1965, Italy. Starring Leonora Ruffo, Mario Novelli, Roland Lesaffre, Kirk Morris, Alfio Caltabiano, Leontine May, Nando Angelini, Giovanni De Angelis, Mirella Pamphili, John Sun, Gordon Mitchell. Directed by Pietro Francisci.

Futures come and futures go, and every decade seems to bring a different version of the future. In the 1990s, it was Blade Runner meets gothic fetish. In the 1980s, we were all going to wear big shoulder pads and do our hair up like new wave women. In the 1970s, we were all going to wear drab coveralls and live in domes or something. All these futures are pretty lame, and we can each be thankful that we have yet to do that "passing the glass orb" dance that was all the rage in the Buck Rogers television show.

I think most readers of this website will not bother to argue with me (since you either agree or know I won't listen) when I assert that far and away the best future we've ever had was the future as imagined during the 1960s. Now that was some great stuff. All us guys were gonna kick ass and have cool suits, and all you gals were gonna sport outlandish miniskirts and see-through tops. And best of all, we were all going to do it to really cool music.

Those people who got their future from the 1990s have to listen to Ministry and Ramstein. Sad sacks who got their future from the 1980s have to listen to the most godawful synthesizer scores imaginable as they tease their hair and layer on the make-up for that look best described as "like Grace Jones, but gaudier." And of course the 1970s people have to listen to even lamer synthesizers and sometimes even "futuristic" disco music that uses the sound effect "byew" a lot. If you get your future from the 1960s however, you get to fly around with a sexy sidekick while your futuristic hi-fi blasts some swanky lounge tune or crazy electronica full of moogs and theremins.

While most everyone had it pretty good in the future of the 1960s, no one had it better than the Italians, and I still mourn the day that we diverged from the vision of the future as imagined by 1960s Italian science fiction. While woman's miniskirt was short, the Italians went and made them that much shorter.

2+5: Mission Hydra is a perfect example of what the future was supposed to be like according to the Italians, and damn it, we should have listened to them! Our movie opens with a peasant making some discovery that may very well change the life of every single human being on the face of the planet, while a narrator explains to us that a peasant is busy making a discovery that may very well change the life of every single human being on the face of the planet. Shortly thereafter, we follow a group of scientists, one of whom is old and the rest of whom all look like bodybuilders. Just how many bodybuilding scientists are there in the world anyway? I'm not saying that scientists can't be buff, or that bodybuilders can't have an interest in quantum mechanics, but to be either a bodybuilder or a scientist requires extreme dedication to your institution. It seems like you wouldn't have enough time to be both.

These scientists are the kinds that were all over the place back in the 1950s and 1960s. They are good at everything. According to the plot, they are investigating a geological anomaly, which would make you think they were all a bunch of very buff geologists. But as we will see later on, not only are all these guys masters of all things having to do with the crust of the Earth, but they are also accomplished astrophysicists and spaceship pilots. Apparently, the geology department at the university I attended was sorely lacking in some of the basics of the field, such as being able to instantly comprehend and fly alien spacecraft. All they did was fiddle about with rocks.

As was often the case, the aging Professor Solmi has a daughter named Louisa who is so beyond hot that you can't even measure her with a standard thermometer. Her job will be to sass the men and walk around in hot pants, panties, mini skirts, and those leathery see-through space bikinis we all know and love. The investigation of the anomaly is apparently some sort of classified project, so exactly why Solmi is allowed to bring his daughter along is puzzling, but I guess the official reason would be, "She's really sexy."

When the team finds an entrance to a vast underground cave, they decide to investigate. What they find surprises everyone: a spaceship buried beneath the earth. Then two Chinese secret agents show up. Actually, they say, "We are not Chinese. We are oriental. We do not work for that People's Republic that has chosen to work with your country." So who do these guys work for then? And was there really mass secret agent mutiny over China's decision to "work with" Italy? I mean, the Chinese gotta get their hot pants from somewhere.

Back down on the spaceship, we learn that in accordance with most 1960s science fiction, it is captained by a real bombshell of a gal, and her and her crew are waking up. What do you know? Her crew consists of two guys - one of whom is Kirk Morris! Any fan - or enemy - of sword and sandal films will be very familiar with him, as he was one of the real workhorses of the peplum genre. Morris starred in one of all-time favorites, Conquest of Atlantis, in which the mighty Hercules teams up with some Arabs to battle the underground forces of Atlantis, their sexy queen, foppish wizard, and army of prancing bronze robots in blue body stockings. Director Pietro Francisci was himself a veteran of the peplum genre, which had begun dying a slow death round about the time this movie came out. Morris had already worked with Francisci on the films Hercules, Samson, and Ulysses, and was also director of the two films thay pretty much started the entire sword and sandal genre, 1957's Hercules and 1959's Hercules Unchained, both starring the legendary Steve Reeves.

