The Andromeda Strain was fine but in general disease movies are very boring. You can't see viruses. The villain of the movie is invisible to the eye. Not the best cinema.
@@Dragon-Believer Disease movies were few and far between then. This was a terrifying movie when it came out. Even for a little boy, Jaws wasn't as scary.
@@TheTeufelhunden68 Absolutely, I was a kid in the 70's when I saw this movie, probably after it was a year or two old, and it was one of the scariest movies of the time, there's something about not seeing what the threat is that can make it so scary, hence not seeing the shark until half way through Jaws and only seeing bits of the monster in Alien for most of the movie.
@@TheTeufelhunden68 - More plausible than some since then, given the modern need to crank everything up to 12 because audiences have short attention spans and need everything spoon-fed to them.
@@Dragon-Believer Actually the thing you don't see if infinitely more terrifying than that which you do. Once you've seen the enemy/monster you've seen it; it can't get any scarier. The unseen remains just that, and so it's terror/impact remains.
The Andromeda Strain was one of my childhood favorite movies. I loved that real scientific equipment was used. It influenced my decision to select Chemistry as my college degree (later changed to Engineering).
I grew up with train tracks at the end of my block my dad was a conductor on a train. I took engineering for two semesters till I realized it didn't have nothing to do with trains
benjamin hoyos over rated, more like it. He’s a rabid anti-scientist, climate change denier, and frankly goes on pages long lectures rather than moving the story along.
@@ThunderStruck15 how is he anti-science? Besides, weren’t we suppose to be drowning in melted icecaps like 5 years ago, according to scientists from the 90s? He’s just skeptical of how fear-mongering climate science has become for political reasons.
This is one of my favorite movies of all time. For two reasons mainly. I was 8 years old when this came out and it was the first horror movie that really gave me nightmares. But mostly it was because Kate's character had an epileptic seizure in the movie, and as an epileptic myself, it was the first time I could connect personally to someone on TV. So her character became an inspiration to me, that even with epilepsy, I could still grow up to be someone important.
Brilliantly written, brilliantly acted, brilliantly directed, etc. It is timeless. A few films come to mind that are similarly timeless, Goodfellas, for example. It is just a really good film with a story that’ll never grow old. Fortunately for us, COVID-19 isn’t nearly as disastrous as Andromeda.
I enjoy watching it because it's one of those movies that stands above other movies of its time, like Goodfellas, Raiders, Exorcist, Jaws or Apocalypse Now.
I love this movie, never get tired of it. The actors were very believable, especially James Olson as a surgeon, non scientist, normal guy who was very frustrated with everything going on. RIP😥
This was my first introduction to thrillers, the concept of medicine as a weapon, and epilepsy. Sometimes, from the perspective of a child, the stuff we don't understand about something like this makes it all the more terrifying.
Barot8 very much so .."...head of its time .....there you go I didn't know mike Crichton was a medical doctor he did a freakin good job.A now with the corona virus around it's pretty poignant point as is the movie contagion
This movie is rated G and as a kid, second grade, scared the Hell out of me. The monkeys ard rats dying were shocking, but the images of the virus GROWING gave me nightmares. Great movie and have yet to read the book. Love the score for this one.
The organism in the Andromeda Strain is NOT a virus. At least it is not like any virus we have on Earth. The Andromeda Strain organism does not have any of the ordinary characteristics or traits of a terrestrial virus. The Andromeda Strain organism also has extraordinary traits that make it very different from any terrestrial organism or virus. For example, Terrestrial viruses cannot reproduce by themselves in a vacuum bombarded by electrons. The Andromeda Strain could do that.
I still remember reading this book in my 5th grade classroom.. Mrs Summers was the teacher. I was sat separately from my class as a disciplinary punishment, but enjoyed it so much I kept getting myself in trouble :D
I loved the Andromeda Strain. It was one of those sci fi movies that freaked me out in the 1970’s. Some other freaky movies were: Soylent Green, Phase 4, Omega Man... needless to say, my childhood was TRAUMATIZED by these great movies.
There were a few great science fiction movies of the 50's, The Day The Earth Stood Still, War Of The Worlds, and my favorite, Forbidden Planet. But you all are right, a number of great movies were made in the 60's and 70's with The Andromeda Strain being my favorite. In today's world, the comic book movies are fun, special affects are great, but starting to get old. And remakes of the classics turn out to be pure crap. I do want to see the 2011 movie "Contagion" since it's suppose to closely parallel the current pandemic, but I've been too cheap to rent it. LOL Oh, BTW, I did enjoy the TV miniseries of Steven King's "The Stand".
I remember watching this on TV when I was a kid, and being really creeped out by that scene where they slit the wrist of a corpse, and nothing but powder spills out! 0_0 Also: Damn, I'm old! ^_^
Just saw this movie for the first time last weekend and was genuinely entertained. I usually skip a little through movies because I get bored but this movie I sat and watched the whole way through.
