If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Fantastic!

Best movie ever!

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Watching this very underrated classic from producer George Pal, Which teams him again with the director of his 1953 classic The War of the Worlds, Byron Haskins, Who retired shortly afterwards.Some might say that George Hamilton, excuse me, George Hamilton-TAN, Who plays Dr. Tanner, ironically, miscast in the lead role. But, I disagree.Ironically, he was originally cast by the producer for the part that eventually went to actor Earl Holliman, Who, like several other members of the cast, appeared in the original twilight zone TV series.What a fascinating cast this film has. 50s Universal and Columbia science fiction regular, Richard Carlson (It Came From Outer Space), Yvonne deCarlo (Lily Munster herself), Aldo Ray, and several Twilight Zone veterans, in addition to Earl Holliman; Vaughn Taylor, Barbara Nichols, Gary Merrill, Nehemiah Persoff, Celia Lovsky (who's also best remembered as the Vulcan priestess in the Star Trek episode Amok Time), and the late Suzanne Pleshette, at her most attractive. And, The late Michael Rennie (The Day The Earth Stood Still) is excellent as always.Very suspenseful, well directed, well scripted, from a book by sci-fi veteran Frank M Robinson (The Glass Inferno), add to this, a magnificent score by Miklos Rozsa (Spellbound), which is what I remember the most about this film when I first viewed as a kid.In fact, I'm listening to The surviving music cues, which were partially destroyed.

They say the devil's in the details. He must have shot this movie, because absolutely no attention was paid to detail in any way. I have noticed in other movies that George Pal is good at making scenes full of flashy, hi-tech gadgets, but not at making people act in believable ways. "The Power" dwarfs all his previous efforts in this direction.This movie attempts to take itself seriously. But it is so poorly executed that it is impossible for the viewer to take it seriously. It's too bad MST3K is not still around. "The Power" would be a natural for it.IMDb limits review size, so I can't fit all the incredibly stupid stuff in. I'll have to restrict myself to a few of the highlights. What amazes me is that it just keeps getting stupider and stupider as it goes along, just when you thought such a thing couldn't be possible.== Spoilers == Tanner (George Hamilton) and Lansing (Suzanne Pleshette, who's about as much like a professor as last month's centerfold) are at the lab after hours. Suddenly the rocket-G-force simulator centrifuge starts up, which gets their attention. They try to turn it off, but the controls are jammed. Tanner throws the switch. (Switches are such big stars in this movie, they should be listed in the cast!) Suddenly the whole lab is lit in red light, for no reason, and none is ever given. Hallson (Arthur O'Connell) is dead in the centrifuge, and evidently has been for hours, although we all heard it turn on only minutes before.Tanner is blamed for murdering Hallson and goes on the run. The first place he runs is into a fun house, which for no reason is a storefront on a busy downtown street. He has psychedelic experiences there, nearly gets killed when the merry-go-round goes out of control, but then leaves.He gets ditched in the desert by a hick gas station attendant. Instead of following the jeep, which is obviously heading back to town, Tanner goes off in a completely different direction. It has been only half an hour, but he is already dying of thirst. He still has on his suit with jacket, tie and tightly buttoned collar.He takes shelter in a grove of trees, which turns out to be an Air Force testing ground. The jets come and deliver enough ordnance to wipe Hanoi off the face of the map. The explosions don't even ruffle Tanner's hair. To get their attention, he sets the place on fire. Why the bombs have not ignited anything is not explained. Why the pilots would think fire in an area that's just been bombed back to the Stone Age unusual in any way is similarly ignored.Tanner goes to the house of Mrs. Hallson (Yvonne de Carlo) who has seen him several times previously in the film. She opens the door and looks right at him, but asks, "Who are you?" As soon as he says his name, she seems to know who he is and lets him in.Tanner, Lansing, and Melnicker (Nehemiah Persoff) have to hide out from the police. What more logical place than a kitchenwares convention? There are no rooms left in the hotel, so they go to a wild party in a stranger's room. "Why?" asks Lansing. "So we can keep together, keep awake." No explanation why they need to keep awake. Also no explanation why Melnicker dies while sitting alone on the sofa. Or why the party just happens to have a striptease record on the stereo, waiting for someone to drop the needle. Or why Melnicker's erstwhile dancing partner gets up after everyone has passed out, puts on the record and starts to strip.An hour and twenty minutes into the film, Tanner tells Lansing, "We have to start somewhere." She and Nordlund (Michael Rennie) must be at a meeting by 2:00 PM. Tanner goes straight to the home of another co-worker, Van Zandt (Richard Carlson). It is suddenly night when he gets there.A driverless car comes up and tries to run Tanner down. He tries to leave in his car, but is paralyzed. He decides to drive anyway, veering all over the road and narrowly missing other cars. He sees headlights following him in the mirror and is suddenly OK. He sideswipes a semi, which doesn't even dent the car, but somehow loosens the front wheel. He comes to a drawbridge where traffic is stopped, and drives through the barricade into the water. He and the car sink. He looks like he's going to drown, but then opens the convertible top, swims to the surface, where the car is still bubbling like a fishtank aerator (no sign of any bubbles a minute ago during the underwater shots) and swims away.Detective Corlane (Gary Merrill) shows Tanner a note that they found in his apartment, asking him to meet Scotty (Earl Holliman) at the auditorium. Corlane says, "You will, but not alone." When they get there, Tanner says, "Scotty will never talk to me with all these cops here." Corlane: "You're not going in with the cops." Then he (a cop) goes in with Tanner!!! == End Spoilers == To make this review fit, I cut about half the dumb stuff I was going to point out, so you can imagine how much more stupidity awaits! This movie is not bad in the way most bad movies are bad. The acting is good by an all-star cast. The production values are fairly high. It doesn't drag. If you don't care at all about continuity or credibility, or expect things to make sense, or people to behave in logical ways, you will probably enjoy it. In fact, if your short-term memory has been eradicated, you will probably find it very entertaining.People who still retain all their faculties will likely find it a hoot from start to finish.

