World War II (1983) Novelization

Written by Harold King under the pseudonym Brian Harris. Based on the 1982 TV mini-series written by Robert L. Joseph and directed by David Greene and Boris Sagal.  It starred David Soul, Brian Keith, Cathy Lee Crosby, Robert Prosky, Katherine Helmond and Rock Hudson. It tells a (now-dated) story about how shenanigans with the Soviet Union could get out of hand. I say dated only in reference to the fact that it deals with the Soviets. The basic premise still seems pretty solid.

The mini-series this novelization is based upon was broadcast on NBC over two nights on Sunday January 31, 1982 and Monday February 1, 1982. This was the golden era of the mini-series, and this one sticks out from my childhood as one I actually wanted to watch. I recall that even at the time, I could tell that most of it was filmed on a set, but that didn't reduce the effectiveness by much. This is an unsensational telling of how a war could have started between the US and Soviet Russian in the early 1980's. At the time this story was told, the two countries had been locked in a cold war for more than 30 years. The threat of nuclear doom was ever-present for most people of that generation, and the story tapped into that fear in a logical and believable way. 

The original director was Boris Sagal. He was killed early in production in a helicopter accident while on location in Oregon. The production company was scheduled to spend a month on location filming outdoor scenes. After Sagal's death much of this work was moved to indoor sets. There is still the odd shot of the outdoors in the film, but the vast majority are indoors with fake snow. This is noticeable, but as I said, it works well enough. The indoor sets are cramped which compresses the action scenes.

The novelization is a distinct improvement over the mini-series. For one thing, it is not hampered by a TV movie budget and greatly expands the number of soldiers involved. It also uses the geography effectively instead of having to be contained on smallish indoor sets. This spreads the action out more realistically so the cat-and-mouse nature of the battle scenes work better.   Also, the novelization is R-rated with realistic dialogue and action. This serves to make the action more believable. It takes the already engaging premise and does everything a good novelization should do by filling the story gaps and going where movies (or in this case television) can't go for either budgetary or censorship reasons.

Very much recommended if you can find it.

From the back cover:

IT IS THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW...

The starving masses are rioting in wheat-poor Soviet Union.

The United States is in desperate need of fuel.

And a few Russian military fanatics have sent a suicide strike-force to capture the Alaskan pipeline as ransom for America's grain.

Now, a secret battle between a Russian and an American unit rages in Alaska's frozen wastes...

Now, the leaders of the two powers play a terrifying game of nuclear brinkmanship...

Now, two generations after "The Last Good War,", four generations after "The War To End All Wars," the world hurtles toward "The War That Nobody Wants"

The Big One...The Final One...

WORLD WAR III

NBC Miniseries from 1982, starring David Soul, Brian Keith, Cathy Lee Crosby, Robert Prosky and Rock Hudson.

Excerpt:

One of the hangars had been cannibalized to repair and insulate the other. It wasn't a beautiful job, but all it had to do was retain a reasonable amount of heat, which it accomplished, barely. But Caffey's primary problem wasn't keeping the men warm. His problem was keeping enough of them alive after each contact with the enemy (he was using the word now openly) so they could fight again. And again. Until he'd run out of men or ammunition, or until the Soviets quit and went home.

And they weren't quitting.

They'd keep it up, Caffey told one of his NCOs in response to a question during debriefing earlier, if they had to resort to throwing rocks and iceballs. Which was exactly what they'd be down to if later contacts were as costly as the first had been.

He knew he'd hurt the strike force. He'd killed or wounded probably thirty men and crippled if not destroyed the rocket-launching vehicle. Maybe they could patch it up. It didn't matter. It would cost them time. They'd be much more cautious now. They'd move slower. But the price he'd paid was staggering. Two of his four choppers were out of action---half his air force. He'd lost two pilots in the Huey that went down plus two thousand rounds of precious ammunition. A pilot in the second attack Huey was badly wounded and the chopper itself was no longer useful---the bullet-riddled fuselage attested to the miracle that it had returned at all. He'd lost nine men in his infantry---two killed, seven wounded. It wasn't a terribly high casualty count until you considered that he'd only used thirty men in the first skirmish; that's as many as he could cram into two choppers. Thirty percent casualties against three or four percent for his enemy weren't terrific statistics, no matter what he'd accomplished. He'd irritated them and that's about all he'd done. They weren't stopped and they weren't turning back. What they were was angry, Caffey thought. And waiting eagerly for the next time.

These were the things he'd explained in tonight's briefing. He took a long breath when he asked for questions.

"Sir, nobody's mentioned it, but . . . what about our families?" It was the lieutenant who'd asked if the plan would work the day before. "I know it sounds irrelevant, considering what's happening up here, but some of us were due to go home two days ago. I don't want to go back until we've done our jobs, and I know our families don't know what we're actually doing, but . . . what do they think we're doing here?"

"They've been told exactly the truth, Lieutenant." Caffey offered a tiny smile. "You've been snowed in by the weather . . . and you're all eating well and getting exercise."

There was some laughter.

"How much longer can we keep it up, sir?"

"Until the weather breaks," Caffey said. "Until we run out of ammo or the people to use it."

The laughter died away.

The Curious case of The Dark (1978) Novelization

Written by Max Franklin (aka Richard Deming). Based on the 1979 film written by Stanford Whitmore and directed by John 'Bud' Cardos. It starred William Devane, Cathy Lee Crosby, Richard Jaeckel and Keenan Wynn.

