Thanks for the memories!

Awesome Movie

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Singing cowboy Gene Autry (in his first starring film role) plays -- singing cowboy Gene Autry, star of a daily radio broadcast which is performed live from "Radio Ranch." Autry's contract, very strangely, requires that he perform in every show without fail or he will immediately and on-the-spot lose control of the program and the ranch. Yes, it's silly, but you'll soon learn to leave most of your sense of reality behind if you want to enjoy this early genre mash-up involving Autry, his two young sidekicks (Frankie Darro and Betsy King Ross, who was advertised as "America's champion trick rider" but gets precious little trick riding to do, alas) and their team of "Junior Thunder Riders" as they try to thwart both a team of evil and greedy scientists from gaining control of the ranch so that they can exploit its radium deposits, and the underground denizens of the lost city of Murania, an advanced civilization of super-science which will stop at nothing - even mass destruction - to keep the outside world from intruding.Also making appearances are comic duo Smiley Burnett and Peter Potter, who typically have a slapstick gag or two that frequently hinders the heroes in just about every episode; most of the chapters follow a basic pattern of Gene and company getting out of trouble with either the scientists or the Muranians at the beginning of the episode, rushing back to the ranch so that Gene can make his broadcast, a song from Gene or occasionally a western combo, and after the 2nd episode, Gene trying to make sure he doesn't get caught for the murder of his sidekicks' father, his partner (he's not guilty, of course)! This one has it all folks - Laurel & Hardy-type slapstick routines, lots of great singing cowboy music, mad scientists and fantastic inventions, gunfights - one of many ways in which the whole serial seems to exist in a parallel universe can be shown by the fact that they actually stage gunfights, bank robberies etc for the radio show, despite the lack of a live audience! There's little in the way of sex in this one - this seems to be aimed at a slightly younger crowd than Flash Gordon , the next major science-fiction serial to come along a year later. The queen of Murania (Dorothy Christy) is attractive enough but quite severe and wooden; no romance between her and the 28-year-old (but rather older looking) Autry is ever on the horizon. The scenes in the Muranian city are probably the highlights overall, with some surprisingly good sets and solid painting/matte work (keep in mind this was a very low budget affair) and some pretty advanced science fiction hardware for the day - a disintegrating ray, televisors that can show events anywhere, an aerial torpedo that can be controlled in mid-flight, a super-fast elevator, etc.The acting is almost uniformly mediocre to poor, with Wheeler Oakton as the Muranian queen's Chancellor (and ultimately traitor) probably the most memorable, though in basically a typical 30s stock-villain way; and of course it can be fairly repetitive like a lot of serials - but overall the weirdness of the thing and the willingness to just mash up all kinds of disparate elements together and hope they stick worked for me, and I'd have to say I liked this just as much, maybe a little more even, than the Flash Gordon serials of the next few years. The copy I watched is the recent VCI edition, which is not tinted unlike the alternative edition available from The Serial Squadron, but is pretty high quality in most respects, and loaded with extras. I can't recommend this too highly to those few interested in the genre.

