Planet of the Vampires
Encyclopedia
Planet of the Vampires is a 1965 Italian science fiction horror film directed by Mario Bava
. The film stars Barry Sullivan
and Norma Bengell
. The screenplay, by Bava, Alberto Bevilacqua
, Callisto Cosulich, Antonio Roman
, and Rafael J. Salvia
, was based on an Italian language
science fiction short story
, Renato Pestriniero's "One Night of 21 Hours". The story follows the horrific experiences of the crew members of two giant spaceships that have crash landed
on a forbidding, unexplored planet
. The disembodied inhabitants of the world possess
the bodies of the crew who died during the crash, and use the animated corpses
to stalk and kill the remaining survivors.
The film was co-produced by American International Pictures
and Italian International Film, with some financing provided by Spain
's Castilla Cooperativa Cinematográfica. Ib Melchior
and Louis M. Heyward
are credited with the script for the AIP English-language release version. Years after its release, some critics suggested that the film's narrative
details and visual design appeared to have been a major influence on Ridley Scott
's Alien
(1979).
emanating from Aura, an unexplored planet. Both ships, the Galliott and the Argos, attempt to land on the surface of the fog-encased world. While entering the planet's atmosphere, the crew of the Argos becomes possessed by an unknown force and try to violently kill each other. Only Captain Markary (Sullivan) has the will to resist, and is able to force all of the others aboard his ship out of their hypnotic
, murderous state.
After the Argos lands on the surface, the crew disembarks and explores the eerie landscape in search of the Galliott. Thick, pulsating mists, lit by ever shifting eerie colors, saturate the terrain. When they finally arrive at the other ship, they find that the crewmembers have killed each other. Markary’s younger brother, Toby, is among the dead. They proceed to bury as many of the corpses as they can, but several bodies are locked inside the ship’s bridge. Markary departs to get tools for opening the sealed room, but the corpses disappear by the time he returns.
Some of the Argos’ crew are found dead. Tiona (Evi Marandi) sees their corpses walking in the ship, and becomes paralyzed with fear. Markary advises the survivors that they must escape from Aura. Unfortunately, the Argos incurred serious damage during the landing, and repairs will take time. During the waiting period that ensues, several more killings occur. In a private tape recording, Markary admits that he suspects none of them may survive.
While exploring Aura, Wes (Ángel Aranda
) discovers the ruins of a spaceship a few miles from the Argos. Markary, Sanya (Norma Bengell), and Carter (Ivan Rassimov
) investigate. Inside the ship, they discover large skeletal remains of the long dead crew and thus realize that they are not the first ones to have been drawn to the planet by the distress beacon. Markary and Sanya are temporarily trapped inside the ship, but manage to escape and return to the Argos. Carter inexplicably vanishes.
Two crew members of the Galliott, Kier (Federico Boido
) and Sallis (Massimo Righi), arrive at the Argos to steal the ship’s Meteor Rejector device. Kier escapes with the machine, but Markary fights Sallis. Markary tears open Sallis’ uniform, exposing his putrescent
body. He learns that Sallis' corpse is being manipulated by an Auran, who reveals that the two ships were lured to the planet in order for the Aurans to escape from their dying world. With the crew of the Galliott under their complete control, they plan to use the ship to escape to the humans' home planet. Markary vows to stop them.
Markary and his crew rush to the Galliott to retrieve the Meteor Rejector. They are successful, and manage to place explosives in the ship. During a struggle with the Aurans, Dr. Karan (Fernando Villeña) and Tiona are killed. Markary and Sanya return to the Argos and manage to escape as the Galliott is destroyed. After takeoff, however, they reveal themselves to be possessed by Aurans. They ask Wes, the last survivor, to join them. Wes refuses and tries to sabotage
the Meteor Rejector, but fatally electrocutes
himself while doing so. Because the device has been broken beyond repair, Markary and Sanya decide to change course to a nearby planet: Earth
.
had achieved a great deal of commercial success in the early 1960’s with Bava’s Black Sunday (1960) and Black Sabbath
(1963), as well as dozens of lesser Italian films, including several sword and sandal
pictures. Eventually, AIP heads Samuel Z. Arkoff
and James H. Nicholson
decided to coproduce some of these films, rather than just pay for the rights to distribute them, in order to have more control over their content. Planet of the Vampires was one such coproduction, financed by AIP and Italy’s Fulvio Lucisano for Italian International Film, along with some Spanish production money provided by Castilla Cooperativa Cinematográfica. AIP provided the services of writer Ib Melchior, whose previous movies had included such modest hits as The Angry Red Planet
and Reptilicus
, as well as the relatively big budget Robinson Crusoe on Mars
. Melchior wrote the screenplay for the English language version of the film, with some assistance from AIP producer Louis M. Heyward.