Just to make the sword and sandal connection that much more complete, another staple of the genre, big man Gordon Mitchell, shows up in a cameo via a viewscreen as the high commander of the aliens!

The captain of the ship, Phena, also has at her disposal some colossally useless robots who were apparently modeled after the Archie Bunker body type. Why would you build your robot to be fat and out of shape? I mean, your regular crew consists of two huge, buff guys. Why not model after them instead of thinking, "Hey, let's make a robot who would fit the name Corky!" The robots are there to basically wander very slowly around the cave before getting shot to death by one of the Chinese agents who is not Chinese, but is instead oriental. In the 1960s, just about all robots moved with the grace, dexterity, and speed of a wingless, one-legged buzzard. I don't know why no one ever thought to build robots that haul ass and could do flips. What the hell good is a robot who walks around with all the mobility of a corpse or can't even bend its legs? Those people from Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah, may have chosen to build a robot with a receding hairline, but at least they made him able to run really fast.

The Chinese agents who are not Chinese but are instead oriental march everyone down into the cave, where they shoot the robots and then all get captured by the woman in charge of things. She seems polite enough, but insists that they help her and her measly crew repair the spaceship, which crash landed on earth some two years before. Rather than work on the ship then, the aliens decided to simply take very long naps in hopes that an old scientist, his bodybuilding assistants, and his ultra-hot daughter with lots of eyeliner on might happen along to lend a hand. What can I say? The plan worked perfectly.

In order to ensure cooperation, Phena makes everyone put on very bulky orb necklaces that can film and record every move as well as deliver a deadly shock of electricity should people get out of line. It would seem to me that politely asking for help would have been a better idea, but whatever. I guess if you have an all-seeing death ray orb necklace thing, you might as well use it.

Everyone sort of putters around for a few minutes while Louisa tries on a variety of sexy outfits. She apparently went spelunking with a bag packed full of various flashy garments. One of the scientists gets a little too uppity, so overzealous crew member Murdu kills him with that orb thing. He then waltzes in and announces their plan to take the humans with them after the ship is repaired, which is accidentally broadcast to those Chinese guys because Phena was still pressing the "let everyone hear our secret plan" button. Pretty lame technology that lets the people you're spying on spy right back at you.

Everyone is pretty angry about the whole Murdu killing a guy thing, but just as the authorities figure out something sinister is afoot, the captain makes everyone help her launch the spaceship, which they do. I don't know why. This results in much hilarity as Louisa forgets there is no gravity. Every single film made in the 1960s features a person in space who forgets there is no gravity, but unlike them, this one was wearing a short skirt and sexy black thigh-highs. Despite the fact that one of their friends has just been murdered by a space alien who has kidnapped them all and made them fly into space, the scientists all take time out to have a good laugh as Louisa writhes around with her dress floating up around her head. Wouldn't you do the same?

Cap'n Phena explains that she is sorry for kidnapping them, but she needed their help in order to launch. She says she'll return them to Earth as soon as possible, though I'm not sure that isn't right at the moment. Everyone seems to be a good sport about it except those Chinese guys, who at this point are coming across as the only two intelligent people on the whole damn ship. One of the scientists whiles away the hours by flirting with the captain while Louisa flirts with crewmember Belsi (or something like that), played by Kirk Morris. When they aren't engaging in the age-old ritual of courtly love, Phena and Louisa enjoy swapping clothes so the captain can feel what it's like to be a real 1960s Italian hipster and Louisa can feel what its like to wear a leather bikini with a fishnet midriff.

Meanwhile, the space forces of Earth sort of mount a really lame pursuit of the ship, with some guy at a Mission Control type console yelling about how "The fate of the planet hangs in the balance. All our lives depend on this." It is never explained why the lives of everyone on Earth depends on a few guys catching a few other guys in a space ship. It's not like they triggered a doomsday device or are going out to fetch a conquering fleet. The only damage they did to Earth while taking off was maybe scorching an acre or two of farmland.

