| Captain Video | |
|---|---|
Judd Holdren and a native of Atoma |
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| Directed by | Spencer Gordon Bennet Wallace Grissell |
| Produced by | Sam Katzman |
| Written by | Royal K. Cole Sherman L. Lowe George H. Plympton Joseph F. Poland |
| Starring | Judd Holdren Larry Stewart George Eldredge Gene Roth Don C. Harvey Skelton Knaggs |
| Music by | Mischa Bakaleinikoff |
| Cinematography | Fayte Browne |
| Editing by | Earl Turner |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
| Release date(s) | 27 December 1951 |
| Running time | 15 chapters (287 min) |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Captain Video: Master of the Stratosphere is a 15-chapter serial released by Columbia Pictures in 1951. It was directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet and Wallace A. Grissel with a screenplay by Royal G. Cole, Sherman I. Lowe and Joseph F. Poland, based on a treatment by George H. Plympton. The serial is unique for several reasons--- in particular, it is the first and last film serial ever based on a television program, Captain Video and His Video Rangers.
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Judd Holdren, in what was only his second starring screen role, plays Captain Video, the leader of a group of crime-fighters known as the Video Rangers. He faces an interplanetary menace, as the evil dictator of the planet Atoma, Vultura (Gene Roth) and his lackey, the traitorous earth scientist Dr. Tobor (George Eldredge) are planning to conquer the earth.
Captain Video was the only serial adapted from television.[1]
As produced by Sam Katzman, the serial has a production budget seemingly not much larger than the famously tiny budget of the DuMont Television Network's live daily teleseries.
Republic Pictures used and reused the same basic plot in Radar Men from the Moon, Zombies of the Stratosphere and Commando Cody: Sky Marshal of the Universe in 1951 - 1953, and borrowed Holdren himself for the latter two serials. The Captain Video chapterplay is a bit more satisfying to science-fiction fans, because it does make an effort to keep the action interplanetary, instead of earthbound. Captain Video and his teenaged sidekick, the otherwise nameless "Video Ranger" (Larry Stewart), must make frequent visits both to Atoma and to another distant planet, Theros.
Both Atoma and Theros are impersonated by Bronson Canyon, so to distinguish the two, the Atoma footage is tinted pink and the Theros footage is tinted green in the original release prints.[1] These colored scenes were processed by Cinecolor.
In the Captain Video teleseries, "Tobor" is the name of a large robot, who was one of the series' most popular characters. Calling a villain "Dr. Tobor" may have been intended to fool young theater-goers into thinking they would see the robot in the serial. In fact, the only robots on view are the ludicrous cardboard, fedora-wearing robots seen in the 1935 Gene Autry serial The Phantom Empire. (These were originally built as dancing robots, for the 1933 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer musical Dancing Lady).
This was the second of only three science fiction serials released by Columbia. The third, The Lost Planet (1953), is a virtual sequel although with different character names,[2] The slaves of The Lost Planet's evil extraterrestrial dictator Reckov (also Gene Roth) inexplicably all wear uniforms that look like those of the Video Rangers of 1951. In any case, the hero in The Lost Planet is a newspaper reporter named Rex Barrow, also played by Judd Holdren. As in the Captain Video serial, there is also an evil earth scientist, Dr. Grood (Michael Fox), in cahoots with Reckov of the Lost Planet.
Captain Video was very successful when first released to theaters, and kept playing long after other serials had been retired to the vaults. It is one of only two serials that Columbia reissued three times (in 1958, 1960, and 1963).
Harmon and Glut describe this serial as a "rather shoddy, low budget space cliffhanger."[1]
The serial includes several science fiction gadgets of the era. The Opticon Scillometer was used for looking through walls. Objects were made to disappear with the Isotropic Radiation Curtain. The Mu-ray Camera could photograph lingering images after the event. Temporary madness could be caused with the Psychosomatic Weapon. A variation on Radar was entitled the Radionic Directional Beam and the Radionic Guide.[1]
Source:[3]
| Preceded by Mysterious Island (1951) |
Columbia Serial The Mysterious Pilot (1951) |
Succeeded by King of the Congo (1952) |
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