American Barry Sullivan
and Brazilian Norma Bengell
led the cast of international actors. Writer Robert J. Skotak reported that each castmember "used their own native language on the set, in many cases not understanding what the other actors were saying." Sullivan's lines were spoken in English, Bengell's in Portuguese, Evi Marandi's in Italian, and Ángel Aranda's in Spanish.
Restricted by a low budget, Bava was unable to utilize opticals, so all of the film’s extensive visual effects work were done “in camera”. Miniatures and forced perspective
visuals are used throughout, with lots of colored fog adding atmosphere but also obscuring the sheer cheapness of the sets. Bava explained: "Do you know what that unknown planet was made of? A couple of plastic rocks — yes, two: one and one! — left over from a mythological movie made at Cinecittà
! To assist the illusion, I filled the set with smoke."
According to Tim Lucas
, the two plastic rocks were multiplied in several shots by mirrors and multiple exposures. The planet's exterior sequences were filmed on an empty stage obscured by mists, table top miniatures, and Schüfftan process
shots.
with Daniel Haller
's Die, Monster, Die!
(1965). Planet of the Vampires has accumulated a mixed critical response over the years. Castle of Frankenstein
described the film as "Beautifully photographed Italian sfantasy with excellent sfx and superb color." Variety
s 'Dool' opined, "Plot is punctuated with gore
, shock, eerie music and wild optic and special effects...Color camera work and production values are smooth and first class...Flash Gordon
type story...should keep the young on the edge of their seats and the older set from falling asleep." Richard Davis, in Films & Filming, wrote that "Bava is tied to a grossly synthetic studio set which doesn't for a moment convince of its extraterrestrial reality...the piece on the whole is poor stuff." Monthly Film Bulletin
noted the film was, "...a triumph of mind over matter, or of Bava over a shoestring budget and appalling dubbed dialogue...[Bava] does atmospheric wonders with pastel-shaded fog and cunning camerawork." Joe Dante
wrote that the “…fabulous comic strip
sci-fi shows director Mario Bava at his most visually inventive…”Phil Hardy
’s The Aurum Film Encyclopedia
: Science Fiction noted the film was “A gorgeous atmospheric confection from Bava…Bava’s ever-moving camera creates a chilling sense of menace. The result is a triumph of the pulp
imagination.” Glenn Erickson
(aka “DVD Savant”) wrote that “Bava's stunning Gothic
variation weaves a weird tale of flying saucer
s, ray guns and zombie
s that looks like no other space movie ever filmed.” In Fangoria
magazine, Tim Lucas said "Planet of the Vampires is commonly regarded as the best SF film ever made in Italy, and among the most convincing depictions of an alien environment ever put on film."
A survey of eight internet
reviewers on the Rotten Tomatoes
website resulted in 37% of the respondents reacting negatively to the film. Of the three who disliked it, Ken Hanke felt the film "looks great but [is] dramatically lacking", and a "Ozu's World Movie Reviews" writer noted that he "lost interest in wanting to know more about the supernatural manifestations."
Several critics have suggested that Bava's film was a major influence on Ridley Scott
's Alien
(1979), both in terms of narrative
details and visual design. Derek Hill, in a review of the MGM
Midnite Movies DVD
release of Vampires written for Images Journal, noted, "Bava’s film (along with It! The Terror from Beyond Space
, 1958) was a direct influence on Ridley Scott’s 1979 big budget B-movie Alien. But where Scott’s film tried to mask its humble drive-in
origins, Planet of the Vampires revels in its origins. The film literally feels like a pulp magazine
cover come to garish life...” Robert Monell, on the DVD Maniacs website, observed, "[M]uch of the conceptual design and some specific imagery in the Ridley Scott screamer undoubtedly owes a great debt to Mario Bava's no budget accomplishments.”
