I always thought about 100 people would watch a video like this. So thanks for checking it out and leaving a comment. I have enjoyed reading your thoughts on The Black Hole. It is fun to find other people that enjoyed the same things you did when you were younger, which is what this channel is all about.
Did you know it was almost rebooted? After the project fell through Ron Howard used the footage in the reshoots of Solo which saved a ton of money because so much CG was already done for the black hole.
Yes the black holes in The Maw were meant to be a reboot of this movie. Disney found out black holes don't actually look that and canned it. Give it a few more years and another reboot attempt will happen.
First vhs ever rented as a kid, on our new machine.. ALWAYS loved it! Epic despite the lame r2d2 knockoffs (props to Maximilian for being legit).. truth about the sets!
Its fatal flaw was that it was two different films. One was a kids version of Star Wars, with those goofy floating robots, and the other was a fairly disturbing horror film.
That is a very good way of looking at it. I do wonder if the original idea was horror/thriller and Disney bought it and tried to make it family friendly.
@@Kalamain I believe it was originally supposed to be more along the lines of The Poseidon Adventure in space. But Disney bought it after Star Wars and then, yeah, I think they tried to steer it more in that direction. Another example of the perils of creating by committee.
@@troubadour723 Yeah... If they wanted THIS kind of film... Why buy THAT kind of script? I will never understand some people. I also wonder if this was Disney's original attempt to run into the family/sci-fi genre and... They missed... Shame really as I think that the Black Hole would have made for a good horror movie... All the basics were there!
The floating robots were way more bad ass than R2D2. The way Vincent destroys the Evil Maximilian robot is almost oddly sexual. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-n5pOiyD4h6E.html
You are so right! After I finished the edit and posted, I realized I should have said a lot more about John Barry's score. I think I even recorded some audio talking about it but forgot to insert it. Ugh.
This is actually one of my favourite films, mostly because of the visual effects. Some of the best miniature and matte work ever done, especially considering the time it was done.
Yeah I remember reading the short Golden Books version and then I actually saw it years later. Amazing movie! One of my favorites of old school Disney!
I saw The Black Hole when I was 9, during its theatrical run. It was amazing. I bought two of the models based on the movie - the Cygnus and V.I.N.C.E.N.T
I was 7 when I saw it,Loved it,bugged Mum to get some of the action figures.Got Dan,Charlie,Kate,Harry,Alex,V.I.Ncent,Maximilian and Reinhardt.No B.O.B though ☹️They’re all lost to time now..
We could be twins. I saw it as well when I was 9 in the theater. My Cygnus model was hung from my bedroom ceiling with fishing line. I also had the VINCENT and MAXIMILIAN models.
This movie deserves so much more love and acknowledgement than it gets. I think I'm still scarred by the scene where Kate takes the mirrored mask off of one of the 'crew'.
Maximilian cutting through Anthony Perkins' book and into his chest was akin to the scene in Alien with the chest bursting alien when I was a kid. The Black Hole is a great dark movie that I think should be re-made.
@@thunderfeet - I don't think they had much say in the matter. Reinhardt probably reprogrammed the sentry robots, put the black android S.T.A.R. in command, rounded up the crew, executed any who disagreed, and got S.T.A.R. to oversee the conversion of the remainder into silent, programmable 'Humanoids' to run the Cygnus. Whilst this was going on, Reinhardt was building Maximillian, to take over from S.T.A.R., who knew too much. I stick by my 'Haunted House In Space' description, as, apart from Reinhardt, everyone on board the SS Cygnus, was either robot, or lobotomised humans, who might as well be dead. There you go. That's kid friendly entertainment, from Disney, right there. 🤔🤔🤔
Along with Tron, this film is so damn underrated. I saw this in the theaters, and there has been rumors for decades that The Black Hole was going to get a sequel, but then Disney released Tomorrowland and bought Marvel.