This movie terrified me as a kid. Like scare the living HELL out of me. More then jaws or alien or predator. CNBC warfare scare me more than actual combat. If I got a rifle,you got a rifle 50/50 I win. A nuke or bio or chemical weapon I can't fight
One of the best Sci fi films I saw. Another plague scare movie, a bit older, was the Satan Bug. Arthur Hill is excellent as the project head. My favorite scene is when the soldiers show up the the doctors house and say "sir we have a fire". Great Cold war era stuff. Reminds me of my old mad scientist days back in the 1980s.
I remember reading the novel when it first came out, I liked how the movie followed the novel instead of veering off on a tangent. I've recently read the newest novel ' The Andromeda Strain : Evolution' and found it to be extremely enjoyable in that it doesn't bombard you with over explained tech talk, it gives you enough to allow you to back reference to the earlier book and movie. All in all I would highly recommend it for anyone who enjoyed the originals.
One of my favorite movies. The town is Shafter, Texas where most of the location filming occurred. If you look closely you can still see the church. It is a very remote area in West Texas between Alpine and Panther Junction. I was in the area the summer of 1979.
I'm fairly new to the channel and I love the positive responses to this movie. So many people are quick to dismiss movies with shot lengths over five seconds. I must point out Richard Kline's superb cinematography--one of his specialties is the use of split diopters to fudge depth of field, providing proper focus on two subjects at different distances in the frame--hard to achieve with anamorphic lenses otherwise. One more thing: "601".
The scene when the one scientist prone to seizures missed seeing what would have been the cure(?) made me so sad as a child. The one with laser had me on the edge of my seat. We very seldom make movies like this anymore.
@Bunker Sieben I grew up loving his works, even though I have just read Jurrasic Park, The Sphere, and just recently Micro. Congo and the Andromeda strain are books that is currently with my aunt's, but haven't read yet.
My favorite movie from back when I was in High School...my biology teacher back when I was a Sophomore actually decided to have the whole class watch the movie over the course of a week...I loved it so much that once we were done, I borrowed the exact same VHS from our teacher and took it home to share with my Mom and Step-Dad! 😍 I was actually hearing the main theme from "The Andromeda Strain" as you were discussing it...never have I heard anything so NOT music sound so...musically perfect...😍💖
Your channel was recommended by UA-cam just now. Saw 'Andromeda Strain', and opened the video. Boy, was I pleasantly surprised to see your excellent analysis. The book and the '71 film are classics, and you gave them their due respect! I'm definitely watching the film again today!
The Andromeda strain is a classic that's both very intelligently done and a visual treat. It's 1of my 2 always had movies and one of the best films ever made. The other is 2001 ASO.
RIP Michael Crichton, Amazing fucking author and I love the fact that he wrote The Lost World (I think it's one of the only sequels he's ever done) to Jurassic park because of how much people loved it. Favorite Books: Prey, State of Fear, Micro (Sucks he dies while writing this one its really fucking good), Terminal Man, Andromeda Strain, Next, Timeline, Eaters of the Dead, Great Train Robbery, JP and TLW, and my all time favorite: Pirate Latitudes
It's tightly constructed, perfectly executed and as the insert notes read, it's "directed with clinical precision by Robert Wise." I don't recall it being released with much fanfare. It's so good a film for being so "off the radar." This and Swiss Family Robinson are two reasons why to date I get easily bored with movies and am VERY hard to satisfy. Probably due to the magnificent quality and my own personal disdain for the dumbing down of anything. Kate Reid was perfectly cast as the lone female. "Hemlock for our Hippocrates." "Establishment going to fall down and go boom!"
My first exposure to this story was in my freshman biology class, when our teacher put the movie on one day. I was completely fascinated and terrified by every second of it. I ended up buying it on DVD (haha, remember dvds?) and was gifted the book (haha remember BOOKS???? 🤪) later that year. It seems like every 3-5 years I’ll suddenly remember that this movie exists and need to rewatch it- or look up videos of people discussing it and/or the novel, hence why I’m here now. Even though I’m mostly unaffected these days by scary movies, The Andromeda Strain continues to deeply unsettle me whenever I watch it. I think the music and sound design is a big part of it, but the novel definitely unnerves me too. Michael Crichton was a genius!
I once had an English professor alternatively refer to the "Andromeda Virus" as "Moon Dookie," to convey how terrifying (and probable) it would be to encounter something like this in real life.
I suspect you professor was trying to say the science behind the Andromeda Virus was bullshit not terrifying and certainly not probable hence "moon dookie."
@Slavic No it makes it more likely to kill us because we have no natural immunity, just like how European small pox decimated the Native Americans, who had never been exposed to it.
@Slavic Actually by that logic it's more likely to be harmful than not. From a virus's perspective we are just hosts, so an ideal virus remains nearly or totally undetected while using the carrier as both a transmitter and resource pool. A virus that kills its host is unsustainable and doomed to die out, failing the common goal of all life: to survive. A totally alien virus would have just as good of a chance as being totally unable to inhabit our bodies or bypass our immune systems as it would to kill us and doom itself in the process.
