(1982, It, 115 min) Dir Paolo Andreotti. Cast Kirk Douglas, Carl Weathers, Candy Brown.
It’s 1982. Star Wars busted all the blocks five years ago and then Alien did the same two years after that. The studios are tarting up the schlock in trade of the likes of White Star Films so White Star Films, in turn, have to start pumping in the cash to compete. Trouble is they’ve only got so much to go around. Easy – bet it all on one, a sure-fire winner, and with the profits you make two and with the profits from that… Next stop, success! It’s a sure-fire recipe for sure but a meal’s only as good as it’s ingredients, right? So what have we got here? Andreotti knows how to direct a film, sure, but the man’s getting old and he’s coming off Vendetta di Zombie, a film that doesn’t display the kind of common touch a blockbuster needs. Who’s starring too? Kirk Douglas? Didn’t he learn anything from Saturn 3? What about plot? An previously unnoticed object is detected in orbit around our sun and NASA send Captain Dale (Douglas) and his crew to investigate. Turns out this thing is a colossal coffin for some humongous space creature and something else is in there too. Something deadly. Okay, so Coffin Orbit is no Star Wars. Yes, it’s plot is basically Alien and no, it didn’t get the blockbuster market either, but every once in a while someone spends a ton of money on something mad like this and that should be cherished, even if it sunk White Star Films in the process. Just watch it for all the money up there on-screen behind the awful acting and you’ll be fine.
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