I rate this film as excellent, simply because it is so unique as science fiction goes. While particulars such as telekinesis are not in themselves very unique to the genre (and can often be trite and silly), when combined with the central theme of fear, is VERY unique. I cannot think of a single movie, regardless of its classification, that so powerfully and directly deals with the psychological reality of fear - and its destructive effect - as this film does.Of course, if the cast and director had failed to weave this central element of FEAR into the movie skillfully, then it could have easily been a silly forgettable film, or perhaps a not-so-forgettable, hilarious "bomb," remembered fondly and eternally only for being campy. Fortunately, the latter case was not realized, but instead an all-time classic science fiction piece that is remarkable for its singularity.I must also say that despite George Hamilton's reputation for being somewhat of a "ham," I thought he really did well in this, and in fact it is - for me - one of his most memorable roles.George Pal does his magic perfectly (and appropriately) in this movie (such as at the end, when Tanner (Hamilton) and Arthur Nordlund (Michael Rennie) are intimately involved in a surreal, powerful, metaphysical struggle. If you want to see FEAR represented symbolically in its quintessence - and at its most primordial - and represented in graphic form, then Pal's special effects in this scene bring it to life as it has never been done in cinema. It is not a cliché (for me, anyway . . .) to say that this final scene is truly "gripping" in its intensity. In addition, Michael Rennie is just PERFECT as the embodiment of all that is dark, powerful and "satanic." He makes a very Jungian symbol of evil here! I also thought Suzanne Pleshette performed quite well in this as the lead supporting actress.As in another underrated science fiction film of the era, "Colussus: The Forbin Project," one of the delights in seeing this film is its depiction of the optimistic pro-technical, pro-science attitude that was so pervasive in the sixties. One sees this, for example, in the architecture of the buildings at the beginning, where Tanner and Nordlund and Professor Margery Lansing (Pleshette)(along with some of the other co-stars) work . It gives it an ineffable, yet very concrete futuristic "feel" to the scene - something on the line of "Bucky Fuller meets Military-Industrial-complex." Yet, far from feeling "dark" at this point, one gets a very upbeat vibe from it.Likewise, some of the modern architecture in other buildings, such as a Frank Lloyd Wright-type house at one point, also underscores this feeling.There is one rather obvious goof in the movie, when Tanner is somehow "spotted" by the one of the pilots in some jet aircraft who are practicing at a target range. The possibility that a single man could be spotted by a pilot flying at high speed, and with little view of the ground (and in all likelihood, from a great altitude), is fairly remote, even though possible.There is, however, also a good comic touch sometimes, as when Tanner goes into an empty diner at one point, and the extreme-country twang of the singer's voice playing on the radio in the background will probably make anyone laugh, even lovers of country/western music! All in all, a superb film!

This is a decent science fiction movie based on a solid story idea that stays on target. It is a well executed basic movie without big budget effects. To its credit it does not go off on silly tangents such as overdone love stories (perfunctory graphic sex was still rare in this era), connecting the power to aliens or the supernatural, over the top spectacle when the power is used (like the quickening in Highlander) or any other superfluous nonsense. A good clean science fiction story realized cleanly and effectively. Except ...Spoiler warning.My main quibble is that the writers did a Hollywood ending on the original story. The movie is quite faithful to the story until the very end. The power corrupted bad guy (who views ordinary humans as mere animals for him to use as he pleases) has spent the most of the movie trying to smoke out the other person who has the power but does not realize it. (In a scene early in the movie, one of the normal scientists, who fearfully knows that someone with the power is in the group, asks the entire group to attempt telekinesis on a spinner. He is counting on the hubris of the bad guy who will show off and thus help him convince the others that he is not delusional, that the power actually exists. The spinner moves, and vigorously, to the great surprise and alarm of the bad guy. He knows he is not doing it so someone else must have the power and is a thus a threat to him that must be eliminated.)The bad guy succeeds, by a rather blunt process of elimination as he kills off most of the others, in narrowing the hunt down to our hero. The bad guy tries repeatedly to kill the hero and comes close but he just can't finish him off since he cannot overcome the latent power within. In a final showdown the hero, forced to the brink of oblivion by the bad guy in a battle of power and will, finally realizes that he also has the power. To the chagrin of the bad guy it is a greater gift than his own just as he had feared. The hero is then able to return from the brink and easily stop the bad guy's heart to end the struggle.Here comes the big cop-out.Movie Ending: The hero walks off with his girl friend full of good intentions to be sure his power is not used further since power corrupts etc. The world is now safe from the bad guy, all will be well.Real Ending: The triumphant hero, his power now awakened, his ordinary humanity sheared away in the struggle, looks at the cringing animal by his side (formerly his cherished love interest) and thinks "it is going to be fun to be a god." This uncompromising ending takes the power theme to its inexorable conclusion that it is not a matter of morals or free will, a human being with such power will be corrupted. The power corrupts by its mere presence, it does not ask permission.