Me agree. At the time I had no idea what the hell was going on in Tron. About 11 years later I was majoring in Computer Science and it clicked for me obviously. Tron was a very intelligent movie that didn't spoon feed you like most other movies did/do. You really had to understand how computer main frames work and as well as code to understand that film....
@@soldierski1669 I saw it as a child as well, and the final shot "in hell" was absolutely mind blowing to me then AND now. Gives me "Dante's Inferno" vibes. Some say it was religious, but to me it was more metaphysical and archetypal, and what hooked me for multiple viewings. It also seems like a precursor for the idea of transhumanism (the merger of man and machine) leading to a dark dystopian future.
The Black Hole is from a period I call "Dark Disney", in which The Disney Corp. explored more somber, adult oriented themes. Another product of this era I can recommend is the movie "Dragonslayer" from 1981.
@@edmund184 put the crack pipe down and walk away!😜 i really enjoyed The Black Hole, but it isnt nearly as good as any on his list except maybe Moonraker. generally only hardcore sci-fi people really remember TBH, but folks that never even SAW the other films remember most of them.
The effect were for the most part...top notch for The Black Hole....performances too. Lotta name actors in this flick. This was not a cheap movie to make 20M in 79 is about 80M+ today. Disney went all in with this flick.
@@scottdoesntmatter4409 Absolutely. This genre was a big shift for Disney....they used a different distributor name. Don't get me wrong....there is some corny stuff in the movie like Telepathy with a robot which was silly....the shootout challenge with the black robot too. But when 12 years old....entertaining.
@@sci-fyguy7767 And Tron still fares well in the shadow of Woke Joke Disney despite it's allegory to God (user)and Man (program) and the MCP's attempt to stamp out the programs' "religion" and faith in the users.
Saw his movie upon its release at Christmastime 1979 with my fellow 8th grade friends after school as we were going into our holiday break. You know that feeling of excitement you get when you are on your first afternoon of your school vacations, and we were all together watching this cool movie. I loved it and even have the paperback.
Thanks for resurrecting this! Great movie. My dad was a motion picture projectionist and he got lots of free movie merch for me and my sister. Even years after 1979, we used to have our meatloaf and mashed potatoes dinner plates served on The Black Hole themed plastic placements that our dad scored for us. Yoghurt from Spaceballs was right - it's all about merchandising!
This movie scared the shit out of me as a 5-year-old. Maximilian the robot ripping that guys insides apart using his machine hands. The entire movie was dark and haunting, especially that ending. This came out the same year as Star Trek the Motion Picture, and their tones were very similar. This is back before PG-13, which Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom introduced I believe, so one could really pack a lot of adult content into PG. This is 3 years before Tron, another completely original Disney sci-fi story that is of course much better remembered.
I saw it in theaters when I was 10 and it creeped me out! Maximilian was scary, and the crew with the silver masks! A side note, the robots on Six Million Dollar Man/Bionic Woman creeped me out, when they removed the face to see the robot parts underneath. To this day, I am creeped out by that!
This movie is amazing. What's strange as an adult now the movie is vastly entertaining. As a child, it just scared the crap out of me. The Moby Dick references, the redemption at the end, all of it, it really hits home. Things you miss as a child. Thanks for talking about this movie.
@@johntracy72 Curious decision not to change the robot's name. It must have been confusing on set. "And Maximillian enters here --". Off stage: "I do what now?"
Right? As a then 12 year old it was scary...after the Maximillian/Maximillian Schell merge....standing on that mountain with all those burning souls below.....sheesh.
Totally; you could go to watch Star Wars and be scared in some scenes but overall it was a positive and bright movie, and then with this one it was more of a thriller/scary movie to be honest, with some space stuff in it.
I loved the movie when it came out. I was just a kid and it opened up my mind while also scaring me. Saw it again a couple of years ago, and though some of it is dated, it's still a damn good film, so stunning and beautiful.
