In the vast catalogue of space exploration films, audiences have learned that – if anything – it ain’t safe for us out there.
Early entries were largely fraught with the difficulties of surviving in the Final Frontier due to a lack of favorable elements like air, gravity, food, and water. As the projects grew more complex, vicious alien species were introduced into the equation; and their superior skills or vastly greater intellect showed that we weren’t as high up the food chain as our comfortable confines on Earth had led us to believe. In most First Contact situations, those Earthly explorers found out rather quickly that we’d have to develop better weapons to defend ourselves from such interstellar critters or we’d face certain inescapable doom in our quest to go boldly where no man had gone before. While there have been plenty of times wherein crews outsmarted the dastardly alien bastards, space remained risky business; and any attempt to break the bonds of our world should never be undertaken lightly.
Why, even at some delicate point – once audiences grew mature enough to accept the premise and Hollywood censors relaxed their moral standards just a bit – the prospect of (ahem) alien rape entered the equation. The scene wherein the dreaded Xenomorph infamously exercised its sexual aggression on an unfortunate crewmate of the Nostromo (in 1979’s Alien) was softened for years – until a Director’s Cut saw it re-assembled – but just the very thought of its existence showed that such carnal transgressions weren’t impossible to be captured on celluloid. Ready or not, the space race eventually went there in 1981 – maybe not the first time but one of the more memorable – with the theatrical release of Inseminoid (aka Horror Planet).
Director Norman J. Warren wasn’t immune to putting women through some difficult emotional, social, and physical pacing on the silver screen.
In 1968, he delivered Her Private Hell to audiences, a kinda/sorta snapshot behind-the-scenes into the life of a pretty young lady who finds herself exposed – in more ways than one – to life as a model for risqué print magazines. One need only look no further than the poster for his Satan’s Slave (1976) – a fully nude fetching lass lies strapped to a sacrificial altar while a knife dangles precariously overhead about to pierce her virginal goodness – to see that the Horror feature was interested in a bit of gratuitousness. In 1979’s Spaced Out, Warren gave it all a jovial spin – the film is billed and remembered as a sex comedy – with female aliens arriving on Earth and finding men worth their – ahem – “scientific experimentation,” but the pattern remains the same: skin and SciFi were a match made in cinema Heaven.
Of course, this brings us to Inseminoid …
(NOTE: The following review will contain minor spoilers necessary solely for the discussion of plot and/or characters. If you’re the type of reader who prefers a review entirely spoiler-free, then I’d encourage you to skip down to the last few paragraphs for the final assessment. If, however, you’re accepting of a few modest hints at ‘things to come,’ then read on …)
From the film’s IMDB.com page citation:
“A crew of interplanetary archaeologists is threatened when an alien creature impregnates one of their members, causing her to turn homicidal and murder them one by one.”
Early entries were largely fraught with the difficulties of surviving in the Final Frontier due to a lack of favorable elements like air, gravity, food, and water. As the projects grew more complex, vicious alien species were introduced into the equation; and their superior skills or vastly greater intellect showed that we weren’t as high up the food chain as our comfortable confines on Earth had led us to believe. In most First Contact situations, those Earthly explorers found out rather quickly that we’d have to develop better weapons to defend ourselves from such interstellar critters or we’d face certain inescapable doom in our quest to go boldly where no man had gone before. While there have been plenty of times wherein crews outsmarted the dastardly alien bastards, space remained risky business; and any attempt to break the bonds of our world should never be undertaken lightly.
Why, even at some delicate point – once audiences grew mature enough to accept the premise and Hollywood censors relaxed their moral standards just a bit – the prospect of (ahem) alien rape entered the equation. The scene wherein the dreaded Xenomorph infamously exercised its sexual aggression on an unfortunate crewmate of the Nostromo (in 1979’s Alien) was softened for years – until a Director’s Cut saw it re-assembled – but just the very thought of its existence showed that such carnal transgressions weren’t impossible to be captured on celluloid. Ready or not, the space race eventually went there in 1981 – maybe not the first time but one of the more memorable – with the theatrical release of Inseminoid (aka Horror Planet).
Director Norman J. Warren wasn’t immune to putting women through some difficult emotional, social, and physical pacing on the silver screen.
