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Mystery TV Programmes Of The Seventies

Silver ball...that would be the Glitterball. I got the novelisation for Christmas some 22 years ago...

Essentially - alien ball bearing creature crash lands and hunts for complex carbohydrates to convert to electrical energy. Two kids find it and befriend it. Evil tramp type guy thieves it. Millions of ball bearings come from space in the nick of time and kick tramp arse all over the place. All the balls fly away into space in a big ball. The end.

As a matter of Fortean interest, one of the childrens' fathers was an RAF MIB type, hunting the alien down, but never realising that it was hidden in his own house. There was a bit of a Roswell vibe, with jets chasing the damaged UFO.

I thought it was better then Star Wars, me.
 
silverballs

No. You've got it wrong. The first one you're referring to is 'Phantasm meets Snap, Crackle and Pop' of Ricicles fame. There was a marketing tie-in of a severed finger in one of the cereal boxes although that was later recognised as an industrial accident
 
MrHyde said:
Silver ball...that would be the Glitterball. I got the novelisation for Christmas some 22 years ago...

Essentially - alien ball bearing creature crash lands and hunts for complex carbohydrates to convert to electrical energy. Two kids find it and befriend it. Evil tramp type guy thieves it. Millions of ball bearings come from space in the nick of time and kick tramp arse all over the place. All the balls fly away into space in a big ball. The end.

As a matter of Fortean interest, one of the childrens' fathers was an RAF MIB type, hunting the alien down, but never realising that it was hidden in his own house. There was a bit of a Roswell vibe, with jets chasing the damaged UFO.

I thought it was better then Star Wars, me.
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Excellent. Can't find it on any dvd site. That's a film I'd like to see again.
 
If I remember correctly, it was made by the Children's Film Council or something like that, maybe Children's Television Council - I think it also had a young Keith Chegwin in it, or that may have been another film by them.
 
It was the Children's Film Foundation, staple of the middle section of "Screen Test", and de riguer summer holiday BBC morning programming in the seventies and early eighties. Apart from Glitterball, their movies usually consisted of kids with mullets and flares riding around on Choppers and foiling armed robberies, etc. It's logo consisted of pigeons taking off from Trafalgar Square, IIRC.

[edit]The redoubtable TV Cream has a whole section on the CFF - link from front page :) [/edit]
 
stu neville said:
It was the Children's Film Foundation, staple of the middle section of "Screen Test", and de riguer summer holiday BBC morning programming in the seventies and early eighties. Apart from Glitterball, their movies usually consisted of kids with mullets and flares riding around on Choppers and foiling armed robberies, etc. It's logo consisted of pigeons taking off from Trafalgar Square, IIRC.

[edit]The redoubtable TV Cream has a whole section on the CFF - link from front page :) [/edit]
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Ah yes! 'The Odeon Club' of a Saturday morning. If you were really lucky there would be a 'Woody Woodpecker' cartoon, an episode of 'Flash Gordon' (193?) and a CFF classic like, 'Go Kart Go', or 'The Sky Pirates'. Just before being thrown out for giving the Hitler salute, during the National Anthem! :D
 
CFF
Worst. Thing. Ever.

Added a monochromatic bleakness to my saturday mornings that made me wish I was back at school. It took us years as a nation of teenagers to get back into movies after that.

Didn't Dennis Waterman start off in some sort of Soapbox Derby movie?
 
For childhood Fortean programming, we should take our hat of with respect, to Timeslip and Sapphire and Steel. Mr Ben was a bit Fortean too.
 
When I was about 8-9, in the mid '70s, there used to be a Fortean type programme on one of the British Channels (we lived in London at the time). As I recall it was a series. We had only two channels, on one side was the Magic Roundabout and on the other this programme about ghosts and monsters and wierd things. I always wanted to watch it but was not allowed and would be told to watch the Magic Roundabout. I LOATHED the Magic Roundabout (was too young to get all the mad druggie references, so I just saw it as a silly kids show). I saw a bit of the wierd show once, where there was a description of the sighting of Nessie on land - the one where s/he crossed the road in front of a car at night. I recall being terrified by this, but still wanting to watch the programme each week. I have no idea what it was called though. Used to be on in the early evening, somewhere around 5.30-6.30 I would think.
 