I'm genX and saw this and SW in the theater. It was pretty amazing for the time and still holds up, but in a more retro-sci-fi way. The soundtrack was pretty amazing too. The main theme song still gives me chills: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-HJ0X46mUfiw.html
Saw it as well as a little kid in the cinema. Some scary moments that made me slide down my seat each time. When i crawled down one time i heard someone behind me say "there he goes again". From then on i never blinked when facing scary movie moments again. 😀
Absolutely one of my childhood favourites. The musical score was thrilling and haunting. It scared the hell out of me, but mesmerized me at the same time.
For me, as a ten year old at the cinema, it went completely over my head. I didn't realise it was meant to be hell! It was simply a hellish planet on the other side which wasn't worth the jeopardy, or journey. But, with the superficial knowledge of Milton, it's intriguing, if tonally jarring.
I saw it in the theater back then and to me, Even all these years later, Disney's Black hole is one of those cult classics that I still love to watch every once and a while.
Same here. I vividly remember entering the theater with its flashy cardboard standup featuring a slow-spinning black hole. I've watched it multiple times over the years.
My parents took me to see this at the drive-in theater when I was about 8, I absolutely loved it…from that opening haunting music with the flat plane green grid that took a dive into the black hole….to that crazy ending….I still love this movie to this day, and revisit every so often. Wish I still had those action figures of Vincent and Maximilian!
The mystery hook of the Black Hole (1979) was later echoed in Event Horizon (1997) nearly 20 years later. I always enjoy scenarios where people especially trained for tough situations are thrown into situations much tougher than what they were trained for. Aliens (1979), Aliens 2 (1986) and Dog Soldiers (2002) followed this same scenario. All these creative endeavors were highly original and very creative.
The Black Hole was and is an underrated masterpiece. I loved it when it came out, have watched it numerous times still and I watched this and the original Tron when I first got Disney + before watching anything else on it. Please, let's have more disasters like this!
Another sci-fi film that is criminally underrated is Silent Running, from 1972 and starring the excellent Bruce Dern. Like 'The Black Hole', it has robots, a giant ship, great special effects, and an 'unusual' ending. The story is apocryphal, heart warming and incredibly sad at the same time. It left a huge impression on me.
This film (like Tron) was underappreciated at the time. I remember seeing this in the theater and the ending weirded me out a little as a 9 year old kid. I wondered how Dr. Rinehart could breath as he floated in space. The ending was a symbolic inferred message of the afterlife that wasn't as clean and simple as the Death Star blowing up.
The novelization ended a little different; When they emerged from a "White hole" on the other side, they had been broken down into component pieces of matter.... But, they were still alive. Vincent and Kate's telepathy had kept them all together as one gestalt consciousness spread over all the physical matter that had composed their bodies. They went on to become parts of stars, planets, gas clouds, etc. in the new universe while remaining conscious and connected. 😮
@@TheNoiseySpectator Even crazier - there was a comic book series where they emerge on the other side into an alternate universe for continuing adventures, but the series was never completely released.
This was one of the first times I ever saw a 'Cathedral Starship' 😁 Also, Disney may hot have intended it, but this was their first 'Horror Movie': A Mad Scientist obsessed with traveling through a Black Hole (something everyone else thinks is impossible); He transforms his entire crew into 'Undead' beings/acolytes; his one servant is a almost demonic robot that kills someone by Sawing Through Their Chest!! 😬(and strangely enough, an actor best known for portraying a Killer himself 😄). In the end, he tries to go through the Black Hole, but ends up merged with his Demonic Robot in what appears to be Literal Hell.....damn, this was "Event Horizon" before 'Event Horizon' 😅
It's a beautiful ship. Some years ago we were at an art store at a mall and lo and behold they had a framed print of the Cygnus. The description for the item didn't call it that or even mention The Black Hole but that's what it was. So we picked it up for my mancave and it's been there ever since.
