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Author
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Topic: BATTLESTAR GALACTICA!!
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Osi Osgood
Film God
Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted October 15, 2006 08:48 PM
Having read the "Jaws" review, (and having re-watched this with guests over), I thought I'd review another great digest from Universal 8 (formerly Castle films) :
BATTLESTAR GALACTICA!!
This digest runs between 31 or 32 minutes. It was released by Universal 8 in a parts one and two, which should be VERY snuggly fit on one 600ft. reel, (which I did, BARELY FITS)
This was a condensation of the first hour of the original three hour premiere movie, (which was also released to movie theaters as well!) The Story is as follows.
After credits, we zoom in on the Atlantia, where a meeting of the leaders is taking place. They celebrate the peace that has been initiated by Baltar (boo ..... hiss) with the Cylons.
Meanwhile, Apollo and his younger brother Zac (played by Rick Springfield, who would be on General Hospital and later a rock star ... remember "Jessies Girl"?) go out on patrol.
Cut back to the president of the humans and Commander Adama, (the always stoic Lorne Greene) as they discuss Adama's misgivings over this Cylon "Peace"
"Forgive me, Mr. President, but they hate us with every fiber of thier being."
"But through Baltar thay have sued for peace"
Apollo and Zac enter a mysterious space cloud, and find two Cylon tankers, and subsequentially, a whole Cylon attack fleet waiting. Thru some deft maneuvering, they outflank and destroy the first Cylon ships, but see a whole mess of Cylons coming after them, thier cover blown. Apollo and Zac, (who's ship has been hit) Hi-tail it out of there.
Adama, having returned to his ship , the GALACTCA (good guys, yay!) is informed of some irregularities concerning his patrol. He contacts the president, but Baltar convinces the president not to put the attack fleet on alert.
Sadly, Apollo has to leave Zac behind to warn the fleet, "You can fly with me anytime, little brother." He makes it back and contacts his father.
but Zac, alas, is not as fortunate, almost back to the fleet, he is destroyed! The whole Cylon fleet now attacks, and since most of the fleet were not put on the alert, no one was able to launch fighters ...
except for the Galactica'
They fight bravely but are grieviously outnumbered. The president is dumbfounded, and Baltar has dissappeared. The president's ship is given the "death squadron attack" and the Atlantia, and the president and crew are destroyed.
Adama puts one plus one together and realizes that the Cylon tankers were way out here because the Cylon Basestars were needed elsewhere; the home planets of mankind. The Galactica breaks off from the Battle and heads for home.
But too late. Strafing run after strafing run is made by the cylon fighters and the planets are left in ruins, as a tear filled crew of the Galactica watches helplessly on thier moniters. Adama chooses to head down to the planet surface to see if his wife has survived. She did not, and while the survivors are ready to string up and hang Apollo, Adama informs them that everyone who can get to a ship must leave the planets and go with the Galactica to find the last unharmed planet of mankind, "A Shining planet known as .... earth!" Lastly we see Baltar the traitor gloating over the destruction of his own people, informing the Cylons to carry out thier imperious leaders orders for mankind .... extermination! Credits role!
This is an excellent cut down of that first hour of the first three hour premiere, (later cut down to three seperate 45 minute long episodes.) While there is obviously about 10 minutes missing from the first hour episode, it is only the silly junk that has nothing to do with the main plot. Everything is there!
I'm 40, and I remember very fondly sitting in front of the T.V., with my bowl of cereal and watching this when it came out and being mesmerized by it. Next to Star Wars, this was the next best thing. The production values on this first story were above those later seen in the series and done on such a scale that it was quite believeable. The last two hours of this story were more soap opera and I'm very glad that they chose the first hour to do the digest of. As I watched this the other night I was struck by just how good this series looked. At least for T.V., special effects took a big jump up with this series.
As with the other Universal 8 releases, this has a superb quality. The sharpness is outstanding, especially from a T.V. show scource, (they may have used the 35MM masters from the theatrical release of this, but I can't say for sure.)
The colors were quite vibrant and still are, (my copies are on Kodak SP stock), what I found interesting is that I watched the DVD of the original feature, and then I watched the Super 8mm again, and I was struck by how really rich the colors are on this release. Sometimes, color balance on these Super 8 releases, (even with L.P.P. prints) can vary widely, due to bad or great color on the original negative. This one looks quite good.
On a slight note, It was nice to look at this print again, as I was able to see the Universal 8 logo in it's original color. I must admit that most of my Universal 8 prints have varying color, from good to less than good, and so the logo tends to follow suit. This Battlestar was well kept over the years and had absolutely no fade whatsoever, and it's a pleasure to watch.
The sound is good, not the absolute best mono, but certianly passable, it would be a good candadite for re-recording in stereo, as the DVD box set of the series is in glorious stereo and with only slight alterations, almost the whole first 30 minutes is represented here.
Being that they concentrated on the first hour of the three, the flow of this digest is very good, not choppy at all. Whoever did these Universal digests knew thier stuff!
On a side note, Universal released a second two part digest of a later two part (two hour) episode of this series, the super 8 release entitled "Mission Galactica" and I do not have it, but I have heard it is quite good and guest stars Lloyd Bridges as the commander of a long lost Battlestar, the "Pegesus", who rejoins with the Galactica to fight the Cylons.
A very good Universal 8 release!
Long Live Super 8mm
[ November 17, 2007, 10:51 PM: Message edited by: Osi Osgood ]
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"All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "
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Osi Osgood
Film God
Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted October 19, 2006 06:11 PM
I remember watching this series,"Galactica 1980" in which Boxey is grown and now a fighter pilot, but I really wasn't impressed with it. There was one great episode, "The Return of Starbuck", which told the story of what happened to Starbuck, a very good story. I wish that third release could have been this episode, on super 8.
I wouls still be interested to see this "Galactica 3" on super 8, but it would have to be extremely rare.
I was lucky enough to find my copy of "Battlestar Galactica" on Kodak SP. Whoever owned it must have stored it very well, as the color is perfect to this day. The ironic thing is that the color is better, in many ways, than the color on the DVD's, no kidding. I have heard that some peoples copies have not fared as well.
I also appreciate that these two parters were just the right size to fit on one 600ft. reel. The two parter of Empire Strikes Back is a little too tong to fit on one reel.
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"All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "
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