The Andromeda Strain, based on a novel by Michael Crichton, posits that life exists outside in space, and that the aliens have reached earth. While they are only microbes, the bad news is that they are immediately deadly to humans. The movie was only a moderate hit. It had too much science talk and too little action to be a big hit, but I was fascinated.
I read the book, then I saw this in theaters in 1971. Yeah, my friends thought I was a weird kid. I remember being gobsmacked that they gender-swapped one of the characters in the movie, but it made no difference to the plot; in fact, it was refreshing to see a woman scientist. That's something you didn't see much 55 years ago. Did The Andromeda Strain give me nightmares? No, I was already obsessed with nuclear annihilation, endless war, and pollution. But the book and movie gave me more to think about.
Saturday, January 03, 2026
The Andromeda Strain
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4 comments:
I went the reverse direction.
Saw the movie then read the book.
Still enjoyed both.
RandomTroll
I don't remember which order I read/saw them in. But many things still remind me of it. Computer doctor: "ALLERGIES?" "Ragweed pollen." "ROGEEN PALLEN." ... The survivor baby and the old sterno ("squeeze") bum. (Just the very idea and mechanics and career choice of someone being a sterno bum.) (And in Firesign Theater's /Everything You Know Is Wrong/: "This is no crazed sterno bum. This is a respected law enforcement officer, Sheriff Luger Axhandle of Heater County, California." The interminable drugged slow-motion climb through the elevator shaft while being shot at by tiny burning lasers. The automated full-body disinfection process when the scientists first enter the underground complex. The weird way it ended, with a natural rainstorm washing the entire problem into the salt sea and saving the world. And it's somehow mixed up in my mind with the feeling of reading The Godfather, and the smell of hot dust in a tube-type intercom/radio thing I had that came from my grandparents' restaurant, and the way it felt and smelled to be in the shoe end of a men's store and reading in the back seat of a car. Mostly, though, the disappointment of it's being about a disease the whole way through instead of becoming a trip through space (because of Andromeda in the title).
I remember seeing this in a theater, because I too had read the book and liked it. But in 1971?? My God, was it that long ago?? I was still a sophomore in high school!!
-"BB"-
Loved the book, then loved the movie!
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