Anyway, everyone is floating around in space, and the Chinese guys eventually get fed up with all this and stage a revolt, which succeeds in about one minute when they just haul off and shoot Belsi and Murdu. For some reason, this pisses off all the hostages despite the fact that, well hell, they've just been shanghaid a million miles from home and Murdru mercilessly slaughtered one of their best friends. They argue about whether they should go to planet Hydra like Phena wants, or just head back to Earth. That would seem to be a foregone conclusion. Whatever the case, they decide to land on a random planet. Something about a misalignment of rotors or something like that. You know, spaceship stuff. They also do a blood transfusion which, for some reason, restores Belsi and Murdu to full health.

While the captain gets to give the usual space alien speech about "my people do not have this human emotion you call. love," everyone gets ambushed by some shaggy sasquatch monsters who wave sticks around. Deciding that this is, perhaps, not the best place for the picnic, they all hop in the rocket and take off again, frying most of the sasquatches in the process. They then stumble across a derelict spaceship and argue over whether or not the transmission coming through is in Russian or Bulgarian. What they should be amazed by is the fact that there are Russians or Bulgarians flying around hundreds of millions of miles away from Earth.

They do some space walking where they need to wear nothing other than a plastic little snorkel, only to discover that the inhabitants of the Russian - or possibly Bulgarian (what with the Bulgarians being so advanced in the space race) - rocket are long dead and somehow turned into skeletons. When the professor replays the flight recordings, everyone finds that the Earth has been destroyed by nuclear war. Phena then gasses all the men for no good reason, and they land on her home planet of Hydra, where they find that Hydra's civilization has been destroyed by nuclear contamination! Ha ha ha! Joke's on you!

What a weird, downbeat ending to an otherwise stupid but enjoyable sci-fi adventure. It comes out of nowhere and I assume was meant to be a real "makes you think" sort of shocker. It just seems a bit goofy to me, but then we are talking Cold War here, and we all moved with broad, obvious strokes back then. I guess the plot is sort of a rip-off of This Island Earth, only with both planets getting destroyed instead of just one.

Most of this movie makes no real sense, and for the most part people behave in absurd ways simply because the script demands it. Everyone seems real laid back about the whole kidnapping thing, including the kidnappers, who allow their captives to pretty much wander around and do whatever they want. But of course, the Italian genre films that make much sense are few and far between. What people want from them are wild sets, outlandish sexy costumes, crummy special effects, and guys punching stuff. Well, you get all that, and sometimes it is being done by Kirk Morris. Although not a whole lot happens from scene to the next, there is still a decent pace that prevents the movie from getting boring, and just as you're starting to feel your patience nagging you, they'll toss around some space monkey monsters or the Chinese guys will do something rational like try to take over the ship since it's established early on that everyone on board instantly figures out how to fly the thing around.

The special effects are on the cheap side even for the 1960s, but all things considered, I've certainly seen worse. The shaggy monsters are alright, and anyone familiar with the science fiction of the time will be happy with all the wobbling planets and shots of rocket ships emitting flame and blue smoke that wafts upward even in the vacuum of space. The scenes of the destruction of Earth are pretty good, so I assume they were clipped from another movie. The futuristic city of planet Hydra look like a really well done middle school diorama. All things considered, I can safely say there is not a single special effect in this movie that is less believable than something you might find in Angry Red Planet.

Besides the puzzling hopeless ending, the other curiosity about this film is the title. I understand the "Mission Hydra" part, but what's the deal with "2+5?" I guess maybe there were five scientists kidnapped, plus the two Chinese secret agents in their sunglasses and black suits (standard issue for all secret agents at the time), but that's really not a detail that I feel is so important it must be highlighted in the title.

In 1977, in the wake of the phenomenal success of Star Wars (I refuse to call it A New Hope), someone got the bright idea to retitle this movie as Star Pilot and release it in an attempt to cash in on the science fiction craze. It didn't really work.

Italian science fiction can often be a long and difficult experience, but this movie manages to be good in a very classic b-movie sort of way that simply doesn't exist anymore. It's corny, shoddily written, and full of the most astoundingly bad logic you can imagine, but it's also a glorious look at the sort of Saturday matinee fare that can be tremendous fun in spite of, and probably because of, it's sundry shortcomings. While the apocalyptic ending comes completely out of left field and seems to have absolutely nothing at all to do with the rest of the movie, it's easy to ignore it since you've just watched ninety minutes of strapping men and buxom Italian beauties in crazy little outfits.

Now honestly, isn't that the way things should have been?

Labels: Science Fiction, Year: 1965