For a 1970's movie orthat era. This was a movie buffs dream...nice exposition,suspense,drama,and practical effects. This still holds up by today standards...in some cases better. The creep-factor was not wasted on the paranoia of the 70's..all in all, stellar scifi. Your channel is very introspective and enlightening...KUDOS!
I first read that book in 1971. It was one helluva read and have reread it many times since. I found the film one of the few films that actualy got close to what was in the novel and the intensity of the last few minutes of the film is still a nail biter. I've always thought that Dr. Crichton should have updated his novel to reflect the advances in microbiology since 1969.
Talking about 1969: "...the then new field of biological warfare..." Biological warfare has been around since before the Trojan War. Flinging scorpions over walls, driving sick populations into enemy countries, throwing corpses into city water supplies, etc.
I had a thing a few years ago where read a lot of Michael Crichton's books including 'The Andromeda Strain'. Everyone of the books is different but there is a very heavy scientific bent to them. I recommend all of them to you, although 'Airframe' is a bit slow but comes good at the end.
Airframe is one of the few books by Chriton I haven’t finished. I had to stop because I wanted to hurt two of the villains in the book. Very few villains in any media have managed to earn that level of ire.
Michael Crichton is one of my favorite authors and several of his books are on my list of favorites. Jurassic Park, Andromeda Strain, Timeline, Sphere, Congo, Airframe, The Terminal Man, and Rising Sun were all phenomenal books with a fictional story filled with enough factual basis that it can be used as a study as well as entertainment. His books were so well researched that many of the facts in the book are actually accurate and many of the things in say Terminal Man were actually happening at the time and in the following 2 decades.
This is a syfy classic and one of my favorites. This was a riveting on the edge of your seat thriller and really damn scary. To this day I remember the phrase code name "Wildfire."
I loved the book and the original Andromeda Strain movie. Excellent. Riveting, indeed! The original movie discussed here is way better than the remake and it still holds up well these many decades later. Thanks for this video!
This movie is fantastic. My ten-year-old son was mesmerized and couldn't stop from watching. Paced and intelligent storytelling with deep characters and a motivated thesis rule. Take not Hollywood!
Thank you for this. It raised long-ago memories for me, then confirmed or explained elements of them. I saw the film, in a theatre, when I was 8 years old. I lived in Belgium but was visiting family in Massachusetts so saw this American film My feelings from back then, which stayed with me, were that it seemed less trivial than other (especially sci-fi-ish)films, and that the woman scientist stood out. Much of the rest I didn't grasp all that well, given age and foreign-ness. So finding your discussion of Kate Reid's character and her performance, and her in general, explained so much about my old, hard to hold on to memories. You spoke eloquently, insightfully and to the point. What I reacted to, as an 8 year old in a strange country, was: seeing a really talented woman being given a role which in the normal way of life back then (and still far too normal today) would have just been given to some bloke; seeing her really shine; seeing her not being shown in the way 99.9% of women in films at the time (and still hugely today) i.e. as sex meat. And this had such a powerful effect on me - I realized that something very different was going on here, that this memory stayed with me all these years. So, again, thank you very much. I really liked and appreciated and was impressed by how you raised this and spoke about it. I don't mean to seem negative about men, but...there are a lot of men who would not have either picked up on this subject, or have verbalized, or have verbalized it so well.
I remember watching this movie not understanding how that thing went from killing you in an instant to beeing absolutely harmless at the end of the movie...
"The film starts by showing how technology was snowballing and there is bound to be a crisis caused by human over sight like Chernobyl" The Chernobyl incident happened over a decade after this movie was released...
I first saw this movie in the early 2000’s when I was like 14, 15 and it was intriguing yet equally terrifying...and I still feel that way to this day about it.
I remember watching this movie with my mother when I was 10, and freaking out. mom loved it but I ran upstairs and refused to come down till it was over.
Before the video even starts I got to say I remember watching this movie when I was a young kid this was an awesome freaking movie leastways when you're 7 it was
I saw this movie in 1971 and not since. Read the book first. Excellent analysis. One other detail: in the book, blood turns into putty, in the movie, it turns to dust. More impact on-screen.
I think it far more plausible that a physical manifestation should alter the natural clotting phenomenon and render the dynamics of our whole vascular system a 'putty' rather than a dust of any kind.
We need more screenwriters who are dedicated to the plot and characters of the original books. Movie adaptations like the Andromdea Strain are few and far between in their honoring the novel & author.
I read the book and watched the movie in the early 90s. One of my first introductions to Michael Crichton. I loved the movie, as slow as it was, because it stayed mostly true to the book. I've read every Crichton book ever made. One of my favorite authors.
