Michael_Elliott End of the World (1977) 1/2 (out of 4) Father Pergado (Christopher Lee) is desperately trying to do research on aliens that he believes are on Earth. Before long another couple join the search and soon it turns out that the Father will be going up against Zindar (also played by Lee).John Hayes' END OF THE WORLD has the title that would make one think that they were walking into a disaster movie but it's actually a science-fiction movie and a really awful one at that. Apparently Lee wasn't too fond of this movie either as he was apparently lied to about it. With that said, it's obvious that there wasn't any sort of budget here as the entire thing has a very cheap feel and in all honesty, the screenplay is incredibly bad and almost on the level of PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE.There are many problems with this movie but the biggest is the fact that I'm sure everyone was wanting to do a "big" movie but didn't have the money for it. The problem with the screenplay is that it has a good opening and then everything else that follows is just pure boredom. I mean, the entire investigation that eats up the majority of the running time just isn't all that interesting and I'd argue that there's not an ounce of suspense or anything else for that matter. You're basically just sitting there watching this stuff and wishing you were anywhere else.The film does have an impressive cast but I think it's fair to say that everyone was just hoping that their check wouldn't bounce. Lee is decent in the film but you really can tell that he'd rather be somewhere else. Sue Lyon and Kirk Scott play the main investigators and don't bring much energy the picture. Lew Ayres appears during one scene so it appears he was just paid for a day's work. You've also got Dean Jagger in a small role. Good, solid names but they just don't add much.END OF THE WORLD is a really awful movie but the ending is so bad you pretty much have to see it to believe it. I won't spoil it here but it's almost worth sitting through the rest of the picture for.

Bezenby I kind of liked this one, but please note: The last film I watched before this was The Alpha Incident, so maybe that film made this one seem good by comparison.mooching a quarter from the chef, he heads to the phone, which promptly explodes, quickly followed by a water urn which showers the chef in boiling water, causing him to dive straight through a window. Dejected, Lee heads back to his church, whereupon he is greeted by himself. That's the first five minutes of this strange film. Weirdness like that draws me right in.Meanwhile, some scientist guy is monitoring signals from outer space, and discovers a steady signal that he can somehow translate into English, and seems to predict a national disaster. Other signals from Earth are seemingly broadcast towards the source of this signal, and our hero quickly becomes obsessed with sorting out this mystery. Which is a shame, because his boss sends him on a lecture tour which severely hampers his investigations, but not before he translates another signal that seems to predict the eruption of a volcano in Africa…Light on action but heavy in atmosphere and intrigue, with a tone of total desperation about it, End of the World seem to be a film that could only be made in the seventies. I'll warn you though: There's an awful lot of scenes of people wandering around in the dark (made darker still by the rough copies of the film going around) but instead of finding these boring I found them quite fitting to the rest of the film. It's one half mystery and for the second half of the film it's all daft pseudo-science and humming, luminous machinery, set to an interesting electronic score. You should hear some of the crazy lines Lee and the other guy have to spout at each other. The cheap visual effects (of which there are plenty) and the ending just make this a hugely enjoyable pile of nonsense. If daft science and seventies nihilism are your thing, you'll get a kick out of this one. Although it's devoid of blood and gore and everyone else on here hated it.

MartinHafer Wow, this film had 'crap' written all over it! The sound effects appeared to have been done by some guy using computer, a crappy synthesizer and pinball sound effects for EVERYTHING! In fact, it was the director who also handled the sound...and it showed. Also, I know this will sound terrible, but veteran actor Dean Jagger looked like death warmed over--like he was dying of cancer. Now I know he went on to live another 14 years, but here in "End of the World" he looks like he's on borrowed time. Plus, because the director was also the guy in charge of sound, Jagger's severely weakened voice came off as only a little more than a raspy whisper. Additionally, while a film in the public domain is no guarantee of horrible quality, it IS pretty highly correlated! You can clearly see why no one would want to bother renewing the copyright on this...film.As the film progresses, a series of natural disasters strike. While the number and intensity are unusual, no one suspects anything...except for one egghead with a computer. He's been trying to decipher some signals from space and he is able to interpret three words that make it seem like aliens MIGHT have something to do with one of the disasters! In addition to this strange occurrence, he also uses his equipment to try to determine where some huge radio signals are coming from---and it appears to be from a convent! It seems the nice father in charge (Lee) is communicating with aliens! Don't you just hate that?! Sadly, once the egghead figures all this you, the film really, really loses steam. When he is confronted by these aliens disguised as people, you'd think there'd be a lot of action and tension. Instead, the entire scene is amazingly muted and dull--with a monologue by Lee that sounds as animated as his reading a phone book! After all, you'd THINK seven aliens disguised as a priest and six nuns would be pretty cool--and even more so because of their cool machinery. But you'd be wrong--there is no excitement whatsoever to this--how could that be?! It's because it's all so talky and lifeless, that's how.Overall, the film is a major chore to finish, as there's just nothing interesting about it. Plus, while it's bad and cheap, it's just not bad and cheap enough to be fun for a laugh--it's just bad!

Cristi_Ciopron Your mind will not be satisfied by this no—budget doomsday thriller; but, pray, who's will? A youngish couple spends the actual end of the world in the hidden laboratory of some aliens masquerading as Church people.Small _apocalyptically themed outing, END OF THE WORLD has the ingenuity and the lack of both brio and style of the purely '50s similar movies. And it's not only that, but EOTW plays like a hybrid—not only doomsday but convent creeps as well. The villain of the movie is a well—known character actor.This wholly shameless slapdash seems a piece of convent—exploitation, that significantly '70s genre which looks today so amusingly outdated. Anyway, the convent's secret laboratory is some nasty piece of futuristic deco! Christopher Lee is the pride of End of the World; but the End of the World is not at all his pride!