Showing posts with label The Fly. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Fly. Show all posts

Thursday, August 16, 2012

The Fly II

 Released Year: 1989
Directed by Chris Walas 

Casted by:
Eric Stoltz as Martin Brundle
Daphne Zuniga as Beth Logan
John Getz as Stathis
 Story:
Several months after the events of the first film, in which scientist Seth Brundle became a mutant hybrid of man and housefly, Martin Brundle, the son of Seth Brundle and Veronica Quaife, is born. His birth is under the control of Brundle's employer, Antonius Bartok, owner of Bartok Industries (which financed Brundle's teleportation experiments). Veronica dies during childbirth, leaving Martin in the custody of Bartok, who plans to exploit his unique condition.

Martin grows up in a clinical environment, and is constantly subjected to studies and tests by uncompassionate scientists. His lifespan is quickly accelerated as a result of his mutant genes, but he also possesses a genius-level intellect, incredible reflexes, and no need for sleep. He knows that he is aging faster than a normal human, but he is unaware of his insect heritage, having been told that his father suffered from the same rapid aging disease that Martin himself is afflicted with.

As Martin grows, Bartok befriends him, amusing him with magic tricks, and tells him that a "magic word" needs to be a secret word that can never be confided to anyone or else it would spoil the magical effect. When Martin is three years old, he has physically aged into a child of around ten. He frequently sneaks out of his quarters. One night he finds a room full of laboratory animals, where he befriends a Golden Retriever. The next night, he sneaks out again to bring the dog some of his dinner, only to find the animal is missing. Searching for the dog, Martin makes his way into an observation booth overlooking Bay 17, which contains Seth Brundle's two surviving Telepods. Bartok's scientists are attempting to replicate Brundle's experiments, and are using the Golden Retriever as a test subject. The teleportation fails, leaving the dog alive but horribly deformed. The mutated animal attacks and maims one of the scientists, and young Martin is horrified by the spectacle.

Two years later, Martin's body has physically matured to that of a twenty year old adult, and his intellect has grown perhaps even faster. On his fifth birthday, Bartok presents Martin with a bungalow on the Bartok facility's property, and offers him the chance to perfect his father's Telepods. In the past five years, Bartok and his scientists have not made any progress in getting them to work successfully again after they were damaged on the night Brundle died. Bartok expresses his hope that Martin will be able to finish what his father started, and apologizes for the dog, stating that the animal was quickly put out of its misery after the failed teleportation experiment.

As he begins work on the Telepods, Martin befriends Bartok employee Beth Logan. They grow closer together as Martin tries to get the Telepods to function correctly. Eventually, Beth invites Martin to a party at Bartok's specimens division. Breaking away from the party, Martin discovers that Bartok lied to him; the mutated dog has been kept alive as a specimen for the past two years. He runs out of the party and later sneaks down to the animal's holding pen. The deformed dog, in terrible pain, still remembers Martin, who ends its misery by euthanizing it with chloroform, which caused Martin much grief. The next day, Bartok asks if Martin is aware of the break-in at the specimen pit. Martin coldly says "No," and Bartok smiles (realizing Martin is lying) as he states that Martin is finally growing up.

Eventually, Martin gets the Telepods to function properly (after realizing that it required creative thinking, just as his father had), and he and Beth Logan become lovers. However, he also learns the truth of his father's fate, his own biology, Bartok's motives, and of a possible cure to his condition. Unfortunately, the cure, which involves swapping out Martin's insect genes for healthy human genes, requires the sacrifice of another healthy human being, who will in turn suffer a grotesque genetic fate as a result.

At this time, however, Martin's dormant insect genes awaken and the signs of his transformation begin. Martin escapes from Bartok Industries after Bartok reveals his plans--Bartok intends to use Martin's unique biology and the Telepods for his own corrupt ends of power and control. Even though Martin had successfully repaired the telepods, Bartok is unable to use them as Martin has installed a password along with a computer virus attached, which will erase the Telepods' programming if the wrong "magic word" is entered. Bartok knows Martin had indeed been listening to him when he was a child, and that they will never figure out the "magic word" without him.

Martin and Beth flee and go on the run. They go to visit Stathis Borans (who's become a reclusive, embittered drunk since Veronica died in childbirth), who confirms to Martin that the telepods are his only chance for a cure. Martin and Beth take Borans' Jeep and check into a motel, but Martin's physical and emotional changes become too much for Beth to handle, and she surrenders them both to Bartok in desperation. Before Martin becomes fully enveloped within a cocoon, Bartok tries to get him to reveal the password, but Martin refuses.

As Martin enters the final stages of his transformation, Beth is brought to Bay 17, where Bartok interrogates her about the "magic word." Meanwhile, the fully transformed "Martinfly" emerges from his cocoon and ruthlessly stalks and kills those trying to subdue him, as well as taking revenge on his betrayers. Despite the brutal methods he uses to eliminate the security team dispatched to recapture him, a trace of Martin's former humanity remains, as demonstrated by his refusal to harm a rottweiler that was sent to sniff him out and refusing to harm Beth.