One of Vampires most celebrated sequences involves the astronauts performing an exploration of an alien, derelict ship discovered in a huge ruin on the surface of the planet. The crewmembers climb up into the depths of the eerie ship and discover the gigantic remains of long dead monstrous creatures. In 1979, Cinefantastique
noted the remarkable similarities between this atmospheric sequence and a lengthy scene in the then-new Alien. The magazine also pointed out other minor parallels between the two films. However, both Alien’s director Ridley Scott and screenwriter Dan O'Bannon
claimed at the time that they had never seen Planet of the Vampires.
Tim Lucas has noted that the basic plot and ideas of the film not only inspired Alien but “continue to influence filmmakers and inspire the genre today, as witnessed by David Twohy
’s Pitch Black (2000) and Brian De Palma
’s Mission to Mars
(2001).”
In the late 1970s Atlas/Seaboard
published a short-lived comic book
entitled Planet of Vampires, which combined plot elements from Bava's film with elements of Planet of the Apes
and I Am Legend.
Mario Bava
Mario Bava was an Italian director, screenwriter, and cinematographer remembered as one of the greatest names from the "golden age" of Italian horror films.-Biography:Mario Bava was born in San Remo, Liguria, Italy...
. The film stars Barry Sullivan
Barry Sullivan (actor)
Barry Sullivan was an American movie actor who appeared in over 100 movies from the 1930s to the 1980s.Born in New York City, Sullivan fell into acting when in college playing semi-pro football...
and Norma Bengell
Norma Bengell
Norma Aparecida Almeida Pinto Guimarães D´Áurea Bengell , best known as Norma Bengell, is a Brazilian film and television actress, singer, director, producer, and screenwriter....
. The screenplay, by Bava, Alberto Bevilacqua
Alberto Bevilacqua
Alberto Bevilacqua is an Italian writer and filmmaker. Leonardo Sciascia, an Italian writer and politician, read Bevilacqua's first collection of stories, The Dust on the Grass , was impressed and published it...
, Callisto Cosulich, Antonio Roman
Antonio Román
Antonio Román was a top Spanish film director, screenwriter, film producer and film critic.During the 1940s, Antonio Román was one of Spain's most celebrated filmmakers and went on to become one of the managers of the Cooperativa Cinematográfica Castilla...
, and Rafael J. Salvia
Rafael J. Salvia
Rafael J. Salvia was a Spanish screenwriter and film director. He wrote for 81 films between 1950 and 1976. He also directed 21 films between 1953 and 1973.-Selected filmography:* Atraco a las tres...
, was based on an Italian language
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
science fiction short story
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...
, Renato Pestriniero's "One Night of 21 Hours". The story follows the horrific experiences of the crew members of two giant spaceships that have crash landed
Emergency landing
An emergency landing is a landing made by an aircraft in response to a crisis which either interferes with the operation of the aircraft or involves sudden medical emergencies necessitating diversion to the nearest airport.-Types of emergency landings:...
on a forbidding, unexplored planet
Planet
A planet is a celestial body orbiting a star or stellar remnant that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, is not massive enough to cause thermonuclear fusion, and has cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals.The term planet is ancient, with ties to history, science,...
. The disembodied inhabitants of the world possess
Demonic possession
Demonic possession is held by many belief systems to be the control of an individual by a malevolent supernatural being. Descriptions of demonic possessions often include erased memories or personalities, convulsions, “fits” and fainting as if one were dying...
the bodies of the crew who died during the crash, and use the animated corpses
Zombie
Zombie is a term used to denote an animated corpse brought back to life by mystical means such as witchcraft. The term is often figuratively applied to describe a hypnotized person bereft of consciousness and self-awareness, yet ambulant and able to respond to surrounding stimuli...
to stalk and kill the remaining survivors.
