I was a huge sci-fi buff in the 70's and 80's. Varley hit the scene in the 70's as a stupendous short story writer. IMO, he changed sci-fi writing forever. Somehow I missed "Air Raid", but I did read the prescient *environmental* novel "Millennium" (1984), the novel he must have fleshed out from "Air Raid"? "Millennium", the novel, is very detailed, very original and sophisticated, and not much like the movie. I was very disappointed with the movie when I first saw it (but not as much as now) as there are few movies that come from true sci-fi writers (Hugo winners and the like) and I was really looking forward to it. This is not Star Wars territory.
Kristofferson was OK for Kristofferson back then, Cheryl Ladd lost her acting chops for 108 minutes and she was much older looking than recently ("Permanent Midnight"). I didn't say face-lift, did I? Daniel J. Travanti was good, of course, but barely in the movie. The Robot was tongue in cheek and probably the only redeeming quality. Basically, there is nothing in this movie but mistakes. The movie captured me when it started but when the first plane crashed, the movie crashed.
While I love Varley, his forte is short stories, some novels are moderate to great, but definitely not screenplays (although we don't know how tied his hands were and he only wrote one other screenplay - "Overdrawn at the Memory Bank", which I have not seen, but have read, yet another fantastic short story).
I try to find redeeming qualities even in bad movies, or try to see the B-movie-ness of them, but this one is just bad. Ed Wood bad. So I guess it is campy, but not even camp I enjoy. Go *read* some Varley. The short stories first, you will be blown away.
Kristofferson was OK for Kristofferson back then, Cheryl Ladd lost her acting chops for 108 minutes and she was much older looking than recently ("Permanent Midnight"). I didn't say face-lift, did I? Daniel J. Travanti was good, of course, but barely in the movie. The Robot was tongue in cheek and probably the only redeeming quality. Basically, there is nothing in this movie but mistakes. The movie captured me when it started but when the first plane crashed, the movie crashed.
While I love Varley, his forte is short stories, some novels are moderate to great, but definitely not screenplays (although we don't know how tied his hands were and he only wrote one other screenplay - "Overdrawn at the Memory Bank", which I have not seen, but have read, yet another fantastic short story).
I try to find redeeming qualities even in bad movies, or try to see the B-movie-ness of them, but this one is just bad. Ed Wood bad. So I guess it is campy, but not even camp I enjoy. Go *read* some Varley. The short stories first, you will be blown away.