Award winning classic sci-fi parody, produced in 1980. I uploaded my own 30 year old 2nd generation VHS tape...because it's better quality than any other, that I was able to find on the web.
Man when HBO was young and didn't have endless promos and such they used to play lots of stuff like this inbetween movies, it was sometimes more fun to watch all this stuff than the movies they were showing.
Robert Luben i totally remember all the shorts. The Bid Snit, Cock-A-Doody and this where ones I always remember. Look out for SPIKE & MIKE film festivals. It shows some of the classics along with the latest shorts.
Agreed. Even HBO video juke box. It was there I first saw Iron Maidens video Number of the Beast. HBO back then had a more playful/freeform side to itself.
I loved the man-eating videotape, this, Bambi meets Godzilla, the mini-docu-thingy about animation with a running orange alien (probably the first time I heard Kraftwerk; the alien was running to Autobahn), the clips of things like people bicycling...it was so wonderful! Anyone remember the Sorry Partner, You Lose with the coin-operated gunslinger?
omg!!!! I havent seen this in.... FOREVER!!! My brother and I used to watch this when it came on HBO,,,, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyy back when HBO was only on air for a few hours a day!
"Brown alert! Evacuate the lower chambers!" Ha! Looking thru 'View Masters'! Alien's wardrobe courtesy of Krogg of Jupiter (in the credits) Oh, my GAWD! I laughed so hard the tears ran down my leg! One of the many who saw this on HBO in 1980 (along with Hardware Wars) Thanks for sharing! "This means something!"
This and hardware Wars need to be preserved and have new transfers made. Such a time capsule of people's imagination and reaction to the first time impact of the films they are spoofing.
Neat!! In Stan Freberg’s United States of America The Early Years, Paul Frees did the narration and in The Middle Years Corey did an impression of Frees’ version. Both have done lots of voice acting. RIP Paul Frees.
I have been looking for this and Hardware Wars for years Thank You!!!! Now, i can get back to building a mountain in my living room, and its going to be keen
Still hilarious after more than thirty years,,,,what's so funny is how it sums up Close Encounters in less than thirteen minutes at a fraction of the cost,,,,,when I was a kid I loved the crazy antics of actors, now the parody makes me laugh,,,,
Growing up a local station would play this (along with Hardware Wars) to fill time if they had a movie that ended before 11. During the summers I would turn on the TV around 10:45 just to see if the movie had ended. Thought it was so funny as a kid. You really need to see Close Encounters for anything to make sense.
Thank you so much for posting this! First Choice (the Canadian version of HBO back in the early 80s) used to play stuff like this in between films. My friends and I taped this and played the living hell out of it. So great to finally see it again... 'You're blocking the road!'
I loved these short films, mostly from film school students I believe late 1970s and early 1980s. After HBO went 24 hours a day they stopped doing this. I actually have Hardware Wars on VHS.
Added nerdery: the Narrator is voice over artist, Corey Burton who has done many,many cartoons including the recent "Clone Wars" as Count Dooku and Cad Bane!
I've been looking for this for years, thanks! I saw it on an episode of turkey television on nickelodeon when I was a kid. I used to laugh so hard at the dancing railroad crossing sign and singing mailboxes. Brings me back ;)
I first saw it there too! Shows like Turkey Television, You Can’t Do That on Television, and Double Dare made that network! And the “don’t try this at home” experiments on Mister Wizard’s World were like the entry level classes for Mythbusters!
This Man's work shaped me as a human being at a very young age. Not in a creepy way as that first sentence could have been read, but in a fantastic silly way that I will be forever grateful for! When I was about 8-9 (late 80's-90's), I came in possession of a long play VHS tape that had the first 3 Star Wars Movies on it (Original not any of the MANY changed versions) as well as a bunch of Ernie's work(This, Hardware Wars, Porklips Now, and Bambi Meets Godzilla). My friends and I watched them repeatedly and I shared them with anyone that came over over the years. Often receiving a blank stare and a "what the hell was that?!". I tried to find out how to reach him years ago to thank him for his work, but it turns out he has apparently disowned it all(Which is why some dude re-posted Bambi Meets Godzilla on youtube long ago with his name(Michael something I believe) in the credits instead of Ernie's. I really wish I could change his mind. It is worth embracing and is at least responsible for two silly a$$ mofos that were raised on it. Neither of us could be more thankful for it too! Another funny part is that I saw these before I saw Apocalypse Now or Close Encounters of the Third Kind, so much later when I did see those, I couldn't stop laughing!!! I saw Apocalypse Now in Theaters for the first time(Not new of course), but I kept busting out in hysterical laughter at the most inappropriate times. Like when dude gets hit with the spear...I could only think about "suction cup arrows....", etc. I'm sure people thought I was a sadistic racist or something, it's just that I'm actually quite the opposite and those experiences up to nearly a decade later were made because of his work nearly 20 years before. I guess you never know what kind of impact your creations may have on people. I can only express gratitude, I don't know how I would cope if I wasn't as silly as he enabled me to become. THANKS ERNIE!!!