I’m so glad to have found this. I always liked this movie, but sort of accepted the poor reviews as authoritative. But I’m older and wiser now, and have learned to trust and accept my own opinions and judgments. I will rewatch this again soon with a more objective eye, and not one influenced by outside opinions.
I showed this movie to a friend of mine and he made a pretty good comparison to another movie called Event Horizon. I thought about it and saw a lot of similarities between the two movies. I would definitely want to see a modern version of the Black Hole.
I’ve always loved this movie. I saw it at the cinema when it came out and loved it then, and still love it when I rewatch it now. The robot Maximilian is one of the scariest robots in movie history in my view.
The scariest thing about him is that he has never heard of Asimov, and doesn't give a shit about those '3 Laws of Robotics' that we keep repeating. So, yeah... Nightmares. lol
I saw this in the theater when I was 7 and was hooked hard. I was also pretty intimidated by Maximillian, for me he was every bit the symbolic villain as Darth Vader. I found running across the walkway with the fiery asteroids rolling in completely terrifying. My parents got me the vinyl record version of the movie, which back then was the closest you could get for experiencing it at home. We only had a few movie albums, chief among them Star Wars and the Empire Strikes Back, and I listed to the Black Hole just as much as those two. The soundtrack is still absolutely spectacular to me.
The Black Hole was a great movie! I saw it in the theater when it came out. It was Disney's first PG movie and it had a great cast. I re-watched it recently and, IMHO, it still holds up. I wished they made a sequel to show what happens after they go through the black hole.
A comic book attempted to continue the story; only thing I remember from it were its characters looking nothing like the movie's actors and discovering an identical ship to their own.
A sequel, Brian? The great epics of World history do not and cannot have "Sequels". Everything has changed so much by the story that things cannot go back to the way they were. I encourage you to look up the novelization of the movie, and read over the last few pages. I liked that ending so much better than the ending of the movie. (Astonished emoji). ... But, I don't have time to write out an explanation of it, right now. 🏃🏼♂️💨
I had the audio book version of this as a kid (the one that had book with a cassette tape that beeped when you were supposed to turn the page). I was absolutely hooked on it! I don't think I saw the movie until many years after that. In fact, I might not have ever actually seen the movie, and only recognize it from the book!
interesting trivia: You mentioned TRON as an equally brave attempt at a different type of film and for TRON's initial test shots of frisbee action, they used Black Hole crew robot costumes for those test shots.
I love the intro sequence with the green spacetime frame. As I´ve heard this was the most complex CGI to this date. And then John Barry´s score - it felt like the Black Hole was singing a siren´s song, luring the space traveler into its´ deadly gravitational embrace.
Like you, I watched this as a child, I'd be around 11 years old, and I fell in love with the film. The huge ships, cute robot VinCent, the awesome, but evil robot, Maximilian, the special effects and the music too. All set a round the mysterious phenomenon we call a black hole. I was hooked. I haven't watched it for many years, but I still remember it fondly. Sadly, many of the cast have now left us, but they were a talented bunch.
I actually rewatched it only a few months back and while yes the special effects are not that impressive, the story and setting is still good. The ending, well, thats "strange" but you can always switch it of once the enter the black hole ;)
I'm still watching it every now and then. It's still a good movie. It's mysterious and dark in some ways but a movie about a interstellar black hole is just captivating. The effects were very good at the time as well. The visuals of the Cygnus just gave the viewers the illusion of how titanic in size the ship was. The rail car added depth to its colossal size. But overall Disney did something special with this one and it show despite the strange ending.
What do you think it meant, the ending. Sure at the very end, they emerged into what we now would call a "baby universe", but before that, inside the black hole. Do you think what they witnessed was real?
As an adult of 54 now, I remember watching this when it came out and I loved it but was terrified of it. The evil robot was so cool. Late last year, I started watching it again but had to stop part way through when it got to the crew scenes-It still scares me. I'm plucking up the courage now to finish watching it. Imagine that. Great film with a great and atmospheric music score.