In 1968, he delivered Her Private Hell to audiences, a kinda/sorta snapshot behind-the-scenes into the life of a pretty young lady who finds herself exposed – in more ways than one – to life as a model for risqué print magazines. One need only look no further than the poster for his Satan’s Slave (1976) – a fully nude fetching lass lies strapped to a sacrificial altar while a knife dangles precariously overhead about to pierce her virginal goodness – to see that the Horror feature was interested in a bit of gratuitousness. In 1979’s Spaced Out, Warren gave it all a jovial spin – the film is billed and remembered as a sex comedy – with female aliens arriving on Earth and finding men worth their – ahem – “scientific experimentation,” but the pattern remains the same: skin and SciFi were a match made in cinema Heaven.
Of course, this brings us to Inseminoid …
(NOTE: The following review will contain minor spoilers necessary solely for the discussion of plot and/or characters. If you’re the type of reader who prefers a review entirely spoiler-free, then I’d encourage you to skip down to the last few paragraphs for the final assessment. If, however, you’re accepting of a few modest hints at ‘things to come,’ then read on …)
From the film’s IMDB.com page citation:
“A crew of interplanetary archaeologists is threatened when an alien creature impregnates one of their members, causing her to turn homicidal and murder them one by one.”
A quick Google.com search suggests that sexual fantasies haven’t much changed over the years. While many of the vivid dreams really are little more than the human need to spice things up here and there, there remain those that hint of power and submissiveness playing into the roles we may not talk about as freely. This could be as simple as feeling a bit of pain with one’s pleasure, or it might grow more psychologically complex, such as role-playing wherein one partner is entirely dominated by another, even so far as being – ahem – forced to participate.
It’s into this delicate feeding ground that Inseminoid really only ventures circumstantially. While a great deal has probably been written about the film which relates directly to the – ahem – seminal moment wherein a female explorer is inseminated (or is she?) by some lumbering alien creature, the truth is that the moment is rendered far more as subtext than it is literally. With a bit of theatrical insinuation on director Warren’s part, one might interpret the scene involving the sex act in a limited variety of ways. Still, there’s a man – well, an alien one – and a woman; and it’s pretty clear that what takes place is far from consensual.
On a distant planet, a crew of archaeologists have been tasked with studying the remains of some non-human civilization. Not long after discovering some hieroglyphics suggesting some hints to a past history, the scientists discover a new chamber housing some previously undocumented crystals. A freak explosion injures a colleague, putting this planetary base on lockdown. But a two-person team caught outside in the labyrinth of stone tunnels comes face-to-face with one of the remaining aliens … and this E.T. is interested in perpetuating its own species!
In no time, Sandy (played by Judy Geeson) wakes into a dream-like state. Lying fully naked on a medical table, she sees images of the station’s physician hovering over her with a hypodermic needle in hand. But these visions slowly blur, giving her a fleeting glimpse of some thing standing at the foot, spreading her legs, and inserting a tube with curious liquid into her most private of areas. Sleep returns, and she’s eventually found by her peers and returned to the safety of the base. Before long, however, she begins to slip between her normal state and a desire to kill those that she once saw as friends.
Now, as a critic, I don’t often get ‘into the weeds.’ I’ve always believed that you can take what you want from art – there could be dozens of messages in any picture, and it’s up to each of us to determine what those possible statements might mean, if anything. What I see may not be what you see, and that’s a universal truth that’s existed since the dawn of cave paintings. This is why I’ve always encouraged my readership to take my observations with plenty of grains of salt. Ultimately, you get to decide what you like: I see it as my task to usually point out the worthy attractions on our shared journey. Nothing more.
Still, I think it’s safe to suggest that Inseminoid taps into a primal fear that females experience in their role as mothers.
No one wishes to give birth to a madman. No one hopes for the very worst for a child. It’s entirely human to question what you might be bringing into this world, and it’s equally compassionate to suspect that the world might undeserving of whatever goodness, mercy, and grace this new child might bring with it. This is where I believe screenwriters Nick and Gloria Maley were heading in their conception of Inseminoid’s odd set of circumstances; and they saw the fabric of Science Fiction and Fantasy as the cloak needed to swaddle their metaphorical infant inside. The web they spin is really little more than a monstrous whodunit – a space-based Ten Little Indians by way of Agatha Christie – and I’d argue those hoping to score wider intellectual pursuits from this effort are a bit confused. Inseminoid has no deep cultural or spiritual meaning: this is all about exploiting what goes bump in the night … and it just happens to be a homicidal woman artificially impregnated with bloodthirsty space twins.