After arriving in Bay 17, Martinfly grabs Bartok, types in the password "DAD", and forces himself and Bartok into Telepod 1, gesturing for Beth to activate the gene-swapping sequence. Despite Bartok's pleas for mercy, Beth activates the sequence, and when the two are reintegrated in the receiving telepod, Martin is restored to his fully human form, his fly genes now removed from his body, and Bartok suffers the fate of becoming a freakish maggot like monster. In an ironic twist, in the final scene the mutated Bartok is placed in the same specimen pit where he had kept the mutated dog.
  L² Scored: 7/10

L² Comment:
Hmm, this is not bad. Eric Stolz very American boy look, love the way he is in the movie and he can act :) The fly mutant monster looks more funny this time, which i think is not really a good thing. Though the first movie's fly is more ugly, but i feel more real of it... however, the storyline is not bad... where can i find the first 3 movie during 1950s?

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

The Fly 1986

 Released Year: 1986
Directed by David Cronenberg

Casted by:
    Jeff Goldblum as Seth Brundle
    Geena Davis as Veronica Quaife
    John Getz as Stathis Borans
 Story:
 Seth Brundle, a brilliant but eccentric scientist, meets Veronica Quaife, a journalist for Particle magazine, at a meet-the-press event held by Bartok Science Industries, the company that provides funding for Brundle's work. Seth takes Veronica back to the warehouse that serves as both his home and laboratory, and shows her a project that will change the world: a set of "Telepods" that allows instantaneous teleportation of an object from one pod to another. Veronica eventually agrees to document Seth's work. Although the Telepods can transport inanimate objects, they do not work properly on living things, as is demonstrated when a live baboon is turned inside-out during an experiment. Seth and Veronica begin a romantic relationship. Their first sexual encounter provides inspiration for Seth, who successfully reprograms the Telepod computer to cope with living creatures, and teleports a second baboon with no apparent harm.

Flush with this success, Brundle wants to spend a romantic evening with Veronica, but she suddenly departs before they can celebrate. Brundle's judgment soon becomes impaired by alcohol and his fear that Veronica is secretly rekindling her relationship with her editor and former lover, Stathis Borans. In reality, Veronica has left to confront Borans about a veiled threat of his (spurred by his romantic jealousy of Brundle) to publish the Telepod story without her consent. Upset, Brundle teleports himself in Veronica's absence, unaware that a common housefly is in the pod with him. Brundle emerges from the receiving pod, seemingly normal. Seth and Veronica reconcile, and, shortly after his teleportation, Seth begins to exhibit what at first appear to be beneficial effects of the process—such as increased strength, stamina and sexual potency. He believes this to be a result of the teleporting process "purifying" his body as it was being rebuilt. However, he soon becomes violent, and eventually realizes that something went horribly wrong when his fingernails begin falling off. Brundle checks his computer's records, and discovers that the Telepod computer, confused by the presence of two separate life-forms in the sending pod, merged him with the fly at the molecular-genetic level.

Over the next few weeks, Brundle continues to deteriorate, losing various body parts and becoming progressively less human in appearance. He theorizes that he is slowly becoming a hybrid creature that is neither human nor insect (which Seth begins referring to as "Brundlefly"). He starts to exhibit fly-like characteristics, such as vomiting digestive enzymes onto his food in order to dissolve it, and the ability to cling to walls and ceilings. Brundle realizes that he is losing his human reason and compassion, and that he is now being driven by primitive impulses he cannot control. Attempting to find a cure for his condition, Brundle installs a fusion program into the Telepod computer in order to dilute the fly genes in his body with pure human DNA. To her horror, Veronica learns that she is pregnant by Seth, and she cannot be sure if the child was conceived before or after his fateful teleportation. Veronica and Borans persuade a reluctant doctor to perform an abortion in the middle of the night, but Brundle abducts Veronica before the abortion can be carried out, and begs her to carry the child to term, since it could potentially be the last remnant of his untainted humanity. Veronica refuses, afraid that the child will be a hideous mutant. Meanwhile, Borans breaks into Brundle's lab with a shotgun and comes to Veronica's rescue, but is seriously injured and nearly killed by the almost fully transformed Brundle, who dissolves Borans' left hand and right foot with his corrosive vomit-drop enzyme.

Brundle then reveals his desperate, last-ditch plan to Veronica — he will use the three Telepods (the third pod being the original prototype) to fuse himself, Veronica, and their unborn child together into one entity, so they can be the "ultimate family". Veronica frantically resists Brundle's efforts to drag her into Telepod 1 and then accidentally tears off his jaw, triggering his final transformation into a monstrous combination of man and insect. The "Brundlefly" traps Veronica inside Telepod 1, then steps into Telepod 2. However, the wounded Borans manages to sever the power cables connected to Veronica's Telepod with his shotgun, allowing Veronica to escape unharmed. Breaking out of its own pod as the fusion process is activated, Brundlefly is gruesomely fused with chunks of metal and other components from Telepod 2. As the mortally wounded Brundlefly-Telepod fusion creature crawls out of the receiving pod, it silently begs Veronica to end its suffering with Borans' shotgun. A devastated Veronica hesitates for a moment, and then pulls the trigger, killing Brundle.
 L² Scored: 10/10

L² Comment:
A remake of the same name movie in 1958, 1986 version has always been one of my old time favorite horror movie :) Love the make up of the fly and how it transfer. I think Jeff Goldblum did a good job in the action of a fly. And as i rewatch this movie, i found that he is kinda hot too :) No wonder Geena Davis married him after this movie~