The Hellstrom Chronicle Blu-ray Review
Do mad scientists bug you?
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, February 21, 2012
This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but a. . .buzz?
Well, who's to say that that
wasn't T.S. Eliot's first choice? (Luckily Mr. Eliot is no longer around to defend
himself from such spurious attempts at humor.) Most people have various levels of annoyance with at least some
species of insect, whether it be the high pitched whine of a mosquito closing in on a blood supply in an ear or the
uncomfortable prick of a bee's stinger finding its mark on a sunny summer day. Some may think this is an exaggeration,
but I swear it's the honest truth: one of my sisters had such a fear of bugs (mostly spiders) when we were growing up
that she used to carry a can of Raid in her purse and would spray the sidewalk in front of her as she walked, just to
make sure she wouldn't cross paths with any untoward creepy-crawlies. If one were to believe the weird and pretty
wacky
The Hellstrom Chronicle, one would need a can of Raid the size of Saturn to take care of an incipient
population of bugs that literally are out to kill us poor humans. Rather incredibly
The Hellstrom Chronicle won
the 1971 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. The incredulity comes not from any intrinsic excellence (or lack
thereof), but from the fact that
The Hellstrom Chronicle is about as much of a standard documentary as Milli
Vanilli was a splendidly talented duo comprised of Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus. That's right:
The Hellstrom
Chronicle is, at its core, a hoax. The supposed entomologist at the center of this film, one Nils Hellstrom, is a self-
confessed "fanatic" who is convinced bugs are well on their way to supplanting Man as the dominant species on Earth.
Hellstrom also happens to be a fictional character, played by character actor Lawrence Pressman, who astute viewers
will recognize from everything from
Doogie Howser, M.D. to
Profiler. Here, sporting what can only be
termed "Gene Wilder hair", Pressman evinces a modern take on the Mad Scientist, a well meaning but obsessive man
whose rantings may be based in fact but which nonetheless sound absolutely ludicrous.
Insects' size relative to Man accounts for the sort of blissfully ignorant "out of sight, out of mind" attitude a lot of people
take toward or co-habitants on this planet, and also accounts for many individuals' over the top reactions (like my
sister,
for example) when they
do come in contact with one of these patently strange creatures. Insects are
so
alien to us at an almost atavistic level that it's little wonder so many science fiction special effects designers have
tended
to base their alien character designs on things like Praying Mantises or other smallish ghoulies. The actual scientific
sections of
The Hellstrom Chronicle (as opposed to the rather silly bridging segments featuring "Dr. Hellstrom"
himself) offer a variety of astounding (especially for early seventies filming) up close and personal looks at various
insects
going about their daily lives, which often in fact might be better termed as going about their daily deaths. A lot of this
footage is squirm worthy and those with squeamish stomachs are well advised to have their hands at the ready to
shield
their eyes from some of the more gruesome imagery.
That said, there's no denying the awesome impact that the filmmakers achieved with the actual insect footage. This
was sensational stuff back in its day, the likes of which had never really been seen before, and if our modern day eyes
have been dazzled more effectively by films such as
Microcosmos, that still doesn't detract from what was in
1971 a rather substantial technical achievement. (The film, aside from its kind of bizarre Oscar win, also took home the
Technical Grand Prize at Cannes.) Accompanying the incredible visuals is a rather spritely score by an unexpected
source: one Lalo Schifrin, the jazz man who wrote so many spectacular themes in the late sixties for both television
(
Mission: Impossible, Mannix) and film (
The Fox). Schifrin's score alternates between kind of scary and
moody cues that are reminiscent of Dominic Frontiere's classic work on the old
Outer Limits television series, to
more fanciful, almost dance like cues for a number of sequences that have little "friends" like ants on the march.
The Hellstrom Chronicle also contains a couple of fun clips from some
real (meaning completely fictional)
insect horror films like
Them!. It's a weird kind of Through the Looking Glass irony that the schlocky snippets
seem at least as convincing, if not more so, than the staged human elements in the "documentary" that contains them.
Is
The Hellstrom Chronicle better seen in our post-modern, ultra-ironic world as a
comedy? A cogent
case could be made, especially with regard to Pressman's wacky yet wonderful take on the Hellstrom character.
Intense yet understated, this is a "scientist" one imagines suddenly bursting into a riff on Colin Clive, unexpectedly
blurting out, "
They're alive!
Alive!!!" And
that's ultimately what defeats
The Hellstrom
Chronicle's attempts to be taken seriously as a documentary. Insects may well be about to claim the mantle of Lord
and Master on Planet Earth, but the film is
so hyperbolic that it often comes off as downright silly. In the early
seventies
The Hellstrom Chronicle was a surprise box office sensation after it was marketed (rather smartly) as
a science fiction horror film. Once audiences had paid their bucks, they were greeted with this filmic bait and switch, but
few probably complained. It was a kinder, gentler era, after all. But seen now through the lens of 20/20 hindsight,
The Hellstrom Chronicle is a piece of marketing genius that never really delivers on a pure content level.
The Hellstrom Chronicle Blu-ray, Video Quality
The Hellstrom Chronicle is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in
1.33:1. I frankly never saw this film in a theatrical exhibition, but my assumption is that the source
was probably
1.33:1 and it was masked for a 1.85:1 exhibition ratio, as little if anything about this presentation has the look of having
been cropped for a "full frame" home video release. In fact a lot of the insect footage clearly seems to have been shot for a
1.33:1 aspect ratio, unless there is irrelevant material that has been cropped from the sides, something rather unlikely,
especially if the theatrical exhibition was "only" at 1.85:1. As with all of the Olive Films Blu-ray releases thus far, this was
obviously sourced from a decent enough looking print, so expectations must be set accordingly. The print is relatively
damage free, but there are still scratches, white flecks and other minor damage that are quite noticeable throughout the
running time. Strangely, the "human" footage has a sort of soft, fuzzy ambience, while a lot of the insect footage pops
substantially better, with well above average clarity and fine detail. The bulk of this transfer has the look of having been
sourced from 16mm, not 35mm, but that shouldn't scare off trepidatious viewers. While
The Hellstrom Chronicle is
very much a product of its early seventies era, this Blu-ray presentation, while far from perfect, looks rather good, all things
considered.
The Hellstrom Chronicle Blu-ray, Overall Score and Recommendation
Every year brings its own Oscar controversies (this year there seems to be special umbrage taken at the Music Division's
rather odd decision to only nominate two Best Song contenders, though as a lifelong Sergio Mendes fan, I'm thrilled he's
one of the nominees this year). In doing research for this review, I wasn't able to dig up much post-Academy Award
brouhaha over
The Hellstrom Chronicle having won for Best Documentary when it really wasn't a documentary
per se. But 1971 was, after all, a different time, post-Watergate to be sure but still "innocent' enough to award a
prize to a supposed "documentary" that had actually done decent box office (then, as now, a decided oddity). It's
somewhat shocking to realize that one of the best known and most iconic of all documentaries, Marcel Ophuls' spectacular
The Sorrow and the Pity, was also nominated that year and surely "should" have won.
The Hellstrom
Chronicle is at best a rather peculiar little film that stands apart from its "documentary" kin for the very reason Milli
Vanilli stand apart from their Best New Artist Grammy kin: it's a
fake! This isn't to say that the film isn't enjoyable in
a bizarre, almost outré, way, but as a documentary? Sorry, using that term for
The Hellstrom Chronicle really
does bug me.
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