Beyond this, Inseminoid – as a story – really makes little sense.
It’s into this delicate feeding ground that Inseminoid really only ventures circumstantially. While a great deal has probably been written about the film which relates directly to the – ahem – seminal moment wherein a female explorer is inseminated (or is she?) by some lumbering alien creature, the truth is that the moment is rendered far more as subtext than it is literally. With a bit of theatrical insinuation on director Warren’s part, one might interpret the scene involving the sex act in a limited variety of ways. Still, there’s a man – well, an alien one – and a woman; and it’s pretty clear that what takes place is far from consensual.
On a distant planet, a crew of archaeologists have been tasked with studying the remains of some non-human civilization. Not long after discovering some hieroglyphics suggesting some hints to a past history, the scientists discover a new chamber housing some previously undocumented crystals. A freak explosion injures a colleague, putting this planetary base on lockdown. But a two-person team caught outside in the labyrinth of stone tunnels comes face-to-face with one of the remaining aliens … and this E.T. is interested in perpetuating its own species!
In no time, Sandy (played by Judy Geeson) wakes into a dream-like state. Lying fully naked on a medical table, she sees images of the station’s physician hovering over her with a hypodermic needle in hand. But these visions slowly blur, giving her a fleeting glimpse of some thing standing at the foot, spreading her legs, and inserting a tube with curious liquid into her most private of areas. Sleep returns, and she’s eventually found by her peers and returned to the safety of the base. Before long, however, she begins to slip between her normal state and a desire to kill those that she once saw as friends.
Now, as a critic, I don’t often get ‘into the weeds.’ I’ve always believed that you can take what you want from art – there could be dozens of messages in any picture, and it’s up to each of us to determine what those possible statements might mean, if anything. What I see may not be what you see, and that’s a universal truth that’s existed since the dawn of cave paintings. This is why I’ve always encouraged my readership to take my observations with plenty of grains of salt. Ultimately, you get to decide what you like: I see it as my task to usually point out the worthy attractions on our shared journey. Nothing more.
Still, I think it’s safe to suggest that Inseminoid taps into a primal fear that females experience in their role as mothers.
No one wishes to give birth to a madman. No one hopes for the very worst for a child. It’s entirely human to question what you might be bringing into this world, and it’s equally compassionate to suspect that the world might undeserving of whatever goodness, mercy, and grace this new child might bring with it. This is where I believe screenwriters Nick and Gloria Maley were heading in their conception of Inseminoid’s odd set of circumstances; and they saw the fabric of Science Fiction and Fantasy as the cloak needed to swaddle their metaphorical infant inside. The web they spin is really little more than a monstrous whodunit – a space-based Ten Little Indians by way of Agatha Christie – and I’d argue those hoping to score wider intellectual pursuits from this effort are a bit confused. Inseminoid has no deep cultural or spiritual meaning: this is all about exploiting what goes bump in the night … and it just happens to be a homicidal woman artificially impregnated with bloodthirsty space twins.
Beyond this, Inseminoid – as a story – really makes little sense.
Its characters are all paper thin, and they’re about as blandly unexceptional as has ever been committed to film. Oh, one or two of them occasionally do something to hint at distinctiveness, but because the formula here is really crafted to scare audiences silly such bold and decisive character traits serve as nothing more than a delay for the next body to drop. While Geeson’s performance is a bit hammy in spots, she also scores respectable marks in conveying the unimaginable agony of both alien rape as well as the fear of not knowing what exactly is gestating inside her womb. The birth sequence is effective even if some see it as little more than unbridled screams punctuating the stillness of some endless cave. (Could there be any greater visual metaphor for life itself?)
But, sadly, that’s really all a film like Inseminoid brings to the table.