You and I are contemporaries, Dave. 😀 It was one of my all time favorites. I have a question for you to consider after you have watched it all, again. Did the ending really happen? Or did they just imagine it,while they were inside the black hole? Let me know what you think...
Love this movie. Watched as a child in the cinema and still rewatch every few years. I even won a contest with Nestle for a copy of the soundtrack on vinyl, which I treasured (I still have the vinyl and the letter that came with it)
This is probably one of my absolute favorite bad movies of all time - I celebrate it every chance I get, because so much of it fits together. I can't call it a GOOD movie because the parts that don't fit are pretty glaring, but you're right. This is a puzzle that ALMOST fit together perfectly. Not to mention the best robot death scene ever. "Carry on the tradition -- we'll never be obsolete."
In the Top 10 list of cinemas most scary robots, he probably scores place 1, 2 AND 3 🙂, place 4 will be kept empty just to point out the gap, with only place 5 staring with the "Terminator" skeleton. His design is spot on menacing and scary.
This was one of two movies that gave me nightmares as a child. (the other being "Time Bandits.") Today, I love both movies. As for the Black Hole, just look up the theme song and tell me that's not the creepiest theme you've ever heard...
These movies were the one thing that kept Disney on my radar. I was in my 20's and beyond the warm fuzzy years of the 60's Wonderful World of Disney. They were one of the few studios making some real experimental movies like this and TRON. The fact I went to and enjoyed these type movies while most did not always told me something about people like me - we were not sheep. The only thing I can say about the movie itself after reading the book first was they changed the ending. The book suggests that after passing through the black hole our protagonists became 'more', perhaps evolving as they now had a form of telepathy which they use lightly while travelling towards some bright 'future', while the film goes religious on us - in essence the Black Hole killed everyone and they 'got what they deserved'. Bit of a cop out but the general public never was too bright.
One of my favorite childhood sci fi movies, i actually had a kids book version with screen shots from the movie...a few years ago I was trying to remember the name of the movie just to try and find it to show my kids. Brought back memories for sure
I loved this movie as a kid, though I was too young when it was released (3yo). I later read the comic-book adaption in the Donald Duck magazine and saw the movie a million time on VHS. Absolutely loved it, esp. the droids and their human-like behavior
Saw it in the theater as a little kid and I loved it - especially the shots of the black hole and the external spaceship panoramas. I also really liked the music, it created a pretty creepy atmosphere. Recently watched it again and still quite enjoyed it.
Great analysis! This film gripped me as a kid and I rewatched recently and despite shortcomings, it does have a pretty creepy vibe and ofc the completely out of the blue evisceration which did kind of scar me. The robots look like Henry the hoover (look it up if you don't have them over there) drags it down a bit ..
It's a very underrated movie. If anything the weakest element is what a lot of people remember most fondly - Vincent and Bob. Without them it's pretty hard sci-fi, right up until the very end, when the black hole ostensibly leads Reinhardt and Maximillian to Hell and the surviving crew to Heaven. Throws a lot of people, but it's a very interesting movie.
I totally agree with you!!! I saw this movie when I was 8-9 years old and was fascinated by the scary undertone of it! I still think it has,after all these years, some great special effects...and I loved the soundtrack! I was born in 1979,just saying,and these days I listened to a lot of radio play cassettes,this was one of my all-time favourites... 🙂🤘
This film has always had a soft spot for me and I Love The Black Hole as one of my absolute favorite films along with A Clockwork Orange, The Godfather, Star Wars 1977, The Shining, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Scarface, The Terminator, and Full Metal Jacket. The Black Hole is a very underappreciated and great sci-fi Disney film, the John Barry music score was brilliant, and The Black Hole had great characters like Dr. Hans Reinhardt, Maximilian, V.I.N.CENT, and Old Bob. Gary Nelson's direction for the film was stellar, the target practice scene with V.I.N.CENT, Old B.O.B, and S.T.A.R was awesome, and Dr. Hans Reinhardt as well as Maximilian the Robot were both excellent villains. The Black Hole along with Star Wars 1977 and Raiders of the Lost Ark are one of my most re-watched films, Gary Nelson and Stanley Kubrick are both one of my all time favorite film directors, and I loved Stanley Kubrick's work on A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, and Full Metal Jacket.