The film was co-produced by American International Pictures
American International Pictures
American International Pictures was a film production company formed in April 1956 from American Releasing Corporation by James H. Nicholson, former Sales Manager of Realart Pictures, and Samuel Z. Arkoff, an entertainment lawyer...
and Italian International Film, with some financing provided by Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
's Castilla Cooperativa Cinematográfica. Ib Melchior
Ib Melchior
Ib Jørgen Melchior is a novelist, short story writer, film producer, film director, and screenwriter of low-budget American science fiction movies, most of them released by American International Pictures...
and Louis M. Heyward
Louis M. Heyward
Louis Mortimere Heyward was an American producer and film and television screenwriter.-Life and career:...
are credited with the script for the AIP English-language release version. Years after its release, some critics suggested that the film's narrative
Narrative
A narrative is a constructive format that describes a sequence of non-fictional or fictional events. The word derives from the Latin verb narrare, "to recount", and is related to the adjective gnarus, "knowing" or "skilled"...
details and visual design appeared to have been a major influence on Ridley Scott
Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
's Alien
Alien (film)
Alien is a 1979 science fiction horror film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a highly aggressive extraterrestrial creature which...
(1979).
Plot
Two huge interplanetary ships on an expedition into deep uncharted space receive a distress signalSOS
SOS is the commonly used description for the international Morse code distress signal...
emanating from Aura, an unexplored planet. Both ships, the Galliott and the Argos, attempt to land on the surface of the fog-encased world. While entering the planet's atmosphere, the crew of the Argos becomes possessed by an unknown force and try to violently kill each other. Only Captain Markary (Sullivan) has the will to resist, and is able to force all of the others aboard his ship out of their hypnotic
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
, murderous state.
After the Argos lands on the surface, the crew disembarks and explores the eerie landscape in search of the Galliott. Thick, pulsating mists, lit by ever shifting eerie colors, saturate the terrain. When they finally arrive at the other ship, they find that the crewmembers have killed each other. Markary’s younger brother, Toby, is among the dead. They proceed to bury as many of the corpses as they can, but several bodies are locked inside the ship’s bridge. Markary departs to get tools for opening the sealed room, but the corpses disappear by the time he returns.
Some of the Argos’ crew are found dead. Tiona (Evi Marandi) sees their corpses walking in the ship, and becomes paralyzed with fear. Markary advises the survivors that they must escape from Aura. Unfortunately, the Argos incurred serious damage during the landing, and repairs will take time. During the waiting period that ensues, several more killings occur. In a private tape recording, Markary admits that he suspects none of them may survive.
While exploring Aura, Wes (Ángel Aranda
Ángel Aranda
Ángel Aranda is a Spanish film actor. He appeared in 48 films between 1955 and 1980. He was born in Andalucía, Spain.-Selected filmography:* The Arizona Kid * The Hellbenders * El Greco...
) discovers the ruins of a spaceship a few miles from the Argos. Markary, Sanya (Norma Bengell), and Carter (Ivan Rassimov
Ivan Rassimov
Ivan Rassimov was an Italian film actor of Serbian origin who appeared in many horror and exploitation films....
) investigate. Inside the ship, they discover large skeletal remains of the long dead crew and thus realize that they are not the first ones to have been drawn to the planet by the distress beacon. Markary and Sanya are temporarily trapped inside the ship, but manage to escape and return to the Argos. Carter inexplicably vanishes.
Federico Boido
Federico Boido , is an Italian film actor who has appeared in many horror films, spaghetti westerns, and sword and sandal movies. He also acted in the Sadistik photo novels and related his experiences in the film The Diabolikal Super-Kriminal.He made his film debut at the age of 26...
) and Sallis (Massimo Righi), arrive at the Argos to steal the ship’s Meteor Rejector device. Kier escapes with the machine, but Markary fights Sallis. Markary tears open Sallis’ uniform, exposing his putrescent
Decomposition
Decomposition is the process by which organic material is broken down into simpler forms of matter. The process is essential for recycling the finite matter that occupies physical space in the biome. Bodies of living organisms begin to decompose shortly after death...
body. He learns that Sallis' corpse is being manipulated by an Auran, who reveals that the two ships were lured to the planet in order for the Aurans to escape from their dying world. With the crew of the Galliott under their complete control, they plan to use the ship to escape to the humans' home planet. Markary vows to stop them.