" LOATHED the Magic Roundabout (was too young to get all the mad druggie references"

I thought all those druggie references were just read into the programme later and were never actually there in the first place. For some reason some people assume that anything weirdly creative or fantastical must have been developed under the influence of drugs. Usually it actually hinders creativity. I can never write while stoned. Coleridge forgot the rest of a potentially great poem because he was bombed off his gourd.
This is probably the subject for a whole different thread.

I'll get my multicoloured coat man.
 
Stormkhan said:
For childhood Fortean programming, we should take our hat of with respect, to Timeslip and Sapphire and Steel.
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I was quite giddy to see that the DVDs of Sapphire and Steel are available these days. Until I remembered that it used to absolutely freak me out. How scary were some of those epsiodes? Remember the one about the man who had a big smooth face, like an egg? *shudder*
 
Merged two chidhood TV programme threads.

Sapphire and Steel crops up on the Scariest TV progs... thread, which won't be merged into this one cos it's about something else :).
 
Magic Roundabout, yup, I hated it too.

Funny, I still named my first son Dylan................:D

The other son is named after the Dingo Baby's brother.:rolleyes:


Timeslip-
da da da da DAAAAAAAAAAA
da da da da DAAAAAAAAAAA
da da da da da da da da
DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

daaaaaaa
daaaaaaa
daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

That's all I can remember of it, except for a hole in a chainlink fence which led to, um, somewhere else.........:eek!!!!:
 
The Flashing Blade.

What the hell was that one all about?

I enjoyed 'Robinson Crusoe' (French) and all those weird East German Grimm's Fairy Tales. I even thrilled to 'Captain Zeppos' (Flemish).

But, what was 'The Flashing Blade' (French) all about?

Set around the time of the 'Three Musketeers', lot's of people riding about on horses, waving swords. Never could follow the plot.

I watched it though, probably because of the great theme tune and all the swash buckling!

You've got to fight for what you want...
da da dee dah da da...
etc.

:D
 
stu neville said:
Remember The Cleopatras?
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Trivia alert!

One actress in "Cleopatra" was Pauline Moran ... who went on to play Miss Lemon in the Granada TVs series Poirot starring David Suchet.

No link between Poirot and Cleopatra apart from that, but I enjoyed both series. Oh, and Agatha Christie married an archeologist (Max Mallowan) who dug around in Egypt - a dodgy connection, I know, but who cares?

Patricia "Rocky Horror Picture Show" Quinn and Patrick "Capt. Picard" Stewart in I, Claudius.. Both named after an Irish Christian saint, perhaps as a Fortean link?

God, I love trivia!
 
Re: The Flashing Blade.

AndroMan said:
I enjoyed 'Robinson Crusoe' (French)
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Art of Noise did a great version of the haunting theme tune!
 
Alys said:
there are lots that I had forgotten, but I'm so pleased that someone else saw "Sky" (or is it "Skye?" about the lad with blue eyes being hunted by some plantlike things and he has to get to a gate at a particular time to get home.
another one I liked was where Merlin was awakening and didn't like all the machines, so he was making people break them up and fear them. I think it is called "the Weathermonger"
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Somewhere in Castle Stormkhan, I still have my copy of the book "The Weathermonger" - which was really a Survivors-For-Kids story.

Great stuff!
 
For more info (and the freaky opening credits to Sky try looking here . They tend to specialise in realplayer clips that will either fill your heart with childlike joy or, more likely, reawaken horrifying memories which will leave you sleepless for weeks. Check out the Armchair Thriller caption slide!

I personally believe that todays TV isn't nearly scary enough. But that's the other thread.
 
Holly cow...just watched Children Of the Stones intro and first few seconds!... brings it all back ah!
 
This may have been 80's but it was set in New Zealand Victorian era, had Maori's who lived near the main village and were thought of as bad and scary (or maybe it was just me who was scared) and there was this posh teacher in a boater and he and this woman get stuck up a volvano as it erupts. Didn't really like it but just remembered it.
 
Zygon said:
Speaking of ancient TV crap: any Aussies here? In the STV region we used to get -late 60s I think- an -I've been told- Australian SF show called, IIRC, Phoenix 5'. My memory may be conflating it with Fireball XL5, but I seem to recall a lot of face-on shots of the cockpit (just like in Fireball XL5, or like the plane cabin in Plan 9 From Outer Space), wobbly sets and what must have been the entire budget blown on some reptilian alien's makeup (although there I might be confusing it with the Draconians in early Pertwee-era Dr. Who). Does anyone recall the show? I've yet to encounter anyone else who ever saw it.
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You have now! I have vague memories of this being shown in the late '60s early 70's and it was crap. The entire special effects budget for the series couldn't have gone into double figures.

