Invasion: UFO

These days viewers of the 1970 British science fiction show have plenty of opportunities to see the show in its original episodic format. It's readily and cheaply available on DVD and is often streamed or repeated on satellite channels. However that wasn't always the case and that explains this historical curiosity. The original episodes are plainly the best way to watch the show either as a new or regular viewer but this "movie" is important in the history of the show.

Firstly as other reviewers have noted it's vital to establish that this film was made in 1980 and not 1974 or any earlier date. Some other movie versions had been made in Italy and maybe other territories in the 1970s but they were dubbed rather than in the original English and do not follow the format of this film. This is essentially distilled from three episodes - "Identified", "Computer Affair" and "Reflections in the Water" - with much smaller elements of "Confetti Check A-OK", "The Man Who Came Back" and "E. S. P.".

Why was this done? By 1980 ITC - who were responsible for the international marketing of UFO and other shows - were looking for new ways to sell the show to broadcasters and reach the nascent home video market. ITC felt that it would be much easier to sell UFO in a movie format rather than in its original episodes. Movies can be shown as "one-offs" and are often ideal for late-night broadcasting or satellite and cable channels whereas episodes of a series are expected to be shown on a regular basis and can therefore be trickier to schedule. As regards early home video it was also felt - probably wrongly - that viewers would prefer to watch a movie rather than a couple of episodes on a tape but without the others to follow. Bear in mind that in those days home video was almost wholly centred around movies and TV shows were either unreleased or only released in "highlights" or compilations. Tapes were then very expensive and releasing all the episodes of a series seemed inconceivable.

Some shows lent themselves better to the movie format because they had one or more two-part stories that could be easily compiled - indeed some had been sold to broadcasters or cinemas as movies for many years. UFO though had no two-part stories so a movie had to be more artificially constructed by stitching together material from two or more episodes. Predictably the match here is less than perfect and these do not form a coherent narrative. An element of "Confetti Check A-OK" is well-used to link material from "Identified" to show how SHADO was set-up and Straker appointed as Commander before resuming in 1980 with it becoming fully operational. However after the main story from "Identified" is concluded the story of an alien craft landing in Canada is used from "Computer Affair" and there is nothing to link the two events together. There is some logic in using these two episodes as they were the first two produced and share the same core cast along with SHADO capturing aliens and trying to communicate with them but these are similarities in theme rather than narrative. More jarring though is the jump in the last half-hour to material from "Reflections in the Water". This very radical story was produced near the end of the show and not only is it rather different in style but it has significant differences in cast so Alec Freeman who had featured prominently in the first hour then disappears while Paul Foster (Michael Billington) suddenly appears, as does Wanda Ventham as Colonel Virginia Lake. A clip from E. S. P. Is used well to explain Foster's absence but it would still strike viewers as odd that such a prominent character had not featured earlier. The section used from "The Man Who Came Back" at the climax is certainly dramatic but also leaves unresolved an attack on a key SHADO craft. The movie then returns to the climax of "Identified" for a very poignant scene to conclude affairs.

One of the biggest and justified complaints by regular viewers is the replacement of the show's original titles and opening music by new ones of far inferior quality. The show's original titles and music are among its most memorable attributes and could easily have been reused here with perhaps just the original series title modified to reflect the new one. The company that made the new titles - Film-Rite of New York - also produced new titles under the auspices of ITC for movie versions of episodes of the 1970s ATV series Thriller, also utilising new opening and closing music. The new titles for that show attracted a lot of criticism and the ones for Invasion: UFO are certainly a poor replacement for the original ones. Fortunately in the body of the film between the opening and closing titles the producers resisted the temptation to do things like adding their own scenes or visual or sound effects or replacing any of Barry Gray's wonderful music. There is also a saving grace in that the end titles are similar in visual style to the original ones and the original eerie end music is retained.

The film was broadcast in many territories but ironically - or maybe not - one place it seems never to have aired is the UK where UFO was originally produced. Maybe it was felt that as its original home the movie would have been recognised as more out of place in Britain than in other territories where the original show was not quite as well-known. The video was though available here and for a long time it was the only way viewers could see all the episodes used to make it except for "E. S. P." which did get released, perhaps as only few seconds of it were used in the video. Contractually those episodes could not be released on video until a new agreement was made in the late 1990s and all the episodes then became available on tape and later on DVD. Satellite channels also broadcast all the original episodes again and the movie in effect became redundant.

Invasion: UFO therefore now exists essentially for curiosity value. As well as being an extra on DVD releases it was issued on blu ray a few years ago by the sadly now defunct Network label. It's worth watching at least once just to see how viewers used to experience the show back in the 1980s and much of the 1990s. Times change - in this case for the better - but it can be useful to see how things used to be.