Markary and his crew rush to the Galliott to retrieve the Meteor Rejector. They are successful, and manage to place explosives in the ship. During a struggle with the Aurans, Dr. Karan (Fernando Villeña) and Tiona are killed. Markary and Sanya return to the Argos and manage to escape as the Galliott is destroyed. After takeoff, however, they reveal themselves to be possessed by Aurans. They ask Wes, the last survivor, to join them. Wes refuses and tries to sabotage
Sabotage
Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening another entity through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction. In a workplace setting, sabotage is the conscious withdrawal of efficiency generally directed at causing some change in workplace conditions. One who engages in sabotage is...
the Meteor Rejector, but fatally electrocutes
Electrocution
Electrocution is a type of electric shock that, as determined by a stopped heart, can end life. Electrocution is frequently used to refer to any electric shock received but is technically incorrect; the choice of definition varies from dictionary to dictionary...
himself while doing so. Because the device has been broken beyond repair, Markary and Sanya decide to change course to a nearby planet: Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
.
Production
American International PicturesAmerican International Pictures
American International Pictures was a film production company formed in April 1956 from American Releasing Corporation by James H. Nicholson, former Sales Manager of Realart Pictures, and Samuel Z. Arkoff, an entertainment lawyer...
had achieved a great deal of commercial success in the early 1960’s with Bava’s Black Sunday (1960) and Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath (film)
The motion picture Black Sabbath, whose Italian title, I Tre volti della paura, translates as The Three Faces of Fear, is a 1963 Italian horror film directed by Mario Bava. Boris Karloff, in addition to appearing in the linking passages, has a role in "The Wurdalak" segment...
(1963), as well as dozens of lesser Italian films, including several sword and sandal
Sword and sandal
The Peplum , also known as Sword-and-Sandal, is a genre of largely Italian-made Historical or Biblical Epics that dominated the Italian film industry from 1957 to 1965, eventually being replaced in 1965 by the "Spaghetti Western"...
pictures. Eventually, AIP heads Samuel Z. Arkoff
Samuel Z. Arkoff
Samuel Zachary Arkoff was an American producer of B movies.-Life and career:Born in Fort Dodge, Iowa to a Russian Jewish family, Arkoff first studied to be a lawyer. Along with business partner James H. Nicholson and producer-director Roger Corman, he produced eighteen films...
and James H. Nicholson
James H. Nicholson
James Harvey Nicholson was an American film producer. He is best known as the co-founder, with Samuel Z. Arkoff, of American International Pictures.-Biography:...
decided to coproduce some of these films, rather than just pay for the rights to distribute them, in order to have more control over their content. Planet of the Vampires was one such coproduction, financed by AIP and Italy’s Fulvio Lucisano for Italian International Film, along with some Spanish production money provided by Castilla Cooperativa Cinematográfica. AIP provided the services of writer Ib Melchior, whose previous movies had included such modest hits as The Angry Red Planet
The Angry Red Planet
The Angry Red Planet is a 1959 science fiction film starring Gerald Mohr and directed by Ib Melchior. The director was given only 10 days to shoot the movie and a budget of $200,000 with which to make it.The movie was made with a CineMagic technique which was applied for all of the scenes on the...
and Reptilicus
Reptilicus
Reptilicus, a giant monster film about a fictional prehistoric reptile, is a Danish-American co-production, produced by American International Pictures and Saga Studios, and is upon close examination two distinctly different films helmed by two different directors.The original version, which was...
, as well as the relatively big budget Robinson Crusoe on Mars
Robinson Crusoe on Mars
Robinson Crusoe on Mars is a 1964 Techniscope science fiction film retelling of the classic novel by Daniel Defoe. It was directed by Byron Haskin, produced by Aubrey Schenck and starred Paul Mantee, Victor Lundin and Adam West...
. Melchior wrote the screenplay for the English language version of the film, with some assistance from AIP producer Louis M. Heyward.
American Barry Sullivan
Barry Sullivan (actor)
Barry Sullivan was an American movie actor who appeared in over 100 movies from the 1930s to the 1980s.Born in New York City, Sullivan fell into acting when in college playing semi-pro football...
and Brazilian Norma Bengell
Norma Bengell
Norma Aparecida Almeida Pinto Guimarães D´Áurea Bengell , best known as Norma Bengell, is a Brazilian film and television actress, singer, director, producer, and screenwriter....
led the cast of international actors. Writer Robert J. Skotak reported that each castmember "used their own native language on the set, in many cases not understanding what the other actors were saying." Sullivan's lines were spoken in English, Bengell's in Portuguese, Evi Marandi's in Italian, and Ángel Aranda's in Spanish.
