Film #027 - Humanoid Woman (1981)
Humanoid Woman, or Cherez ternii k zvyozdam*, as it was in its native Russia, is best known to modern audiences for having been featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000 during its first year, when it was on a local Minneapolis TV station KTMA. But its reputation in the Western World as a cheesy B-movie is, quite frankly, undeserved. Sure, it was shot on a low budget and has some really poor effects (especially the robots), but it is, underneath a questionable dub, a thoughtful, well developed film that looks at the nature of humanity and free will.
It tells the story of a clone named Niya (Yelena Metyolkina), who survives a brutal assault on her “father” Glan’s spacecraft. Glan (Gleb Strizhenov) has created Niya and her “siblings” as a means of restoring their dying planet Dessa. Niya finds it difficult adjusting to her new life, especially since some of the scientists studying her treat her as little more than an experiment. When ambassadors from Dessa arrive on Earth seeking aide, she stows away onboard the outgoing ship. When she finally makes it to Dessa, she becomes even more confused, unsure of her purpose in life, since the Earth scientists seem capable of reviving Dessa without her help. But when Dessa’s underworld tyrant Turanchocks (Vladimir Fyodorov) finds a way to control Niya, it threatens to ruin the plans to save the planet.
As you can see, this is no cheap-o Star Wars knockoff or low-budget piece of action/adventure fluff. Humanoid Woman deals with some significant issues: from pollution to the nature of free will to the desire to look after one’s own interests at the expense of others. Coming out of Soviet Russia, it’s somewhat surprising the filmmakers were able to work in so many references to the failure and/or duplicitousness of Dessa’s leaders. There was, of course, a lot of tampering by the government, but not as much as would be expected. They apparently held the desire for commerical success at a greater value than the question of the film’s message.
Of course, a lot is lost in the dub, by notorious “Gamera” importer Sandy Frank. It’s clear to me that a lot of dialogue was overly simplified and there is some highly questionable syntax throughout the film (but no more than the average Gamera film). On the other hand, I must say that the voice cast is noticably better than most Sandy Frank imports, with the voices actually matching the characters’ looks, so it seems like some effort was actually put into choosing voices appropriately.
The biggest knock against Humanoid Woman are the effects. It is clear that the ‘weightless” scenes were shot underwater (air bubbles can be seen on occasion) and the robots are laughably bad. But the spaceship effects are not bad at all (not Star Wars level, of course) and the actors do a good job of selling the effects, even if they aren’t that convincing.
I liked Humanoid Woman, even when I saw it on MST3K. Finally getting a proper copy from the UK, I was pleased that it only confirmed my earlier suspicion that this movie was better than its reputation would indicate. It’s one of the few occasions where I find myself agreeing with critics of MST3K who say that it maligns undeserving films. I think it is only because of its association with MST3K that Humanoid Woman is considered as bad as it is. It certainly wasn’t always that way. As I pointed out in my episode guide, Yelena Metyolkina won a “Silver Asteroid” for her portrayal of Niya in the 1982 International Festival of Science Fiction Films. Look at most of the reviews on IMDb and you will see almost all of them mention MST3K, making me think most people reviewing this film haven’t taken the time to see it properly. True, there may have been a lot lost in translation, but not enough to have so thoroughly scuttled this film’s rep. It’s certainly worth a good look.
* Translates directly to “Per Aspera Ad Astra” - “To the Stars by Hard Ways”.