Voyage To The Planet Of Prehistoric Women

"Voyage to the Planet of the Prehistoric Women" (1968) is the second of two reworkings of "Planeta Bur," a Soviet sci-fi film from 1959. The first was the similarly titled, "Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet" (1962) assembled by director Curtis Harrington for producer Roger Corman. "Voyage to the Planet of the Prehistoric Women" was confabulated by Peter Bogdanovich using the pseudonym, Derek Thomas. Working under the dictum that American International would buy "Planet" if it had some women in it, he inserted new footage featuring Mamie Van Doren, a bevy of nubile cuties in white hot pants, and additional scenes from the Americanized version of another Soviet film, "Nebo Zovet," ("The Heavens Beckon") from 1962. This film has been knocking around for years in a horribly faded version. I've attempted to upgrade it by reconstructing it from the best publicly available sources. First of all, I need to disavow the bizarre story that Pathecolor was some sort of tinting process. Pathecolor was a variant of Eastmancolor (Kodak), and was capable of stunning color. The stylish Poe adaptions by Roger Corman come to mind. Unfortunately, Eastmancolor has proven to be quite unstable over the years, losing density in its yellow and cyan layers until nothing exists but a washed out magenta. The 16mm print used for the generally available transfer, is a prime example of color fading, and of a misguided attempt to equalize its color by adding cyan. The original "Planeta Bur" was probably filmed in Sovcolor (really Agfacolor from the World War II era). Though not capable of the range, subtlety or consistency of Eastmancolor, it did have a pleasing and vibrant color pallet of its own. So here is a by no means perfect, but hopefully, much better presentation of "Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women." Thanx and a tip o' the hat to Peter Bogdanovich, Roger Corman, Pavel Klushantsev, Mamie Van Doren, Filmgroup (for not copyrighting it!) and Robot John.