I like how the actors look like real people rather than perfect hollywood models
The Andromeda Strain was fine but in general disease movies are very boring. You can't see viruses. The villain of the movie is invisible to the eye. Not the best cinema.
@@Dragon-Believer
Disease movies were few and far between then. This was a terrifying movie when it came out. Even for a little boy, Jaws wasn't as scary.
@@TheTeufelhunden68
Absolutely, I was a kid in the 70's when I saw this movie, probably after it was a year or two old, and it was one of the scariest movies of the time, there's something about not seeing what the threat is that can make it so scary, hence not seeing the shark until half way through Jaws and only seeing bits of the monster in Alien for most of the movie.
@@TheTeufelhunden68 - More plausible than some since then, given the modern need to crank everything up to 12 because audiences have short attention spans and need everything spoon-fed to them.
@@Dragon-Believer Actually the thing you don't see if infinitely more terrifying than that which you do. Once you've seen the enemy/monster you've seen it; it can't get any scarier. The unseen remains just that, and so it's terror/impact remains.
When you think about it. This is probably one of THE most realistic alien invasion stories ever.
The 1971 movie was 200 times better than the most recent remake.
You're being generous... Very generous.
the 71 version was a gift to lazy book report writers. Change the female scientist to a man, and the movie is spot on.
There was a remake? How bad is it?
@Doctor BeBop I wasn't considering watching it, but I am curious as to just how bad it is.
I have only seen the remake, I remember watching it and thinking wow I wish there was more.
little did I know.
The Andromeda Strain was one of my childhood favorite movies. I loved that real scientific equipment was used. It influenced my decision to select Chemistry as my college degree (later changed to Engineering).
I grew up with train tracks at the end of my block my dad was a conductor on a train. I took engineering for two semesters till I realized it didn't have nothing to do with trains
@@tolfan4438 HA!
@@tolfan4438 So funny!
In the 1800s you would have been correct, as the Engineer originally meant the person who operated the train engine.
Vidchemy
I was a lab scientist in a hospital lab at the time. I worked on the same equipment.
@@lindaterrell6104 would've been interesting.
Michael Crichton has got to be one of the most underrated authors of the last century.
benjamin hoyos over rated, more like it. He’s a rabid anti-scientist, climate change denier, and frankly goes on pages long lectures rather than moving the story along.
so, maybe perfectly rated?
@@ThunderStruck15 how is he anti-science? Besides, weren’t we suppose to be drowning in melted icecaps like 5 years ago, according to scientists from the 90s? He’s just skeptical of how fear-mongering climate science has become for political reasons.
Writer B.L. Alley you mean the dude that was a *politically based scientist* oh dear.
Barnibus Snaples the only people who think the climate change issues is “fear mongering” are anti-science.
This is one of my favorite movies of all time. For two reasons mainly. I was 8 years old when this came out and it was the first horror movie that really gave me nightmares. But mostly it was because Kate's character had an epileptic seizure in the movie, and as an epileptic myself, it was the first time I could connect personally to someone on TV. So her character became an inspiration to me, that even with epilepsy, I could still grow up to be someone important.
this holds up well after almost 50 years.
Get to see how accurate it is these days....
It is for me one of the best sci fi movies ever made.
@@mal35m what
Brilliantly written, brilliantly acted, brilliantly directed, etc. It is timeless. A few films come to mind that are similarly timeless, Goodfellas, for example. It is just a really good film with a story that’ll never grow old. Fortunately for us, COVID-19 isn’t nearly as disastrous as Andromeda.
I enjoy watching it because it's one of those movies that stands above other movies of its time, like Goodfellas, Raiders, Exorcist, Jaws or Apocalypse Now.
They left out the run on toilet paper.
They had way more newspapers then... 😱
LOL
Trump's solution to toilet paper shortage: Make Constipation Great Again.
@@genemurray8171 Better still use a Trump hater to wipe your arse!! 👍👍
ya say you've got the runs and need toilet paper ?! use Kleenex then...
I love this movie, never get tired of it. The actors were very believable, especially James Olson as a surgeon, non scientist, normal guy who was very frustrated with everything going on. RIP😥
Always loved watching this movie, Andromeda Strain is one of my top 10!
Solomon Gainey mind too
Still holds up as a very frightening film.
This was my first introduction to thrillers, the concept of medicine as a weapon, and epilepsy. Sometimes, from the perspective of a child, the stuff we don't understand about something like this makes it all the more terrifying.
Barot8 very much so .."...head of its time .....there you go I didn't know mike Crichton was a medical doctor he did a freakin good job.A now with the corona virus around it's pretty poignant point as is the movie contagion
I watched it a few years back. It really does hold up. so many other truly feel dated, this one did not.
@@debstherottie472 So much better than the horrifying made for tv remake. Ugh... that was so bad.
Can you make a video on the tripods from war of the worlds?
Yes they're on the list :)
@@filmcomicsexplained AWESOME!!!!