Restricted by a low budget, Bava was unable to utilize opticals, so all of the film’s extensive visual effects work were done “in camera”. Miniatures and forced perspective
Forced perspective
Forced perspective is a technique that employs optical illusion to make an object appear farther away, closer, larger or smaller than it actually is. It is used primarily in photography, filmmaking and architecture...
visuals are used throughout, with lots of colored fog adding atmosphere but also obscuring the sheer cheapness of the sets. Bava explained: "Do you know what that unknown planet was made of? A couple of plastic rocks — yes, two: one and one! — left over from a mythological movie made at Cinecittà
Cinecittà
Cinecittà is a large film studio in Rome that is considered the hub of Italian cinema.-History:The studios were founded in 1937 by Benito Mussolini and his head of cinema Luigi Freddi for propaganda purposes, under the slogan "Il cinema è l'arma più forte"...
! To assist the illusion, I filled the set with smoke."
According to Tim Lucas
Tim Lucas
Tim Lucas is a film critic, biographer, novelist, screenwriter, blogger, and publisher/editor of the video review magazine Video Watchdog.-Biography and early career:...
, the two plastic rocks were multiplied in several shots by mirrors and multiple exposures. The planet's exterior sequences were filmed on an empty stage obscured by mists, table top miniatures, and Schüfftan process
Schüfftan process
The Schüfftan process is a movie special effect named after its inventor, Eugen Schüfftan . It was widely used in the first half of the 20th century before being almost completely replaced by the travelling matte and bluescreen effects....
shots.
Cast
- Barry SullivanBarry Sullivan (actor)Barry Sullivan was an American movie actor who appeared in over 100 movies from the 1930s to the 1980s.Born in New York City, Sullivan fell into acting when in college playing semi-pro football...
as Captain Mark Markary - Norma BengellNorma BengellNorma Aparecida Almeida Pinto Guimarães D´Áurea Bengell , best known as Norma Bengell, is a Brazilian film and television actress, singer, director, producer, and screenwriter....
as Sanya - Ángel ArandaÁngel ArandaÁngel Aranda is a Spanish film actor. He appeared in 48 films between 1955 and 1980. He was born in Andalucía, Spain.-Selected filmography:* The Arizona Kid * The Hellbenders * El Greco...
as Wes - Evi Marandi as Tiona
- Franco Andrei as Bert
- Federico BoidoFederico BoidoFederico Boido , is an Italian film actor who has appeared in many horror films, spaghetti westerns, and sword and sandal movies. He also acted in the Sadistik photo novels and related his experiences in the film The Diabolikal Super-Kriminal.He made his film debut at the age of 26...
as Keir
- Stelio Candelli as Brad
- Alberto Cevenini as Toby Markary
- Mario Morales as Eldon
- Ivan RassimovIvan RassimovIvan Rassimov was an Italian film actor of Serbian origin who appeared in many horror and exploitation films....
as Carter - Massimo Righi as Captain Sallis
- Fernando Villeña as Dr. Karan
Response
AIP released the film as the supporting feature on a double billDouble feature
The double feature, also known as a double bill, was a motion picture industry phenomenon in which theatre managers would exhibit two films for the price of one, supplanting an earlier format in which one feature film and various short subject reels would be shown.The double feature, also known as...
with Daniel Haller
Daniel Haller
Daniel Haller is an American film and television director, production designer, and art director. Haller studied at the renowned Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles....
's Die, Monster, Die!
Die, Monster, Die!
Die, Monster, Die! is a 1965 horror film directed by Daniel Haller. The film is a loose adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's story The Colour Out of Space. The story is about an American scientist who pays a visit to the estate of his fiancée's family...
(1965). Planet of the Vampires has accumulated a mixed critical response over the years. Castle of Frankenstein
Castle of Frankenstein
Castle of Frankenstein was an American horror, science fiction and fantasy film magazine, distributed by Kable News and published in New Jersey from 1962 to 1975 by Calvin Thomas Beck's Gothic Castle Publishing Company. The first three issues were edited by Larry Ivie and Ken Beale. From 1963 and...
described the film as "Beautifully photographed Italian sfantasy with excellent sfx and superb color." Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
s 'Dool' opined, "Plot is punctuated with gore
Graphic violence
Graphic violence is the depiction of especially vivid, brutal and realistic acts of violence in visual media such as literature, film, television, and video games...
