Movie Description
Inseminoid (titled Horror Planet in the United States) is a British science-fiction horror film released in 1981. Director Norman J. Warren's eighth film, the plot of Inseminoid concerns a group of future scientists excavating the ruins of an ancient civilisation on a distant planet. When a monstrous alien creature attacks and inseminates one of the women in the team, chaos ensues as the unbalanced victim, possessing unnatural strength, murders her colleagues one after another in a psychotic bid to protect her unborn twin hybrid offspring. It stars Judy Geeson, Robin Clarke, and Stephanie Beacham. Victoria Tennant makes an early film appearance.
Filmed between May and June 1980, Inseminoid is based on a script written by Nick and Gloria Maley, a couple who had contributed to the special effects of Warren's films starting with Satan's Slave (1976). A low budget of ?1 million, half of which was contributed by the Hong Kong Shaw Brothers, funded location filming in both the Chislehurst Caves in Kent and on the island of Gozo in Malta. Composer John Scott perfected the electronic score of Inseminoid in multiple hours-long studio sessions following the completion of shooting.
Although initial box office reception was positive both in the United Kingdom and overseas, Inseminoid has since failed to impress a majority of critics, who have faulted Warren's film for perceived poor acting, special effects and set design. Despite praise for actress Judy Geeson's depiction of the lead character, Sandy, approval of the film in general has been tarnished due to its concept of an extraterrestrial insemination, which has been viewed negatively in comparison to the premise of Alien (1979). Both Warren and Alien distributors 20th Century Fox have rejected claims that the script of Inseminoid was influenced by that of the earlier film.
Academic criticism of Inseminoid has concentrated on the film's treatment of the female sex and female sexualities in the context of corruption by an alien source. In addition to its depiction of the abject Sandy, who is rendered a distorted Other in the aftermath of her unnatural impregnation, the film has been seen to incorporate a clash between the patriarchal and the maternal towards its climax, as the new mother kills her former friends one by one. Complementing the film's successful VHS run, a novelisation of Inseminoid was written by Larry Miller.