I saw the black hole what I was About 8 and I really enjoyed it. It has a lot of atmosphere and sense of space both in the ship and outside the ship. I know a lot of people will hate it for hardly any action but I find it to be wonderful experience just visually and sound and everything is so good.
I was also about 8 years old when I saw it in theaters. Funny because I don't remember as much, however there was that extremely memorable theme music (while droning and looping, it was also so fitting for what a black hole does!), the two robots and I have some vague memory of Maximilian in hell, with a person trapped inside him? For some reason my parents bought me Black Hole decorations (cups, plates, napkins, party hats) for my 8th birthday and I later bought a bunch of Black Hole jigsaw puzzles. Don't remember liking it THAT much, could I? Haven't seen it since 1979, I really should re-watch it all these decades later and find out!
I was in love with this movie when it came out and it's stuck with me through all these years. This was back when Disney was a safe place for kids. This movie is from an era that is long past.
I don’t think I’d like a remake. As you’ve said, the set design and artistic sensibilities of the film are amazing and unique, and we’re simply not gonna get that in a modern film. Also, the movie had a once-in-a-lifetime cast that you’re never gonna equal. The music is wonderful. The old-school effects really service the plot better than more realistic ones would, and honestly, what ending do you think they’d choose for the movie? Certainly they’re not gonna go to hell and get rescued by an angel, certainly they’re not gonna pull a nebulous 2001 style ending. I think it’s a deeply flawed film, but it’s a unique film, too, and it’d be a shame to lose that, or trade it in for Generic Grimdark Space Adventure #17b
I agree with NOT making this movie again. Writers have to tinker with the story and change so many elements that it loses its identity as a space horror/adventure. I will never forgot when I understood that the crew were just zombies, dying off when their usefulness was done.
Me too. It's also hard to find streaming....unless you pay.....I had that same problem trying to find free streaming for the movie Firefox. Of course there's always Kodi to the rescue.
There is a blu-ray copy of it. If you were a member of the Disney club, you had the opportunity to order it on blu-ray. It wasn't a bootleg or anything like that. It is an official blu-ray copy licensed and distributed by Disney. You should be able to find a copy on ebay or Amazon. I have the blu-ray and it looks great.
I saw the film back in the day, when I was 12 (I was already a huge fan of SF and still am), and I had completely forgotten about it. That you for bringing the memories back!
Saw this first run in 1979 several times. I was blown away. I didn’t quite *get* it at the time, but I loved it. Having watched it a few times since, I think I understand it now: in the first half of the movie, we’re pelted with offhand religious references, such as Harry Booth saying the Black Hole is like something straight out of Dante’s Inferno, and Alex talking about how traveling through the whole would be “A sacred pilgrimage to what may be the mind of God,” and various other odds and ends (Like he endless abandoned crew quarters looking very much like monk’s cells, or the Cygnus itself being essentially a gothic cathedral in space. Reinhard is going on and on about how different physical laws apply on the other side, and while it’s not clearly stated, it’s pretty obvious that he wants to become God or at least a god on the other side. So I *think* this was probably supposed to be a bit more straightforward, with Reinhardt being a mad scientist babbling about God and stuff, and we’re not supposed to take it seriously because he’s obviously crazy, but then when they fall into the black hole we’re supposed to be shocked to discover that he was actually right: black holes are the back door into the supernatural realms. They go to hell - which, I mean, where else would you send people who trespassed in the afterlife? And Reinhardt gets to rule in hell, basically, but then an angel shows up and guides the survivors through because they didn’t do anything wrong. They didn’t intend to come there, so they’re not punished. Instead an angel guides them out and drops them back in real space. the planet they’re approaching at the end is earth. Assuming that’s the case, I would imagine that rewrites and edits made it a bit more ambiguous, because I can’t imagine Disney would be comfortable with that. However the fingerprints are still there, if you’re willing to sit through it like 20 times to find them. :) Or, conversely, I’m forcing sense on an inherently senseless thing, which is entirely possible, but either way: I like my read on the film.