Its jump scares are acceptable though a bit underplayed. The few fight sequences devolve into some of the – ahem – worst choreography I think I’ve seen. Neither the Maleys nor director Warren really give viewers enough of the intellectual substance to fully grasp the particulars of when and where we are – much less why the story is relevant – because in the end all that matters were the frights experienced along the way. It’s never clear whose point-of-view matters here – the script eventually settles on telling Sandy’s story, but I’m never inspired to think anything strongly about her struggle one way or another. She deserves my pity, right? She deserves my empathy? Or is that sympathy? But … if she’s honestly being controlled by the demons inside her, why do I feel like she’s mostly a willing participant … if only to protect her baby? Delivering characters I can root for is the core to any good storytelling, and that’s chiefly what’s missing from this locked box killfest.
The murk is strong with this one, and I arrived at the big finish thinking, “Yeah … so what?”
Some otherwise interesting set design might tickle the fancy of those of us who still appreciate how craftsmen and craftswomen brought these places to life in the era before CGI; and yet that’s not enough to give this film anything greater than a passing glance. Or maybe I’ll just leave a card with money at the baby shower.
Inseminoid (1981) was produced by Jupiter Film Productions. The film shows presently available for purchase digitally or physically via a variety of platforms. As for the technical specifications? While I’m no trained video expert, I found the sights-and-sounds to be quite good consistently throughout the film. Lastly, if you’re looking for special features? As I viewed this one via streaming, there were no special features under consideration.
Alas … only Mildly Recommended.
Inseminoid (1981) is clearly the product of its day. With a simple Horror story set on a distant world, audiences were given little more than a brief carnival attraction – a bit of harmless exploitation – to fill a respectable 90 minutes or so with. Its performances work fine because they were never intended as anything more than sideshow attractions to the center ring of an alien-in-wait which turns out to be little more than rubber and slime. Some nice production work gets wasted in something that most folks will, likely, never see; and, yes, that’s always a shame. Geeson delivers (snicker snicker) conventionally and as the mother of gruesome twins.
In the interests of fairness, I’m pleased to disclose that I’m beholden to no one for this review of Inseminoid (1981) as I viewed it with my own subscription to Amazon Prime Video.
-- EZ
But, sadly, that’s really all a film like Inseminoid brings to the table.
Its jump scares are acceptable though a bit underplayed. The few fight sequences devolve into some of the – ahem – worst choreography I think I’ve seen. Neither the Maleys nor director Warren really give viewers enough of the intellectual substance to fully grasp the particulars of when and where we are – much less why the story is relevant – because in the end all that matters were the frights experienced along the way. It’s never clear whose point-of-view matters here – the script eventually settles on telling Sandy’s story, but I’m never inspired to think anything strongly about her struggle one way or another. She deserves my pity, right? She deserves my empathy? Or is that sympathy? But … if she’s honestly being controlled by the demons inside her, why do I feel like she’s mostly a willing participant … if only to protect her baby? Delivering characters I can root for is the core to any good storytelling, and that’s chiefly what’s missing from this locked box killfest.
The murk is strong with this one, and I arrived at the big finish thinking, “Yeah … so what?”
Some otherwise interesting set design might tickle the fancy of those of us who still appreciate how craftsmen and craftswomen brought these places to life in the era before CGI; and yet that’s not enough to give this film anything greater than a passing glance. Or maybe I’ll just leave a card with money at the baby shower.
Inseminoid (1981) was produced by Jupiter Film Productions. The film shows presently available for purchase digitally or physically via a variety of platforms. As for the technical specifications? While I’m no trained video expert, I found the sights-and-sounds to be quite good consistently throughout the film. Lastly, if you’re looking for special features? As I viewed this one via streaming, there were no special features under consideration.
Alas … only Mildly Recommended.
Inseminoid (1981) is clearly the product of its day. With a simple Horror story set on a distant world, audiences were given little more than a brief carnival attraction – a bit of harmless exploitation – to fill a respectable 90 minutes or so with. Its performances work fine because they were never intended as anything more than sideshow attractions to the center ring of an alien-in-wait which turns out to be little more than rubber and slime. Some nice production work gets wasted in something that most folks will, likely, never see; and, yes, that’s always a shame. Geeson delivers (snicker snicker) conventionally and as the mother of gruesome twins.
In the interests of fairness, I’m pleased to disclose that I’m beholden to no one for this review of Inseminoid (1981) as I viewed it with my own subscription to Amazon Prime Video.
-- EZ
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