Just finished watching this movie. In a nutshell: take all the charming faults and quirks of an old sci-fi monster movie and mix it up with a heavy dollop of Lovecraftian weirdness, and you have something that would look a lot like Equinox. Kudos to Criterion for giving B-movies their due (seeing as they've also given the fancy DVD treatment to THE BLOB and FIEND WITHOUT A FACE). The acting in Equinox is terrible. The dialogue is just rank, complete crap (characters actually saying lines like "Dave, you're a geologist" with a straight face, the lines implying that the other character, who is a geologist, must not remember the fact that he actually IS a geologist). The characters are classic horror stereotypes: they all look like cleancut Leave It To Beaver rejects, and they all have the complete and utter inability to evade danger. They're a wet dream for Call Of Cthulthu GM's: every time a situation presents itself in the story that is obviously fraught with peril, the characters cheerfully walk into it. There is one character with a self-preservation instinct, fulfilling the much-needed "Let's go home, dammit" role, but she's portrayed as the typical Hysterical Female and thus completely ignored. The other 3 main characters (the main male character, Dave, is the stoic rational guy with no personality; Jim, his homey, is the comic relief who isn't actually very comic; and Susan is the other female character, the submissive one who goes along with whatever Dave is thinking; Vicki is Jim's girlfriend, the only one with the good sense to get the hell out of the forest they're wandering in) keep looking for trouble for no real good reason. Its as if they know they're just plot devices and are perfectly content with just moving things along. The pacing of the film is also a bit off: the juicy bits don't happen until the last half hour, and the characters just aren't interesting enough by themselves to hold one's constant attention. Not to mention the occasional plot-hole (the worst of which being a character losing a pivotal item, only to magically having it back in their possession, with no explanation, at a most opportune moment), and the creepy scenes of park ranger Asmodeus (played by director Jack Woods) trying to get his freak on with Susan and Vicki (the most horrific image in Equinox remains Asmodeus/Woods smoochie face, which they play through traumatized flashbacks over and over again).
Now if it sounds like I thought Equinox sucked, that is not the case. Granted, its got many faults, but it is a B-movie, so you have to give it a little slack (quick note: there are 2 versions of the film on the DVD, the original filmed by a trio of film buffs on the cheap, and the theatrical version directed by Woods, which has some plot changes and the addition of Woods character; I watched the Woods version, which is the one I'm currently rambling on about). The positives: nice musical score. A cameo appearance by sci-fi author Fritz Leiber (Lankhmr for life, bitches!). The Lovecraftian stuff: a creepy tome, an even creepier mini-lecture on demonlogy (including creepy red-tones images of black cowled figures throwing themselves into a pit for no real reason; the demonology sequence just screams "bad acid trip"), freaked out old men hiding in the woods from dark forests, and an intrepid intellectual hero driven to madness (before anyone screams spoiler: the film starts in an insane asylum). The monsters, once they finally arrive, look really cool (the most impressive visual effect goes to the green giant), and are definitely reason enough to see the film. So even if the film's acting is terrible and the script a combination of wigged-out metaphysics and bad dialogue, there is enough creepy atmospheric touches (an invisible realm, castles manifesting in the California woodlands, cars driven by no one) and some really awesome monsters to justify the experience. Do I regret buying the DVD? Hell no. I would recommend that interested parties Netflix the sucker first, because the DVD isn't cheap.
As for special features: I haven't gotten around to watching most of them. The only one I've seen so far is a Volkswagen commercial done by one of the film's animators, David Allen, that features King Kong. Like most things involving old-school Kong, its badass.
P.S. I also got the Orson Welles Mr. Arkadin box set a week ago. I've watched one of the three film edits already. Once I see the other 2 versions, I'll post a review of it.
P.S.S. Now I'm off to play God Of War. Nothing like ripping the eyes off a Hydra to brighten one's mood.
