Friday Afternoon Movie: The Hellstrom Chronicle
Posted by Ross Rosenberg
Here we come to yet another Friday, another end to another work week, another afternoon spent impatiently waiting for the hands of the clock to come into perfectly angled alignment signaling the beginning of the weekend. Allow Ectomo to present you with something to perhaps help the time go faster.
“The Earth was created, not with the gentle caress of love, but with the brutal violence of rape.”
So begins 1971’s The Hellstrom Chronicle. A documentary narrated by the fictitious Dr. Nils Hellstrom, played by Lawrence Pressman, an entomologist whose work has led him to a terrifying conclusion, that ultimately it will not be man who inherits the earth, but insects. Truly horrifying stuff, so horrifying in fact, that it requires Pressman to narrate the entire film in an impressively over-the-top, B-movie manner.
Dr. Hellstrom is not the reason you’ll watch, however. The real star here is the incredible footage of insects on display. Shot by a several cinematographers, they manage to get so close to their subjects that the viewer almost occupies the same space with them. It’s truly fantastic camera work, and more than makes up for the hammy, “We’re all doomed!” atmosphere that Pressman’s voice-over attempts to stir up.
Incidentally, this film would be the inspiration for Frank Herbert’s novel Hellstrom’s Hive, about a secret group of humans who model their lives upon social insects, and the unsettling events that unfold after they are discovered by the US government.
The Hellstrom Chronicle [YouTube]
Categories: 70s, Doom, Documentaries, Movies, Insects, Apocalypse
Posted at 2:10 pm on September 26, 2008
5 Comments -
My god!
That man on the street corner was right!
Comment by ITHIDET — September 26, 2008 @ 3:01 pm
wow
super macro and timelapse shooting
Comment by Haux — September 26, 2008 @ 3:27 pm
I saw this movie in High School as part of a field trip to DC and the National Aquarium in the Commerce Building ( Science Class)back in ‘74. My friends and I spent the time in the back of the bus drinking rum and dropping some primo pink blotter acid. I sat 7TH row center with my friendsand I totally became engrossed and freaked out about the prospect of GIANT CARNIVOROUS INSECTS destroying Humanity and taking over the Earth. This movie haunts me to this very day. Thanks!
Comment by BobDog — September 26, 2008 @ 8:43 pm
Sweet zombie Jesus! Im a biologist who studies invertebrates, and all my career i hear about the war between ants and termits, the capabilities of comunnication, the utopy of bees, but looking this, thinking in the ephimerous of our own existence, the terror hidden in our gardens, and the power of the insects, it scares the crap out of me.
Great, great documental, i will be having nightmares about this for ages to come.
Thank you very much
Comment by Nicaprio — September 26, 2008 @ 9:32 pm
Strangely, Amazon claims that there is a DVD-release, altho currently not available. There may of course be peers of ours willing to transfer us bits of it by means of a global, electronic network.
-G
Comment by Gorbleworf — September 27, 2008 @ 4:23 pm