Logan's Run

I watch Logan's Run and am taken back to 1976 in an instant. For then, the movie was a big-budget, sci-fi spectacle before Star Wars changed everything. Based loosely on Albert Huxley's "A Brave New World," the story finds the human civilisation in the 22nd century existing in a pod, living their pleasures and guided by computers, secure from the world's outside contamination. In return, they are exterminated at age-30 preventing over-crowding (a crystal on the right-hand notifies your time up). Naturally some resist - "runners" - who are tracked down and executed by Deep Sleep Operatives or "Sandmen" (way cool). Logan 5 is a Sandman whose time stricken so he can locate "Sanctuary" or the heart of the future's underground railroad. Facing death, Logan runs. He's accompanied by Jessica, pictured, played by the gorgeous Jenny Agutter who is still making films today and did a tour on my other favorite sci-fi: "The Six Million Dollar Man." Other sideshows are Farah Fawcett Majors who is Holly or a mad plastic surgeon's assistant and Peter Ustinov who is the old-man-on-the-outside who becomes The Messiah. Brilliant stuff. The '70s production is chalked with funky fashion, space-boots and futurama consistent with "Space 1999" and "2001: A Space Odyssey." The impact of the movie ultimately lost due to timing, but for a ten-year old like me dropped off at the movies (UA Cinema, Shattuck Avenue) it was, well, nirvana.