Sometimes,
allegories are subtle. The story makes a
point without much effort. Other times,
the story is so strange that the point may be lost in the details or to time. It’s been a few days and I have yet to figure
out what Unknown World was trying to say.
The
story is about a group of scientists trying to find a suitable place to live
below the surface of the Earth. They do
this by going to the top of a volcano and burrowing down with their ride, the
Cyclotram. Two people die during the
expedition.
After
not finding anything at all for a while, they finally find a cave that’s
perfect. It has everything a group of
people would need to survive indefinitely.
The bad news is that one of the scientists, Dr. Joan Lindsey, brought
some rabbits along and they’re all sterile.
This means that the area wouldn’t be suitable. The survivors are able to ride an underground
ocean current back to the surface, where the movie ends.
I’m
assuming that a lot of the context has been lost to time. The main motivation for doing this is the
threat of nuclear war. If we destroy the
surface, we’ll need someplace underground to live. It’s not clear why they have to enter through
a volcano. They have this big
drill. Why not a mountain? Even the name Cyclotram seems odd. It’s like something Disney would name one of
its rides.
The
production also seemed to put very little effort into shots of the
vehicle. It looked like forced
perspective of a toy. Given that the
drill was smaller than the width of the rest of the vehicle, I’m not sure how
it was supposed to drill. And when it
did drill, how did it drill so quickly?
Modern drills can’t go that quickly and need to be replaced or
recalibrated often. I didn’t see any
spare drill bits anywhere.
Also,
it’s really lucky that they find a cave that’s almost perfect. There’s plenty of light, water, food and
space. The only downside is that the
rabbits can’t have kids. It’s kind of a
leap to assume that it will mean the end of humanity. I’m not even sure how they knew the cave was
the culprit. For that matter, there was
no concern about testing any of the humans.
The
acting and writing are about what you might expect from an independent movie of
1951. A lot of it is stiff and
underacted. There are a few scenes that
make little sense, like one character going down a ladder to find water. The ladder happens to be the exact length he
needs to reach the bottom of a cliff. He
then looks around from where he’s standing before going back up.
Also,
how are you going to convince that many people to live underground? Granted, they found a well-lit area, but
you’re going to have to do a lot of rebuilding.
I can just imagine trying to put a Starbucks in there somewhere. It’s not the most appealing prospect, just
like watching this movie.
2 comments :
Remember, this was just after WWII, efter the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in the first years of the Cold War. The point of the expedition was not just to go and find a place to live underground for fun, but, as clearly stated in the opening scene -- to find a place where humanity can survive a nuclear winter. The moral of the story, as I see it, is that we can't run away from ourselves and hide in a cave, but must instead better ourselves and make sure that the surface of the Earth remains habitable. It's an anti-war and anti-nuclear bomb movie.
A lot of that would be lost on today's audience.
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