. I was more of a 'Mouse Trap' kinda guy...

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Days of Wonder

It was the Saturday morning routine. We would go with our mother to the local shopping centre to visit the library; dropping off old books and picking out a few new ones for the week ahead. With our intellectual needs met, my brother and I got left in the video store whilst mam went grocery shopping. It was one of the few places we were ever allowed be on our own. That usually gave us a good 45 minutes to gaze at the seemingly endless walls of glorious VHS tapes. 45 minutes never seemed like long enough, though. Especially as Saturday was the one night of the week that our folks went out, meaning we had to pick out not one, but two videos to keep us entertained for the late afternoon and evening. The poor babysitter.

The 80's was an interesting decade for young, aspiring film buffs, especially if you were under the age of 12. As we had no access to film reviews, you had three ways of finding out what to rent. One; word of mouth from your school friends. This was always a fairly reliable source; we were all action and comedy junkies, whatever had the most explosions/killings/laughs got a guaranteed rental. Two; the trailers you saw on last weeks videotape. (remember when you actually enjoyed watching the trailers before your film started?) The more trailers before the film, the better. And three; by relying on the box art to sell the film to you. The latter was probably the most common method for sleuthing out our evenings viewing.  The wilder and more imaginative the artwork, the more likely you were to pick the film up. Having an major star like Steve Martin in the film was only an added bonus. And being a curious 9 year old, it was no surprise I was drawn to the more lurid looking teenage comedy and horror boxes. Who could resist the charms of such beauty?

Sadly for me, my mother was quite well aware of what was contained within these tapes. Sometimes she slipped up and we got through a 15 Cert if it didn't look too tawdry. Or sometimes we lucked out completely and my clueless father brought us to the video store instead, resulting in a copy of Aliens or something as equally unsuitable coming home with us. But even if we couldn't always get the ones we wanted, the artwork always stuck in my head, landing somewhere on that invisible list of films that I would continuously go back to when I was a bit older and allowed rent whatever I wanted. Those hours spent in front of the video shelves turned me into the horror junkie I was to eventually become in my early teens, as they were the most taboo ones for my folks to allow us to rent. Saying that though, I probably had enough nightmares as it was with the fantasy films I was watching; they REALLY don't make them like they used to. Kids have it too easy these days.

Horror and comedy tapes became a great past time for me and some of my friends in the early 90's. We had our own (limited) cash, so we were able to rent 2 or 3 tapes in the one night if we wanted to. It was during the peak of Xtra Vision and the death of the independent video store, but to us, it meant 50p for an old rental! Somehow, all the oldies we had wanted to see were still there on the shelves, though some were moving dangerously close to the bargain bin. Some of those films never left the bargain bin, and have sadly never made it to DVD.

These days, you walk into a video store and you are lucky to be able to find any films to rent. Xtra Vision, Chartbuster, and Blockbuster have shrunk away due to the rise in downloading and online streaming. Those that remain deal mainly in current releases, video game rental and mobile phone sales. If I want a film review, I just go online. There are hundreds of free access websites for reviews and previews, without having to go anywhere to stare at the boxes. Not that you would want to anyway; the art of film poster design is as dead as VHS itself.

But hey, times have changed, and in many ways, for the better. We no longer watch our entertainment on 21" screens. Digital technology is affordable, meaning I can pick up copies of Porkys II or Return of the Living Dead, in the proper aspect ratio, fully remastered, sometimes with 5.1 surround sound (!!!) for only a few quid. I would definitely take that over pan-and-scan with poor tracking any day. I guess what I miss most is that element of wonder. That childhood excitement about seeing a film. I still get it when I'm reminded of an old VHS cover, or that rare moment when you see Chevy Chase pop up on TV.

I look forward to re-living some of those moments on this blog. Feel free to stop and stare at the boxes; take as long as you need. Old releases are only 50p for two nights. Just make sure you bring them back on time or you will be fined. And always, ALWAYS, rewind your damned videotapes.