Rinehart did not get to rule anything. You could see in his eyes he is being tormented. Nobody gets to rule in hell. Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess.... and you can look up what they confess if you want to know.
@@TRUTHISABSOLUTE777 Yeah, clearly he’s not happy about it. The merger with Maximillian is a weird wrinkle, too. Not sure what to make of that. And FWIW, I never could figure why his lobotomized crew went to hell. They did nothing wrong, right? They were victims. But I don’t think we can take the movie to be making a well-thought-out theological statement. It was made by Disney after all. The fact that it contradicts most readings of the Bible isn’t really relevant because it wasn’t intended to be an evangelical tool. It was just some freaky stuff that happened for the entertainment of the audience with some recognizable imagery. I mean, they knew they wanted a big portentous 2001-styled finale, but they rather famously didn’t know what that finale was gonna be when they started making the movie. They were shooting “Wet” as the industry calls it, without a finished script. Which is why the ending of the book and the movie and the comic book are totally different. Everyone was given a different draft of the script to work off of.
@@mahatmarandy5977 yeah I see where you're coming from. As far as the crew members go, who knows maybe they were hand-picked by him because they had similar evil propensities.
Ugh, I know. I had actually recorded a section for the video and in the final edit I did not insert it in. It goes without saying that Barry's work is stellar! Probably deserves a video all its own.
@@livingthepast Yeah I figured it might be an oversight on your part since you knew so much about it. So much music by John Barry in movies when I was a kid was epic!
I don't remember how young I was when I saw it air on TV, but I thought it was incredible. And the ending scenes were more of an artful expression, meaning it didn't have to make sense. Food for thought, it was. Still haunts me to this day, but for some odd reason, it's fine.
This to me is still one of those great sleeper sci movies that was pretty good for its time with special effects. I saw it when it came out and was more terrified by Maximilian than Darth Vader!
So happy to see this on my feed. I too remember seeing this movie as a 7 year old and being scared and amazed - I actually remember more of this than Star Wars. I love the old sci-fi movies, especially ones that are a bit quirky and off beat, that came out of the 70s and 80s. Thank you for an appreciative trip down memory lane - think I'll go watch it again soon! Cheers
also- first of your vids that I've watched... nicely cut and narrated and hits that sweet spot of under 10 mins but still packed full of good stuff - going to hit subscribe
I just streamed this not to long ago . No one else in the house wanted to watch it and all thought dad was being weird. It just brought back great memories. Man, was I scared of that robot as a kid. I was 7 when that came out. I saw that thing in my dreams (nightmares). But as scary as it was it also intrigued me. When we got a VCR some time later, I watched the movie over and over just to see Maximilian.
In the original concept art for Vincent actually had a humanoid form he could change into. Arms and legs would extend from his torso. They retracted when he was flying. In the final film they kept him in flying mode all the time.
I have always loved this film, and I still watch it to this day. Heck, a star ship design I have for a set of characters I made in an adaption for one of my favorite shows, was based on the USS Cygnus, including having the same name.
That film made a huge impression on me as a kid. It was visually stunning, quite different to anything else I'd seen; deeply mysterious, REALLY dark, and just went completely nuts at the end. Love the music too. It never felt like a Disney film at all.
