Sometime in the future, the crew of the exploratory spaceship
Palomino encounter one of the largest black holes ever seen in deep space. But
as they draw closer to the event horizon, they see something even stranger:
another spaceship, more massive than the Palomino, which is parked impossibly
close to the black hole. The mysterious vessel, shrouded in darkness, doesn’t
appear to be in any danger of being dragged into the black hole, which has a
gravitational force that is virtually unsurpassed in the universe. It turns out
to be the U.S.S. Cygnus, a behemoth of a spaceship that was long thought to be lost.
Still under the command of its designer/builder, Dr. Hans
Reinhardt (Maximilian Schnell), the Cygnus is now crewed by an army of robots,
led by the ominous Maximilian, a floating monstrosity armed with various
stabbing weapons (Reinhardt is apparently a firm believer in good home defense).
The Palomino crew discover that the Cygnus crew had abandoned ship after it
suffered severe damage. But Reinhardt, who stayed behind to go down with this
vessel, managed to make repairs. He’s extremely pleased to see the Palomino
gang, because he’s just about to begin the greatest journey of exploration
ever known: he will drive the Cygnus directly into the black hole itself.
Released during the holiday season of 1979, The Black Hole was the Walt Disney
Company’s bid to cash in on the Star Wars craze. It’s an epic, PG-Rated SF
motion picture that spared no expense and it is definitely visually striking,
but unfortunately it’s pretty tedious and boring as well. And it’s also very
stupid. This is a movie that has a massive meteorite slam into the Cygnus and
then roll down the length of its interior--while leaving the ship still
relatively intact, with its life support still working. In other words, if
you’re looking for scientific accuracy, you won’t find it here. Another annoying
aspect is the cloyingly cute robots, one of whom is the always perky Vincent,
given voice by the late, great Roddy McDowell.
Still, the Black Hole has a great cast, led by Robert Foster as the commander of
the Palomino, and Yvette Mimieux--best known as Weena from George Pal’s original
Time Machine movie--as the lone female in the film. Psycho’s Anthony Perkins
co-stars as the science officer aboard the Palomino, and the always good Ernest
Borgnine is also along for the ride. The old school special effects (no CGI here,
folks), while paying no attention to scientific accuracy, still make for some
very good eye candy. If you’re looking for something different, and don’t mind
plot holes the size of Jupiter, then this might be what you’re looking for.
--SF