Lots of memories coming back from my youth thanks to this thread: Timeslip, Tomorrow People, Ace of Wands.

Not to mention the odd Fortean Episode of the Saint (Loch Ness Monster) and of course my favourite Gerry Anderson's UFO. There was something about Gabrielle Drake in a very tight costume that made quite an impression on a young chap
 
Anyone remember David Attenborough's cryptozoology/fabulous animals series from the 70s? I loved that, even had the book that went with it.
 
The New Zealand kid's TV show was The Children of Fire Mountain. Or was it The Children of Firetop Mountain? Or was it The Warlock of Firetop Mountain?

Anyway, the baddie was called Doomy Dwyer and he pretended to be possessed, like a zombie, at one point. I can sing the theme tune, too.
 
Carnacki said:
Carl Kolchak/Darren McGavin is a god.
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I concur! I love that series; own the whole thing on VHS. I also have the movies on DVD and I'm hoping they'll release the series on disc. Darren McGavin is such an excellent actor. I also have the Jeff Rice novelization of the Night Strangler and would love a copy of the Kolchak Papers, though I'm not clear if it was ever officially released or not.

(also, Carnacki, I just noticed your name; I have read the Whistling Room and love it, I plan to get more Carnacki stories soon)
 
Marion said:
Anyone remember David Attenborough's cryptozoology/fabulous animals series from the 70s? I loved that, even had the book that went with it.
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I remember that! The set was done up to look like a back-room in a museum, if I remember rightly, with David sat at a lectern on a chest of drawers with a big illustrated book o' beasties. Any idea what it was called?

Magus Perde , I have the novel of The Night Stalker, but not The Night Strangler. There were also supposed to be follow-on novels in the Kolchak Papers, but I don't think any were ever released.
 
Magus Perde said:
(also, Carnacki, I just noticed your name; I have read the Whistling Room and love it, I plan to get more Carnacki stories soon)
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FYI, there's an el cheapo complete collection of Hodgson's Carnacki stories available from Wildside Press.
 
Just nearly wet myself laughing at the TV Cream descriptioin of Manimal.

So has anyone else seen an Australian film about a kid who moves to the Outback and finds what he thinks is a bunyip in a water-filled quarry, has some weird experiences with aborigines, and then discovers it's actually an old JCB or something?

Sam
 
Yes, but I'd managed to successfully repress the memory until you mentioned it just there... :(
 
Re: Just remembered a show- Can anyone help?

Justin Lucas said:
All this talk of the dark 70's made me suddenly have a flashback.....Does anyone remember this mystery TV programme.
This was almost definalty on in the 70's, on ITV, was a weekly series,British made,maybe on a sunday early evening. It was about a boy who was into horror, I remember he had a bunk bed with loads of horror toys and posters surrounding it-which i thought was way cool . He goes down a airvent in an office block ( I think) and comes out in a very surrel and dark world with strange filling cabinet offices from hell amongst other things and scary characters/monsters. It's basically about redemption as the boys eventually escapes out the airvent,gets back to his room and tears down his horror posters......
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This programme was called "King of the Castle", and I remember being terrified of it too. The boy in question lived in a really awful towerblock with this lift that kept on going down below the ground floor until it reached the domain of this mad scientist who had created a frankenstein like creature that he kept in a cage. He was trying to make the creature speak and I remember feeling so disturbed and sorry for the creature as he cruelly tortured the thing to make it spit out the word "master". The scientist decided that to make it speak he would need some human vocal cords to transplant, and thats when the boy arrives and then spends the entire time being chased around by this creature and his master. I can,t really remember much else but itscertainly one of the most frightening programmes Ive ever seen.
 
King of the Castle was, I'm pretty sure, on on a weekday, and was very atmospheric. Like dishwasher, I can only barely recall it, but I'm pretty sure the kid in it was being bullied, and that all the weird stuff followed on from him falling (into a liftshaft?) while trying to escape from his tormentors. -Or am I thinking of something else? :confused:
 
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