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Released by: Kino Studio Classics
Released on: March 1st, 2016.
Director: Herbert L. Strock
Cast: Herbert Marshall, Constance Dowling
Year: 1953
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The Movie:
Produced by Ivan Tors and directed by Herbert L. Strock in 1953, Gog made its home video debut (hard to believe it never hit VHS!) courtesy of MGM's Limited Edition Collection of MOD/DVD-R releases for catalogue titles in a bare bones full frame release reviewed here. Now the film gets its high definition debut in its proper aspect ratio and with some extra features courtesy of Kino Lorber's awesome Studio Classics line.
When the film begins at a top secret military base where a couple of scientists have finally perfected their method of freeze drying cute little monkeys! Why would they want to do this? To use that same technology on people so that we can send them on really long trips into outer space on ship manned by robot pilots, that's why! Unfortunately for the aforementioned scientists, something goes horribly wrong and both he and she wind up accidently frozen to death, victims of their own progress.
Given the bizarre nature of the deaths, a government agent named David Sheppard (Richard Egan) is asked to investigate, which is just what he does with some help from team leader Dr. Van Ness (Herbert Marshall) and his former lover, Joanna (Constance Dowling). All signs points to someone having intentionally locked those poor dead scientists in the freeze chamber - but who? It turns out that it might have less to do with the human element on base than with the NOVAC supercomputer that runs the place and the two robot henchmen, GOG and MAGOG (and anyone who went to Sunday school knows that those names mean bad news!).
This has been a tough one to see until now, so how does it play out? Well, there's a lot to like about this movie, and most of that has to do with the set design and the robots themselves. Obviously the inspiration for the Daleks and playing with some interesting themes of 'man versus machine' long before 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Terminator came along, this is a very cool movie that takes place on some interesting looking and very colorful sets. Killer robots are pretty much always a good time at the movies and when our Biblically named antagonists are tearing up the screen the movie is essentially firing on all pistons.
Getting there, however, can be a bit of a chore. The opening sequence with the monkeys and the frozen scientists is all kinds of awesome and then from there things slow down quite a bit in the middle. We wind up with long stretches of talk without a whole lot happening to hold our interest. The cast all do a fine job with the material but the script really slows down for a good long while. Thankfully the ending is good enough to make this worth sitting through and even in those slower stretches the film has got more intelligence to it than your average low budget sci-fi picture, but yeah, there are definitely some pacing issues here even if ultimately the good outweighs the bad.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Gog arrives on both 3-D and 2-D versions from Kino (restored by the 3-D Film Archive), the 2-D version in AVC encoded 1080p high definition in the film's proper theatrical aspect ratio of 1.66.1 and it's quite an improvement over the aforementioned MOD/DVD-R release. Detail is nice and strong and color reproduction is excellent. Skin tones look great and there's nice texture and depth throughout the film. Some minor print damage pops up here and there but it's definitely minor, just small specks never big gouges or scratches.
The only audio option available is a DTS-HD 2.0 Mono track in English, there are no subtitles or dubbed options present. The dialogue is clean and easy to follow and the levels are nicely balanced meaning that you'll have no trouble understanding the performers underneath the score and sound effects. You'll notice better depth and stronger clarity here compared to the previous release.
Supplements start off with a commentary track from films historian Tom Weaver, 3-D expert Bob Furmanek and musicologist David Schecter that's done with a good sense of humor without really talking down about the movie. Weaver starts off solo, explaining that he couldn't really find tons of information on the film, though he notes that it's the third film in a trilogy. From there he gives us as much information as he can about Michael Fox and the other cast members, the use of computers in the movie, the use of animals in features, the sets, the locations like the secret underground base in the desert, the effects and more. Thirty-some odd minutes later, Furmanek takes over and talks about the use of 3-D in the movie, how it was composed for widescreen play, and how it was the 'only 3-D feature from the golden age' to have a specific title made for the 3-D version. He also talks about how around the time the movie played, interest in 3-D had waned and it wound up actually only having five theatrical play dates. He then goes on to talk about how the 3-D version was restored, how impressive some of the compositions are and quite a bit more. Weaver takes over again and then just before the one hour mark Schecter chimes in about Victor Young's music company winding up owning the music that Harry Sukman composed for the film. He then makes some interesting observations about the use of music in the movie and basically gives us a serious history lesson in Sukman's work in film scoring.
Director Herbert Strock is interviewed here for eight and a half minutes from an archival piece recorded in 2003. Here he talks about how this was the only 3-D picture he'd directed and how hard it was to see in 3-D, the cameraman that he used on the film, working on a low budget to get the feature completed, how United Artists decided to release the movie flat for reasons unknown to him, working with monkeys in the film and more! A second interview gets Natural Vision co-creator Lothrop Worth on camera for nineteen minutes in another archival interview. Here he talks about how he helped create the 3-D process used for this feature, some of the technology needed to create a 3-D movie and how it works, different people that he worked with in the film business over the years, and other 3-D features that he was involved with during his time making movies.
Additionally we get a seven minute restoration demo where the technical director of the 3-D archive joins Furmanek in an explanation of what went into fixing this one up to get it into the condition you see it in on this release. Trailers for Gog as well as The Mask, the original theatrical release of The Bubble and the reissue of The Bubble, static menus and chapter selection are also found on the disc.
The Final Word:
Gog is not a great movie but it has some great moments that make it easy to look past the slower, talkier parts and enjoy the robot based mayhem that makes it as fun as it turns out to be. Some cool effects and fun performances work well alongside some great set design and make this one that fifties sci-fi buffs will appreciate, even if it's not likely to make anyone's favorites list. Kino's Blu-ray debut for the film presents it in its proper aspect ratio in a really nice HD transfer with some fine extra features as well. If you're a fan of the movie, this one is worth upgrading on.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
