Destination Outer Space! concludes at Trailers from Hell, with director and TFH creator Joe Dante introducing Gothic grandmaster Mario Bava’s “Planet of the Vampires.”
Bava leaves his corpse-strewn
crypts behind and takes off into deep (and scary) outer space. In doing so he
simply transforms the spaceships into intergalactic haunted houses (though sans
cobwebs). Britain’s Monthly Film Bulletin accurately pegged this lurid
Italian-Spanish-US mash-up as “a triumph of mind over matter, or of Bava over a
shoestring budget and appalling dubbed dialogue”. It comes replete with the
director’s usual stylistic flourishes including the oddly fetishistic space
suits worn by the beleaguered astronauts and a super-saturated red and green
color scheme that suggests sinister Christmas tree lighting.
Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here.