, shock, eerie music and wild optic and special effects...Color camera work and production values are smooth and first class...Flash Gordon
Flash Gordon
Flash Gordon is the hero of a science fiction adventure comic strip originally drawn by Alex Raymond. First published January 7, 1934, the strip was inspired by and created to compete with the already established Buck Rogers adventure strip. Also inspired by these series were comics such as Dash...
type story...should keep the young on the edge of their seats and the older set from falling asleep." Richard Davis, in Films & Filming, wrote that "Bava is tied to a grossly synthetic studio set which doesn't for a moment convince of its extraterrestrial reality...the piece on the whole is poor stuff." Monthly Film Bulletin
Monthly Film Bulletin
The Monthly Film Bulletin was a periodical of the British Film Institute published monthly from February 1934 to April 1991. It reviewed all films on release in the United Kingdom, including those with a narrow arthouse release. The MFB was edited in the mid-1950s by David Robinson, in the late...
noted the film was, "...a triumph of mind over matter, or of Bava over a shoestring budget and appalling dubbed dialogue...[Bava] does atmospheric wonders with pastel-shaded fog and cunning camerawork." Joe Dante
Joe Dante
Joseph "Joe" Dante, Jr. is an American film director and producer of films generally with humorous and science fiction content....
wrote that the “…fabulous comic strip
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
sci-fi shows director Mario Bava at his most visually inventive…”Phil Hardy
Phil Hardy (journalist)
Phil Hardy is an English film and music industry journalist. He was born in Scarborough, Yorkshire in 1945 and studied at the University of Sussex, 1964-1969, during which time he was a visiting student at the Berkeley campus of the University of California . At Sussex he started The Brighton Film...
’s The Aurum Film Encyclopedia
The Aurum Film Encyclopedia
The Aurum Film Encyclopedia is a multi-volume reference work on cinema, published in the UK by Aurum Press and edited by Phil Hardy. The first volume, devoted to western films, appeared in 1983, with eight subsequent volumes announced at that time as "forthcoming". However, as of 2007, only...
: Science Fiction noted the film was “A gorgeous atmospheric confection from Bava…Bava’s ever-moving camera creates a chilling sense of menace. The result is a triumph of the pulp
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
imagination.” Glenn Erickson
Glenn Erickson
Glenn Erickson is an American film editor and film critic. He started in the film industry in 1975 as an editor of low budget films and later worked in minor technical crew capacities in such major films as Close Encounters of the Third Kind and 1941...
(aka “DVD Savant”) wrote that “Bava's stunning Gothic
Gothic fiction
Gothic fiction, sometimes referred to as Gothic horror, is a genre or mode of literature that combines elements of both horror and romance. Gothicism's origin is attributed to English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, subtitled "A Gothic Story"...
variation weaves a weird tale of flying saucer
Flying saucer
A flying saucer is a type of unidentified flying object sometimes believed to be of alien origin with a disc or saucer-shaped body, usually described as silver or metallic, occasionally reported as covered with running lights or surrounded with a glowing light, hovering or moving rapidly either...
s, ray guns and zombie
Zombie
Zombie is a term used to denote an animated corpse brought back to life by mystical means such as witchcraft. The term is often figuratively applied to describe a hypnotized person bereft of consciousness and self-awareness, yet ambulant and able to respond to surrounding stimuli...
s that looks like no other space movie ever filmed.” In Fangoria
Fangoria
Fangoria is an American magazine devoted to horror and exploitation films, which has a number of associated brands:* Fangoria Comics* Fangoria Films* Fangoria RadioFangoria may also refer to:* Fangoria , a Spanish electro pop band...
magazine, Tim Lucas said "Planet of the Vampires is commonly regarded as the best SF film ever made in Italy, and among the most convincing depictions of an alien environment ever put on film."
A survey of eight internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
reviewers on the Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
website resulted in 37% of the respondents reacting negatively to the film. Of the three who disliked it, Ken Hanke felt the film "looks great but [is] dramatically lacking", and a "Ozu's World Movie Reviews" writer noted that he "lost interest in wanting to know more about the supernatural manifestations."