I'm involved in a study of "folding" in film; folding is a matter of overlain or referenced narratives. Sometimes the folding is something only of interest to highbrow specialists, but usually it is a matter of fun.Some folding is a matter of introducing bizarre conventions, and once they enter in one film they promulgate throughout the system. And then through our imagination. So part of my study is looking for examples of folding and most especially the first appearance of specific types.This serial is usually considered an oddball secondrater compared to more famous (if not better) examples. But I am putting it on my list of films that everyone should see before they die. This brief description should indicate why, for those not excited about sitting through five hours of mediocre production.Gene Autry was already a famous radio star before making this. He was the first one to combine hee haw Appalachian folk music with the notion of a western cowboy to create the so-called "singing cowboy." The juxtaposition is amazing if you know the history, and in fact the subsequent history of "country and western" music (now just "country") spins from this one man. But that's all before this.This is his first movie, so they preserved the radio show. Every day at 2:00, Gene (playing himself) must give a show or lose his ranch. The show is live from that "radio ranch," where his ranch helpers play parts in the show. Okay: one simple fold, right? Now add: in producing the show instead of just doing sound effects and voices, the players actually do what they are portraying. Odd. (Another fold.)The purpose of the ranch is to provide a place for kids to do their "ridin and ropin" stuff, and indeed there are kids in attendance who form a secret society called the "thunder riders" after local legends (and experiences) seeing bands of riders inexplicably accompanied by thunder. This gang of kids is at the same time a feature of the story of the radio show, inhabitants of the ranch, and participants in the larger story we'll elaborate in a bit. A feature of the radio show is recruiting kids at home to join the riders in a sort of boy scout affiliation.Gene's ranch happens to sit on a radium deposit. Nuclear fission, even the idea, would be years away but radioactive stuff held a special place in the popular imagination. Needless to say, there is an evil professor and henchmen who want to eliminate Autry so they can get the radium. So far so good.But there is also a subterranean culture under the ranch as well, a huge city at 20,000 feet under, sustained by the radiation and rebellious robots. (Note: this is _before_ "Flash Gordon.") They have all sorts of advanced gadgets including something that gives their evil young queen effective remote vision, providing her with the creation of the movie. They, too, want Autry eliminated. The original "thunder riders" are the special forces of this city who emerge for whatever project is at hand.Thus, science fiction takes to horses and indeed every time some motion is needed as a break from the talking (and singing!) heads, there's a passel of panicky ridin, usually in groups of 20-30, which seems to be the most that can fit in a frame.The serial consists of all the ordinary captures and escapes (always by 2:00!) you might expect. In that sense, the thing is pretty ordinary, excepting that the substance of the radio show and the movie overlap and separate constantly. Its the novelty and complete oddity of the strange framework that makes the thing interesting and important. Film would never be the same after.The framework is clearly a matter of psychotropic hallucination, and indeed you can see the very same folded structure in the similarly drugged out "Tell your Children" written immediately after.If you decide to see it, don't use the DVD (which is technically horrible and is missing key elements), nor the silly movie they edited out of it. The VHS tapes are the thing to seek out.Ted's Evaluation -- 4 of 3: Every cineliterate person should experience this.

This movie would be a classic of its type, if there were anything else in its type. The ostensibly peaceful underground kingdom of Murania actually exists on the slave labor of robots, who are planning a revolt. Periodically, the Muranians dress as "Thunder Riders" and after rocketing to the surface, come out of a cave to terrorize the Surface People (us). But they can't terrorize a gang of kids known as the "Junior Thunder Riders", whose motto is "To the Rescue!" They shout this while wearing buckets on their heads, in imitation of the gas masks of the Muranians. Mendacious scientists have detected radium beneath the surface of Gene Autry's ranch, but they don't know that the radium is coming from an underground kingdom. The scientists keep kidnapping Gene so that he won't make it to his weekly radio show and hence won't get the paycheck that he depends on to make his mortgage payment. The mortgage payment is the engine that actually keeps all these balls in the air, and as in all good westerns, the bankers are the real villains. Gene is so cool as he handles the Thunder Riders, evil scientists, mendacious bankers, cruel but oddly flirty Queen Tika, and surprisingly clumsy robots, while always having time for a kind word to the Junior Thunder Riders and Smiley Burnett. You can tell that he lives by the Cowboy Code.

I first saw Phantom Empire back in the 1970s when it was included in a local museum series of vintage films. I was totally enthralled by it and the incredible underground world below Gene Autry's "Radio Ranch". (The ranch was the site of weekly broadcasts of great oldtime cowboy music.) I'm more a fan of old cowboy movies than I am of science fiction, but I was really taken by the sci-fi set, with wacky multi-story elevators, ray guns, and metal robots. I was particularly smitten by the beautiful but evil Queen Tika, ruler of Murania, who had a magical spinning circle on the floor which she would visit and ask to show her anything she wished. The wheel would spin, complete with a spiraling graphic, which then turned into a real-time view of -- Gene Autry, of course, and his whereabouts, providing the Muranians the opportunity to capture him. (Seeing the spinning circle reminded me that as a six year old, I conjured up similar powers from spinning circle, and had forgotten all about it. Since then, my alter ego is. . Queen Tika!) I recommend the Phantom Empire series as an experience in true, though "kitschy", entertainment! Sincerely yours, Queen Tika