Seconded!! You're the best man
i wish to bump this up on the priority list aswell
Pls
This movie is rated G and as a kid, second grade, scared the Hell out of me. The monkeys ard rats dying were shocking, but the images of the virus GROWING gave me nightmares. Great movie and have yet to read the book. Love the score for this one.
Now you can watch it play out in real life.
Link Knight Hardly...the fictitious Andromeda Strain as depicted in Crichton’s novel had a 99% mortality rate.
The organism in the Andromeda Strain is NOT a virus. At least it is not like any virus we have on Earth. The Andromeda Strain organism does not have any of the ordinary characteristics or traits of a terrestrial virus. The Andromeda Strain organism also has extraordinary traits that make it very different from any terrestrial organism or virus.
For example, Terrestrial viruses cannot reproduce by themselves in a vacuum bombarded by electrons. The Andromeda Strain could do that.
You now have ptsd
You should check out another "biological warfare" horror movie called "Living Hell"....
I still remember reading this book in my 5th grade classroom..
Mrs Summers was the teacher. I was sat separately from my class as a disciplinary punishment, but enjoyed it so much I kept getting myself in trouble :D
I loved the Andromeda Strain. It was one of those sci fi movies that freaked me out in the 1970’s. Some other freaky movies were: Soylent Green, Phase 4, Omega Man... needless to say, my childhood was TRAUMATIZED by these great movies.
Agree with you all the way.Imagine if the scenerio for Soylent Green comes true?Scary.
@Prescription Peddler 👍
Rick I was 13 years old when I seen this in a theater it scared me. Im 62 now. Fuck!!
@@mariagutierrez7577 If you're down, I am.
There were a few great science fiction movies of the 50's, The Day The Earth Stood Still, War Of The Worlds, and my favorite, Forbidden Planet. But you all are right, a number of great movies were made in the 60's and 70's with The Andromeda Strain being my favorite. In today's world, the comic book movies are fun, special affects are great, but starting to get old. And remakes of the classics turn out to be pure crap. I do want to see the 2011 movie "Contagion" since it's suppose to closely parallel the current pandemic, but I've been too cheap to rent it. LOL Oh, BTW, I did enjoy the TV miniseries of Steven King's "The Stand".
One of the best sci-fi movies of all time!!! Such a classic and I never get tired of watching this great movie!!!
Watched this as a kid in the 70's. Loved it.
I remember watching this on TV when I was a kid, and being really creeped out by that scene where they slit the wrist of a corpse, and nothing but powder spills out! 0_0
Also: Damn, I'm old! ^_^
Right there with you -- I'm 61.
Chup Smith : Pardon, poudre ¿?!
@@burtonwilliams5355 ---> Same here... 56. I was Fascinated by TAS, still am...
I remember when it came out and I got to see it on the big screen. I was in college studying to be a vet but changed it to chemistry...
I saw it on network tele when I was 9 years old
Just saw this movie for the first time last weekend and was genuinely entertained. I usually skip a little through movies because I get bored but this movie I sat and watched the whole way through.
I remember at the time, thinking how wonderful it was that a movie actually stayed true to the book. That was rare and I reckon it still is.
It's legitimately Christmas in July when you upload
Why do I see you everywhere?
Aye jellal
Dude u always get top comment or get hearted
and still no mustache
Stfu
This movie terrified me as a kid. Like scare the living HELL out of me. More then jaws or alien or predator. CNBC warfare scare me more than actual combat. If I got a rifle,you got a rifle 50/50 I win. A nuke or bio or chemical weapon I can't fight
Right there with ya
Just wear 2 masks! You'll be fine! Just 14 days of lockdown and it'll all be over
@@duckmeat4674 15 days to flatten the curve and make sure to get anal swabs from a shady nurse. Lol
In regards to fighting virsus,ask the dying aliens in War Of The Worlds.
One of the best Sci fi films I saw. Another plague scare movie, a bit older, was the Satan Bug.
Arthur Hill is excellent as the project head. My favorite scene is when the soldiers show up the the doctors house and say "sir we have a fire". Great Cold war era stuff. Reminds me of my old mad scientist days back in the 1980s.
I remember reading the novel when it first came out, I liked how the movie followed the novel instead of veering off on a tangent. I've recently read the newest novel ' The Andromeda Strain : Evolution' and found it to be extremely enjoyable in that it doesn't bombard you with over explained tech talk, it gives you enough to allow you to back reference to the earlier book and movie. All in all I would highly recommend it for anyone who enjoyed the originals.
It wasn't bad but the original was far superior.
7:57 “How would you know that?” He asked.
“Oh doctor, I have a long criminal record …”
😆🤣😂
😂😂
resistance: fall of man, i like this game and would love an explanation of it
I LOVE that game
i dont think he can explain it since its a game not a film though
@@hazz1046 he does games
I love it, too
resistance and fear both need comebacks
The book was amazing, thanks for covering this!