Influence
Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
's Alien
Alien (film)
Alien is a 1979 science fiction horror film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a highly aggressive extraterrestrial creature which...
(1979), both in terms of narrative
Narrative
A narrative is a constructive format that describes a sequence of non-fictional or fictional events. The word derives from the Latin verb narrare, "to recount", and is related to the adjective gnarus, "knowing" or "skilled"...
details and visual design. Derek Hill, in a review of the MGM
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
Midnite Movies DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
release of Vampires written for Images Journal, noted, "Bava’s film (along with It! The Terror from Beyond Space
It! The Terror from Beyond Space
It! The Terror from Beyond Space is a 1958 black and white science fiction film directed by Edward L. Cahn.-Plot:The film opens with a nuclear-powered spaceship perched on the cratered surface of an alien world. A voice-over tells us that the year is 1973 and that this is the planet, Mars. This...
, 1958) was a direct influence on Ridley Scott’s 1979 big budget B-movie Alien. But where Scott’s film tried to mask its humble drive-in
Drive-in theater
A drive-in theater is a form of cinema structure consisting of a large outdoor screen, a projection booth, a concession stand and a large parking area for automobiles. Within this enclosed area, customers can view movies from the privacy and comfort of their cars.The screen can be as simple as a...
origins, Planet of the Vampires revels in its origins. The film literally feels like a pulp magazine
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
cover come to garish life...” Robert Monell, on the DVD Maniacs website, observed, "[M]uch of the conceptual design and some specific imagery in the Ridley Scott screamer undoubtedly owes a great debt to Mario Bava's no budget accomplishments.”
One of Vampires most celebrated sequences involves the astronauts performing an exploration of an alien, derelict ship discovered in a huge ruin on the surface of the planet. The crewmembers climb up into the depths of the eerie ship and discover the gigantic remains of long dead monstrous creatures. In 1979, Cinefantastique
Cinefantastique
Cinefantastique was a horror, fantasy, and science fiction film magazine originally started as a mimeographed fanzine in 1967, then relaunched as a glossy, offset quarterly in 1970 by publisher/editor Frederick S. Clarke...
noted the remarkable similarities between this atmospheric sequence and a lengthy scene in the then-new Alien. The magazine also pointed out other minor parallels between the two films. However, both Alien’s director Ridley Scott and screenwriter Dan O'Bannon
Dan O'Bannon
Daniel Thomas "Dan" O'Bannon was an American motion picture screenwriter, director and occasional actor, usually in the science fiction and horror genres.-Early life and career:...
claimed at the time that they had never seen Planet of the Vampires.
Tim Lucas has noted that the basic plot and ideas of the film not only inspired Alien but “continue to influence filmmakers and inspire the genre today, as witnessed by David Twohy
David Twohy
David Neil Twohy is an American film director and screenwriter.-Life and career:Twohy was born in Los Angeles County, California...
’s Pitch Black (2000) and Brian De Palma
Brian De Palma
Brian Russell De Palma is an American film director and writer. In a career spanning over 40 years, he is probably best known for his suspense and crime thriller films, including such box office successes as the horror film Carrie, Dressed to Kill, Scarface, The Untouchables, and Mission:...
’s Mission to Mars
Mission to Mars
Mission to Mars is a 2000 science fiction film directed by Brian De Palma from an original screenplay written by Jim Thomas, John Thomas, and Graham Yost. The film's story details a fictional portrayal of a manned Mars exploration mission gone awry in the year 2020...
(2001).”
In the late 1970s Atlas/Seaboard
Atlas/Seaboard Comics
Atlas/Seaboard is the term comic-book historians and collectors use to refer to the 1970s line of comics published as Atlas Comics by the American company Seaboard Periodicals, to differentiate from the 1950s' Atlas Comics, a predecessor of Marvel Comics...
published a short-lived comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
entitled Planet of Vampires, which combined plot elements from Bava's film with elements of Planet of the Apes
Planet of the Apes (1968 film)
Planet of the Apes is a 1968 American science fiction film directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, based on the 1963 French novel La Planète des singes by Pierre Boulle. The film stars Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Maurice Evans, James Whitmore, James Daly and Linda Harrison...
and I Am Legend.