This is an odd one. The behind-the-scenes story of this film is definitely more interesting than the film itself. The film began with Tobe Hooper directing. However, Hooper was fired after only a few days, with journeyman director John 'Bud' Cardos taking over. Cardos is not a stylist and did what he was hired to do: finish the film on time, whatever it took. 

Where it becomes interesting is that the filmmakers decided to alter the story after filming was completed to inject a science fiction aspect into the story. Namely, they made the monster an alien that can shoot lasers from his eyes. Exactly what the original story was is...complicated.

There are reports that the story at that point was about an autistic person who had been locked away for most of their life, going on a murder spree when they are freed by a house fire. This info seems to originate with an interview with Cardos that was in the May 1984 issue of Cinefantasique. This was later repeated in the commentary that Cardos participated in for the 2017 Code Red Blu-Ray release.  

Which brings us to this novelization. The only screenwriter ever credited on The Dark was Stanford Whitmore. The novelization claims to be based on his screenplay, but it is NOT about an autistic person killing people. It tells the story of a 100-year-old Zombie that cuts off the heads of his victims with a scimitar and then eats them. The father of the first victim and a newscaster band together to investigate what is going on. In all ways, the novelization reads like an episode of the Night Stalker TV series, without Carl Kolchak. This is not a bad thing.  A still in the photo section includes a scene of a death BEFORE the alien was added, strengthening the case that the alien was a very late addition.

Let's try to unpack this. The final film matches the zombie plot mentioned above, save for the lasers. The characters all talk about the monster being a zombie, and never reference that the victims have been "blown up" by lasers. The monster, when finally shown, is wearing contemporary clothes and does not really match the description of the zombie in the book.  The autistic angle of the plot bears some similarity to Hooper's later THE FUNHOUSE, so perhaps he made that film to get the idea out of his head.

The changes were talked about in issue 12 of Starburst Magazine: 

"Okay, so it was a gamble," admits Larry [Fredericks], the Cinema Shares president. "But after doing our market research...we decided to shift the emphasis from conventional horror to a sci-fi image, which the plot allowed us to do. We re-thought the publicity campaign completely and really put some hours into getting the new art just right. With our experience of selling across the whole range of world markets, we figured we could make the film really work." 

Note, nowhere in the above is the idea of making the film better mentioned. I think the changes were made because the filmmakers had a film that wasn't very good. According to producer Igo Kantor in the above-mentioned 2017 Blu-ray commentary, the switch to the alien occurred after filming was complete. So switching to an alien was a last-ditch effort to salvage the investment when it became clear the film wasn't very good. 

Watching the film objectively, I think about a minute of alterations were done to support the alien plot-change:

• A prologue that explains that the alien came from the stars was added.
• The scenes of carnage stop before the zombie does anything, with lasers and explosions being overlaid on top of the original footage.
• Some insert shots showing the monster's hands as claw-like and decidedly non-human.
• The climax, which involves the alien battling a slew of police officers, appears to have some new footage to better support the laser angle.  Some full face shots of the alien shooting lasers, some pyrotechnic effects showing the effects of the laser hits.

That's it. I don't see anything else that was added. Of course, based on the novelization, we can see that things were removed or changed. But it is clear, at least to me, that the book used the same screenplay for the film that was shot, at least in part. Most of the names are the same, and the basic plot follows the same beats.  The fact that the monster is wearing regular clothes in the film makes me lean toward the autistic person as explaining the monster (inasmuch as that really explains how he could take so many gunshots and still be alive) . I think the film had a rushed filming schedule that resulted in something that has a couple of good scare scenes but not much coherence.  The producers tried to jazz it up with lasers to try to get their money back. 

So where did the story in the novelization come from?  Given that the filmmakers have repeatedly stated that the monster was an autistic person, I have to conclude that either the author worked from an earlier script that was ultimately changed to what Cardos described, or he took it upon himself to improve things with a story of his own. Cardos came on board about a week into filming, so perhaps there was an earlier script without the autistic person. This could have been what was provided to the author of the book.  I am not sure we will ever know for sure. 

Which is all too bad because this is a good novelization! The author really spends time with things and makes it a satisfying read. Considering that the basic plot does not make complete sense (what is the significance of the blind guy, anyway?), the author does a very good job of trying to make it clear.  If nothing else, the book describes a movie I'd much rather watch than the actual film made.

Excerpt:

At five-thirty in the afternoon Randy Morse had just finished making love to his latest conquest for the sixth time that day. She was a lovely Eurasian girl of eighteen named Camille Quam, whom he had met at an actors' workshop a week before. Since then they had been out of each other's sight for only brief periods, even making the rounds of TV studios to read the call-boards together. A good deal of the time, both day and night, they spent in bed together, always at his apartment, because she still lived with her parents. 

Sitting up in bed, naked, Camille leaned over the side of the bed to reach into her purse on the floor. She drew out a marijuana cigarette, a marijuana clip, and a packet of matches. Lighting the joint, she took a deep drag, held it, and passed the joint over to Randy, using the clip. 

Exhaling, she said, "Get it on, lover." 

Randy took a drag and handed back the clip. The phone on a bedside stand rang. Exhaling, he lifted the phone. 

"Hello," he said. 

"Randy?" a mature female voice said. 

"Oh, hi, Marge." 

"Busy tonight?" Marge Madison asked seductively. 

He glanced at Camille. "Why?" he asked. 

"His nibs flew to New York this morning. He's flying back again late tonight, but meantime, I thought perhaps we could discuss that part." 

"Sure," he said instantly. "I'm free."