Andromeda strain is one of my favorite classic sci fi movies. Glad to see it covered here
One of my favorite movies. The town is Shafter, Texas where most of the location filming occurred. If you look closely you can still see the church. It is a very remote area in West Texas between Alpine and Panther Junction. I was in the area the summer of 1979.
I explored it via Google Earth during lockdown.
One of the best movies of all time, tense, suspenseful and scarily plausible.
You Betcha.
People are wont to say something is impossible until some unanticipated reality shows that they've been wrong.
It's a great movie even today it has credibility.
God, this movie is creepier than ever with this pandemic fueling such fear.
Well, at least the current pandemic doesn’t kill people within seconds, unlike the andromeda strain.
Thankfully Corona only screws up your lungs and can be survived. Andromeda turns your blood into powder.
...and both diseases are fictional.
@@KutWrite what
It's the media pushing fear
This one and The Cassandra Crossing will get your virus feelers up. Good stuff.
THE SATAN BUG.
The 1971 Andromeda Strain is one of my favorite movies. I showed it a younger friend recently and he was amazed how well a movie that old held up.
Thank-you for doing such a marvelous review of one of my favorite books and movie.
This is one of those movies that doesn't need remaking.
Unfortunately, they DID "remake" it. Saw the new version. It sucked.
Crichton's work was exceptionally scientifically literate.
A science fiction classic
Very good pacing
Lots to learn for those interested in writing
I cant believe im just now hearing of this. Absolutely a wonderful film
This is one of my favorite movies and one of my favorite novels. Crichton is an absolute genius.
Fun fact: The Andromeda Strain influenced the 13th episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion!
Neat.
Fun fact: The disease may be real but is just frozen in ancient ice
Fun fact , I dont know what that is
Oh wow! That's actually really cool!!
@@alienmorality some old bacteria or microbe could be found in antartica or in the artic.
I'm fairly new to the channel and I love the positive responses to this movie. So many people are quick to dismiss movies with shot lengths over five seconds. I must point out Richard Kline's superb cinematography--one of his specialties is the use of split diopters to fudge depth of field, providing proper focus on two subjects at different distances in the frame--hard to achieve with anamorphic lenses otherwise. One more thing: "601".
Love your videos, they both informative as well as entertaining.....as always, excellent work!!
Thanks :)
The scene when the one scientist prone to seizures missed seeing what would have been the cure(?) made me so sad as a child.
The one with laser had me on the edge of my seat. We very seldom make movies like this anymore.
55 years now.
And through my research into the Andromeda Strain I find your channel.
This is a good day.
Subscribed.
My favorite sci-fi film of all time. Love it!
One of my all time favorite movies.
An intelligent, deliberate, suspenseful, and well-made film. An underrated Robert Wise film.
I read this book when i was a teenager. Very good. I love Michael Crichton.
One of all time favorite films. Great direction, cast and direction.
Loved this film. Even after all these years I still find it captivating.
Have always loved this movie. It's right up there with The Omega Man. In fact I'm gonna break out my DVD and watch it tonight.
So glad you did this video. This is seriously one of my favorite films!
I love Michael Crichton’s books, hes definitely my favorite author
A very scientific and complex movie . I watched it in the 70s as a kid and never forgot it
OK, I have the novel with my aunt's house. I need to read it. It piqued my interest years ago, but I kept forgeting to read it.
@Bunker Sieben I grew up loving his works, even though I have just read Jurrasic Park, The Sphere, and just recently Micro. Congo and the Andromeda strain are books that is currently with my aunt's, but haven't read yet.
@@evblue5 I love the original Jurassic Park novel, as well as The Andromeda Strain, Prey and Micro. I should really re-read them.
I love Michael Crichton
Saw this as a kid in the early 70's, scared the shit out of me.
My favorite movie from back when I was in High School...my biology teacher back when I was a Sophomore actually decided to have the whole class watch the movie over the course of a week...I loved it so much that once we were done, I borrowed the exact same VHS from our teacher and took it home to share with my Mom and Step-Dad! 😍
I was actually hearing the main theme from "The Andromeda Strain" as you were discussing it...never have I heard anything so NOT music sound so...musically perfect...😍💖
Your channel was recommended by UA-cam just now. Saw 'Andromeda Strain', and opened the video. Boy, was I pleasantly surprised to see your excellent analysis. The book and the '71 film are classics, and you gave them their due respect! I'm definitely watching the film again today!
The Andromeda strain is a classic that's both very intelligently done and a visual treat. It's 1of my 2 always had movies and one of the best films ever made. The other is 2001 ASO.
I think it's really cool to see the publishers watch your videos and wanted to see you cover the virus from the novel.
That's super cool man.
Awesome Film! Good Analysis!
0:20 Dwight Schrute, "It's growing!"
RIP Michael Crichton, Amazing fucking author and I love the fact that he wrote The Lost World (I think it's one of the only sequels he's ever done) to Jurassic park because of how much people loved it.
