Mysteries From Beyond Earth (1976)
Back in the 1970s, there were a string of rather cheesy, but amusing low budget documentary movies that surfaced. Heck, even that style hit television with In Search Of… with Leonard Nimoy. Mysteries From Beyond Earth, from 1976, was one of these cheesy low-budget movie documentaries. The picture quality is grainy, and everything about the documentary smells of the 1970s. Stock footage used from time to time, heck, they even stole footage from the Lost In Space TV series. The occasional psychedelic effects that look like it came off 2001: A Space Odyssey are to be found, usually when the documentary switches to another subject.
Hosted by Lawrence Dobkin, same guy who appeared in such films as Patton, and written by Ralph and Judy Blum (who also written books on similar subjects covered on this film), the documentary covers such off-the-wall subjects as UFOs, the Bermuda Triangle, witchcraft, voodoo, alternative forms of medical treatment, cryogenics, Satanism, the pyramids, Kirlean photography and much more.
This is a low-budget documentary, but surprisingly the editing was rather good (something you couldn’t say of Overlords of the UFO, another cheesy and corny low-budget documentary movie that came out around the same time). The production is rather home made, and it looked like it was all filmed on an old home movie camera (before camcorders existed, that is), and aired on a movie projector. That means lots streaking vertical lines and occasional black splotches on the film.
My biggest objection of this film was when they starting covering witchcraft. There was this young lady (looked about 19 or 20) talking about how witches use magic to invade other people’s minds and make them do things they wouldn’t normally do. That just doesn’t ring true to my ears. But at least she made an excellent point on how witches were unjustly persecuted in Europe in the Middle Ages whenever someone got sick or died.
Perhaps the silliest part of this film was involving two LAPD officers chasing a UFO and when they got themselves on camera, they looked like they were all making it up and reading a cue card. Perhaps another totally silly part of this film is when Lawrence Dobkin starts talking about the Hollow Earth Theory. He talks about how people journeying up to the North Pole have noticed lots of pollen all dusted in the snow everywhere, and some people believed that woolly mammoths may have came up from inside the hollow earth and froze to death. He goes on stating, “The only hollow space found anywhere near are in the heads of people who actually believe in it”. It’s almost as if Lawrence Dobkin was trying to contain himself from laughing because of how full of shit that subject is. You expect him anytime to bring up the Flat Earth Society, an organization where people actually believe the Earth is flat and Man never landed on the Moon and that it was really a Hollywood stage setup. But that was never covered.
The film is far from perfect. Parts of this film tend to drag on longer than it needs to, making it a bit tedious in places. Some of the subjects covered seem like a big load of shit, but at least the great thing is the people who made this film don’t expect you to believe everything being presented. When dealing with UFOs, the paranormal, spirituality, and odd and unusual beliefs, it’s hard telling what is true and what is not if you hadn’t experienced it yourself.
But I have a soft spot for such silly documentaries as it’s a big break from the very professional, slick, and polished productions of many documentaries you might see on PBS, the Discovery Channel, TLC and such similar channels. Mysteries From Beyond Earth as an interesting, although flawed 1970s period piece, and if subjects like what I described you sound interesting, track down a videotape.