I remember going to see this movie at one of the big local cinemas. It was one of the last times I saw a movie with my family, as a child and it was also one of the last of the big movies to feature an overture as part of the presentation - with a medley of music playing over the sound system while the curtains remained closed and the theatre was still lit. It's weird to think of such things now but they were quite commonplace back then and gave the movie going a sense of occasion. The tradition sort of died out in the 1980s and very few movies include such a thing nowawadays - although the Hateful Eight did it a few years back. So much of that movie speaks to a bygone era - the actors, the epic/disaster movie style feel, the musical score, the visual effects (I remember a big fuss being made at the time that the opening sequence of the movie was the longest computer generated effect in a movie). But even though the story ending was a little weak, there is so much that reminds me of happy hours spent with my family, enjoying the wonder of what was playing out onscreen.
I agree with most of this. Seeing this as a kid in the '80's the rolling meteor shot was really amazing and Maximilian was even scarier than Vader to me (he freakin guts a guy on camera!) I've thought for decades it should be remade but with Interstellar portraying a black hole so well this movie maybe missed its window.
I think that I first saw this on VHS and thought that it was awesome. Thinking back on it, it's probably one of the first movies that got me interested into Science Fiction
The toy license for the movie The Black Hole nearly destroyed the Mego toy company. Mego got the Black Hole toy license on a promise to pay Disney a large sum later. The toy sales were horrible, they lost money making them, then ended up owingmoney on the license as well! Mego ended up selling the trademark on the toy name Tron (which they had patented for Micronauts) to Disney to cover the debt. Disney wanted it for their upcoming sci-fi movie Tron.
Thank you so much for giving some love and acknowledgement to this film. Yes, it had its flaws, but it did have some great moments and yes, I too always remember that meteor rolling down the length of the USS Cygnus. Remake it? Absolutely. But not at the expense of a good STORY!! Disney needs to stop putting out dross and focusing on what made it great to begin with. Beautiful stories, wonderfully told. Great video Chief!!
For a FSL unit (one of the curricular themes for that grade was robots), I included BOB, VINCENT, and Maximillian to our list of movie robots. I showed them just enough stills and clips from the movie for them to get a sense of who's who. At the end of the year (very last day), we were permitted to have a movie session. The kids agreed (with more enthusiasm than I expected) to see The Black Hole. :) You should have heard the gasps and the whispered "Maximillian!"s when he appeared on screen in all his glory. What a crew. :)
I have a weird memory of listening to the movie audio while reading a provided picture book along with it in elementary school, I got like 1/4ths through it and could never finish it. The little floating robots were my favorite characters
Decades later and this movie still scares the shit out of me. Not exactly sure why but it does. Honestly I've seen straight up horror movies that have scared me less than this movie.
This and Silent Running struck me as a young kid in theaters before there was so much content available. Back them there were so few films we all knew of most of them.
Great video! The Black Hole was my first SciFi experience as a kid and I loved it. It was scary af and I loved the fantasy behind „what happens if you fly into a black hole?“ This fascination for black holes last to this day … almost 35 or 36 years after I‘ve seen this movie for the first time. It is one of my all time greats and I never compared it to modern standards or Star Wars, just because it is so unique.
I too was captivated by black holes because of this movie and even today, when I come across any type of black hole news article, I pause and read it. Ha! Amazing what a movie can do to ones curiosity.
Gotta love how, during the early scene of the ship rotating, VINCENT starts rotating (from the crew's point of view) inside. That's brilliant... VINCENT is "staying upright...." in *space...!*
I saw the movie like 3 times in the cinema as a 10 yo and I loved it. By growing up I lost touch with it for many years, until I re-discovered it on Disney+ a couple of years ago. I IMMEDIATELY was able to hum the main theme again (before actually watching it) - the soundtrack was able to transport the dark mood of the movie so perfectly. You really should have mentioned that ;) Besides that, great video, thx for it :)
Thanks 👍 This video about the movie The Black Hole... truly comes out of nowhere! The "universe" and the setup of characters made for an interesting backdrop...that I feel is still interesting today.
