Sometimes also listed as 'Planet of Blood', 'Queen of Blood' is a 1966 sci-fi horror film directed by Curtis Harrington and starring John Saxon, Judi Meredith, Basil Rathbone, Florence Marly and Dennis Hopper. It's set in 1990, which although is now 22 years in the past, was 34 years in the future at the time of the film's release!
Florence Marly as the alien in 'Queen of Blood'
Scientists receive a distress call from an alien ship that has crash landed on Mars and a rescue party are sent from Earth to assist them. A sole survivor is rescued and taken on board the ship. However, those on board realise something is wrong when, after unsuccessfully trying to feed the alien, the crew member assigned to guard her is found dead. The alien had eaten blood / flesh after hypnotising him!
They then try to get home in one piece as quickly as they can, before the extraterrestrial vampire has the chance to claim another victim. Will they survive?
The plot alone might not convince you to watch 'Queen of Blood', but how can you resist tag lines like:
"A deathless witch, who devours men, turns the Milky Way into a galaxy of gore!"
"From planets yet unknown comes out of this world HORROR!"
"Hideous beyond belief...with an inhuman craving!"
"In space, no one can hear you scream", but on a spaceship, everyone can
Partly to make up for the lack of a Science (Fiction) Sunday post yesterday (thank you internet connection! -.-) and partly because it's a fantastic monster, today's Monster Monday scarer is The Alien from the, er...'Alien' franchise. I'm just going to focus on The Alien (or Xenomorph as it's sometimes referred to) from the original 1979 movie, because they develop and change over the course of the series, taking on the traits of their various host species. So, that said, on we go...
After the crew of a freighter spaceship answer a distress call eminating from an unknown moon, following which a member of the crew, Kane, is then attacked by a parasitic alien that attaches itself to his face (hence the name 'Facehugger') via a tube the it inserts into his mouth. Following this, he goes into a coma for hours, but then, seemingly of its own accord, the Facehugger releases him, dies and Kane then seems perfectly fine.
However, the Facehugger had not, in fact, released him as the crew had previously thought, but had instead implanted a different parasite into his lungs. During a rather gory, and extremely memorable dinner table scene, this new invader, the Chestburster, explodes out of Kane's chest and scuttles away.
The Chestburster
This Chestburster then goes onto become the gorgeously disgusting and overtly sexual androgynous adult Alien. Dripping in copious amounts of goop, bleeding acid and sporting razor sharp teeth, it does huge amounts of damage to both the ship and any crew members caught in its path. The Alien is both scary and awesome and the same time; a "perfect organism. Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility" (Ash, 'Alien').
A less dripping, but still fascinating, lifesize
Alien suit that I saw at Torquay Museum
Credit for the design goes to surrealist artist H.R. Giger, who came up with the initial Alien design based on his 'Necronomicon IV' work, as well as the Facehugger, Chestburster, Space Jockey and alien ships. (If you've never seen Giger's work before, you need to. It's amazing! He also did the designs for the extraterrestrial in 'Species' too). However, some the praise for the long-limbed, phallic-headed alien also needs to go to director Ridley Scott and the effects team that helped to realise Giger's artistic visions of the creature on film, as well as 7'2" tall Bolaji Bodejo, who was the eponymous 'Alien' for the movie.
Super reviling, but somewhat alluring, The Alien is an aesthetically stunning, bizarre and merciless monster. Excellent!
"What lives on the Moon?"
After the mission of Apollo 17 there was an unrecorded 18th Apollo that landed on the Moon. But the astronauts faced something they were not expecting. In the void of space and the dark of the Moon, a group of astronauts confront a being not of our world.