Favorite Books:
Prey, State of Fear, Micro (Sucks he dies while writing this one its really fucking good), Terminal Man, Andromeda Strain, Next, Timeline, Eaters of the Dead, Great Train Robbery, JP and TLW, and my all time favorite: Pirate Latitudes
A superb film. It's one of
those films that you NEVER
forget 👍☺️
Kate Reid
💞💐💞
It's tightly constructed, perfectly executed and as the insert notes read, it's "directed with clinical precision by Robert Wise." I don't recall it being released with much fanfare. It's so good a film for being so "off the radar." This and Swiss Family Robinson are two reasons why to date I get easily bored with movies and am VERY hard to satisfy. Probably due to the magnificent quality and my own personal disdain for the dumbing down of anything. Kate Reid was perfectly cast as the lone female. "Hemlock for our Hippocrates." "Establishment going to fall down and go boom!"
The way he says “capillaries” haha I’m sorry I cannot deal
What's the problem?
This movie is such a gem. It was remarkably well done and creepy
I absolutely LOVE this movie! I saw it as a kid back in '71 & it scared the hell out of me. Great story telling.
My first exposure to this story was in my freshman biology class, when our teacher put the movie on one day. I was completely fascinated and terrified by every second of it. I ended up buying it on DVD (haha, remember dvds?) and was gifted the book (haha remember BOOKS???? 🤪) later that year.
It seems like every 3-5 years I’ll suddenly remember that this movie exists and need to rewatch it- or look up videos of people discussing it and/or the novel, hence why I’m here now. Even though I’m mostly unaffected these days by scary movies, The Andromeda Strain continues to deeply unsettle me whenever I watch it. I think the music and sound design is a big part of it, but the novel definitely unnerves me too. Michael Crichton was a genius!
I've never seen the movie, but the book is one of my favorites. Super nerve wracking! 😲
Saw this as a young man, scared the heck out of me and then AIDS comes along!!
I saw this as a 10 year old and was mesmerised with fear. “This is how you make SCIENCE FICTION.”
DRpokeme
And now.... Coronavirus 😱
That's why our brave brothers closed the pools
@@vixx-kun7686 some say it's still closed to this day
I once had an English professor alternatively refer to the "Andromeda Virus" as "Moon Dookie," to convey how terrifying (and probable) it would be to encounter something like this in real life.
@Slavic Kinda unrealistic? Yes, beyond the realm of possibility? No.
I suspect you professor was trying to say the science behind the Andromeda Virus was bullshit not terrifying and certainly not probable hence "moon dookie."
@Slavic No it makes it more likely to kill us because we have no natural immunity, just like how European small pox decimated the Native Americans, who had never been exposed to it.
@Slavic Actually by that logic it's more likely to be harmful than not. From a virus's perspective we are just hosts, so an ideal virus remains nearly or totally undetected while using the carrier as both a transmitter and resource pool. A virus that kills its host is unsustainable and doomed to die out, failing the common goal of all life: to survive. A totally alien virus would have just as good of a chance as being totally unable to inhabit our bodies or bypass our immune systems as it would to kill us and doom itself in the process.
Nice treatment. The comparison to Dante's Inferno was interesting. I have always especially loved Kate Reid's work in this film.
For a 1970's movie orthat era. This was a movie buffs dream...nice exposition,suspense,drama,and practical effects. This still holds up by today standards...in some cases better. The creep-factor was not wasted on the paranoia of the 70's..all in all, stellar scifi. Your channel is very introspective and enlightening...KUDOS!
I first read that book in 1971. It was one helluva read and have reread it many times since. I found the film one of the few films that actualy got close to what was in the novel and the intensity of the last few minutes of the film is still a nail biter. I've always thought that Dr. Crichton should have updated his novel to reflect the advances in microbiology since 1969.
Talking about 1969: "...the then new field of biological warfare..."
Biological warfare has been around since before the Trojan War. Flinging scorpions over walls, driving sick populations into enemy countries, throwing corpses into city water supplies, etc.
Yup, nowadays that stuff would be considered Primitive BioWarfare... but still effective and can easily kill us today if one really dies that
@@targitausrithux2320 True. But even some stuff can only go so far till it breaks.
We're such horrible creatures! 😥
Yes, but in '69 we started to get scientific about it.
Uhm.... we're really talking about quite another scale here than a few scorpions or poisoning water supplies.
I had a thing a few years ago where read a lot of Michael Crichton's books including 'The Andromeda Strain'. Everyone of the books is different but there is a very heavy scientific bent to them. I recommend all of them to you, although 'Airframe' is a bit slow but comes good at the end.
Airframe is one of the few books by Chriton I haven’t finished. I had to stop because I wanted to hurt two of the villains in the book. Very few villains in any media have managed to earn that level of ire.
Most of his books were quite entertaining. State of Fear, though, was trollish and overly political.
Few read book, Jurrassic Park. Movie is excellent. Book is better.
