Sial IV (1969)
IMDb meta-data is four episodes, each of 24 minutes, rated 5.4 by an unknown number of cinematizens.
DNA: Swiss.
Genre: Sy Fy; Species: post Apocalypse.
Verdict: Molasses.
Tagline: Do electric sheep dream of androids?
By chance an engineer survives a nuclear war in 1970 and when he is unearthed and revived it is 2145, he awakens to a brave new world deep underground where the few remaining humans have created androids to do all the lifting. He finds that he prefers the honesty of the ‘droids who cannot tell a lie rather than the dishonesty of the people who can.
That summary makes it sound more interesting than it is. The acting is stilted; the direction worse, and it goes downhill from there.The Creation of the Humanoids (1962) is the same sort of story told a little better. It is reviewed elsewhere on this blog.
This future society is Sial and the sector is IV, ruled by…Machiavelli. Yep. This Machiavelli is played by the old hand Marcel Dalio (the croupier from Rick’s in Casablanca [1942], and many other films including Catch-22 [1970]). With that name Machiavelli in it, I had to watch it.
It is very high brow with quotations from Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, and Saint Just. Nothing is quoted from Machiavelli.
Those who are bored by freedom from want and work are treated as though they are sick and cured by drawing their emotions off onto androids who are then destroyed. Maybe that explains the bad hair. Among the sick are those who want to be sick. Who resist leisure and happiness. It is their right to be unhappy, to suffer, to fight, and to be killed! Yes, they are freedom fighters, who will fight freedom wherever they find it. Ayn Rand Libertarians all!
The whole thing is as absurd as an episode of the Avengers of the period but without either the humour or Mrs Peel. [Sigh]
It makes Australia’s own The Stranger (1964-1965) look snappy.
Dalio’s own backstory story as a Jew escaping from defeated France is far more compelling than this program.