Our local library had a VHS tape with Closet Cases, Hardware Wars, Pork lips Now, Bambi Meets Godzilla, etc. We about wore that tape out, and still laugh about it today. Absolutely legendary.
Remember when HBO would show these weird, little shorts in between movies back in the day? I miss that. Thanks for posting this. I still sing the song by the mailboxes. LOL
I just got my hands on this from a 16mm print, I am transferring it in HD video right now, Should be uploaded in A 1 or 2 days, needs a little color correction, but is complete, Enjoy,
I see a couple splices at the start, but that doesn't take away too much, mine's got broken sprockets during the part introducing us to Stan and the Famous French Scientist.
HBO used to start their programs on the hour or half hour, and fill empty space with short films and videos, before MTV. This one and 'Hardware Wars' were shown a lot; Some people think they were made by the same company, but to the best of my knowledge they were separate productions. :) I also shot my resume at the Bureau of Listing To Things From Outer Space via Careerbuilder, but never got a response.
They were student films. There was another in the 80's on HBO that I loved where a bunch of people were eaten by vhs tape at some movie studio. I forget what it's called but I haven't seen it since it aired on HBO in the 80's when I was a lil kid. Funny as shit though. I wish they'd still do that. I'm sure there are plenty of great student films that could make the cut.
I used to see this all the time back when I'd rent Hardware Wars on VHS in the 80's. Sadly when we bought the HW DVD, it was just HW and all the other parodies like this from the tape were left off. So happy to see it again!
One of the best movie parodies of its time! I originally got this on a VHS rental tape. There were 4 shorts on it, Hardware Wars, Closet Cases of the Nerd Kind, Porklips Now, and I can't remember what the fourth one was. Wish someone would redo that on DVD or BluRay.
This needs to be a thing again. Short, comical spoofs of movies. The closest thing I've found was a few of the latter "NOSTALGIA CRITIC" reviews, like the reviews of the "STAR WARS" Sequel Trilogy and "MAD MAX FURY ROAD" and "'NOPE' Done With Five Dollars". This needs to be a genre. I also want to see "Sniglets" come back.
I was at an English teachers' conference last summer, and we were doing a workshop brainstorming teaching ideas. I mentioned sniglets, and one of the younger teachers asked, "What are sniglets?" Her genuine ignorance of the concept made me feel my age!
@@seanryan3020 Yeah. Again, those need to come back. Those were great. Rich Hall is still around doing comedy, as far as I know but he's now a British thing. Watching some of the Sniglets on RU-vid also reminded me of stuff that's no longer a thing that I grew up with and forgot... Like how old analog TV reception was affected by where in a room someone was standing. Also, putting aluminum foil on the antenna (and that sets had antenna).
Thank you!!!! Another piece of my very early teen years! Loved the HBO shorts from way back:-) I had all but forgotten about this one and Hardware Wars too!!!! KUDOS!!!
Haven't seen that in over 20 years. Thanks for uploading it. There used to be another really funny short, about a bunch of Scotsmen standing around in a pub talking about being abducted and getting "a good probin' ". I've been looking around for it but can't find it anywhere.
Not as well-known as "Hardware Wars," but much funnier. Anyone else notice "Steve Erkle" in the credits? Not the same spelling, but perhaps the producers of "Family Matters" liked the sound of it.
The only thing that I would have added, in keeping with the whipped cream motif, was, at the moment the former-scientist-turned-bad-actor intoned the word "pi", a cluster of pies should have come hurling out of the darkness and splattered the faces of the scientists at the Bureau of Listening to Things From Outer Space.