Blew me a way!
Too bad that he wasn't scientifically minded in all things. His reputation resulted in considerable gains for the climate change denial industry.
@@kylenolan2710 as it should be.
Michael Crichton is one of my favorite authors and several of his books are on my list of favorites. Jurassic Park, Andromeda Strain, Timeline, Sphere, Congo, Airframe, The Terminal Man, and Rising Sun were all phenomenal books with a fictional story filled with enough factual basis that it can be used as a study as well as entertainment. His books were so well researched that many of the facts in the book are actually accurate and many of the things in say Terminal Man were actually happening at the time and in the following 2 decades.
Exploring this film in May 2022 is surreal.
Nice to see they fought it. Notice he said "human oversight", toxoplasma gondii flies under the radar here in life.
I love this movie, it's so smart and real.
This is a syfy classic and one of my favorites. This was a riveting on the edge of your seat thriller and really damn scary.
To this day I remember the phrase code name "Wildfire."
I loved the book and the original Andromeda Strain movie. Excellent. Riveting, indeed! The original movie discussed here is way better than the remake and it still holds up well these many decades later. Thanks for this video!
This movie is fantastic. My ten-year-old son was mesmerized and couldn't stop from watching. Paced and intelligent storytelling with deep characters and a motivated thesis rule. Take not Hollywood!
Thank you for this. It raised long-ago memories for me, then confirmed or explained elements of them. I saw the film, in a theatre, when I was 8 years old. I lived in Belgium but was visiting family in Massachusetts so saw this American film My feelings from back then, which stayed with me, were that it seemed less trivial than other (especially sci-fi-ish)films, and that the woman scientist stood out. Much of the rest I didn't grasp all that well, given age and foreign-ness. So finding your discussion of Kate Reid's character and her performance, and her in general, explained so much about my old, hard to hold on to memories.
You spoke eloquently, insightfully and to the point. What I reacted to, as an 8 year old in a strange country, was:
seeing a really talented woman being given a role which in the normal way of life back then (and still far too normal today) would have just been given to some bloke;
seeing her really shine;
seeing her not being shown in the way 99.9% of women in films at the time (and still hugely today) i.e. as sex meat.
And this had such a powerful effect on me - I realized that something very different was going on here, that this memory stayed with me all these years.
So, again, thank you very much. I really liked and appreciated and was impressed by how you raised this and spoke about it. I don't mean to seem negative about men, but...there are a lot of men who would not have either picked up on this subject, or have verbalized, or have verbalized it so well.
I remember watching this movie not understanding how that thing went from killing you in an instant to beeing absolutely harmless at the end of the movie...
"The film starts by showing how technology was snowballing and there is bound to be a crisis caused by human over sight like Chernobyl"
The Chernobyl incident happened over a decade after this movie was released...
He's making a comparison, not describing a plot element.
hi P C...
'
nuclear and virus are BIG different ways
Then it was proven right. ..
I mean, that's not great. It's not terrible either.
@@oatlord get yourself to the infirmary.
I first saw this movie in the early 2000’s when I was like 14, 15 and it was intriguing yet equally terrifying...and I still feel that way to this day about it.
Another all round stunner. Love seeing these classics brought back to the front.
I remember watching this movie with my mother when I was 10, and freaking out. mom loved it but I ran upstairs and refused to come down till it was over.
Chernobyl happened in 1986, so it could not have been part of the opening montage of a movie made in 1971.
It clearly wasn’t. They were just giving examples of the sort of incident the opening of the book was indicating could happen due to oversight.
Before the video even starts I got to say I remember watching this movie when I was a young kid this was an awesome freaking movie leastways when you're 7 it was
I mentioned that above. I loved this movie, but it scared the hell out of me. Worse than Jaws, but I was a little older then.
Growing up this is one of mine, and my dad's, favorite movies. It used to be on TNT a lot in the 90's so we'd end up watching it constantly :)
I saw this movie in 1971 and not since. Read the book first. Excellent analysis. One other detail: in the book, blood turns into putty, in the movie, it turns to dust. More impact on-screen.
I think it far more plausible that a physical manifestation should alter the natural clotting phenomenon and render the dynamics of our whole vascular system a 'putty' rather than
a dust of any kind.
This is one of the very few movies that used the book almost as a script.
CRICHTON was a genius.
We need more screenwriters who are dedicated to the plot and characters of the original books. Movie adaptations like the Andromdea Strain are few and far between in their honoring the novel & author.
The film was much better than the book.
most of Crichton's books require serious dumbing down for movie audiences.
crichton is a big idea guy, not so good at characters. But the actors fill in the gaps.
I read the book and watched the movie in the early 90s. One of my first introductions to Michael Crichton. I loved the movie, as slow as it was, because it stayed mostly true to the book. I've read every Crichton book ever made. One of my favorite authors.
The thing that always pulls me in about this movie is how they follow the scientific method.
Love the book! 📖❤️