Dr. Who and The Daleks :: Education by Design Store

Customer Reviews

GOOD DOCTOR - GOOD MOVIE!

2004-03-25
"Dr. Who and the Daleks" is a fine film version of the television classic! A great addition to anyone's science fiction film collection! Grade: A-

where is continuity?

2003-07-13
Dr WHO and the Daleks- It was altogether a good feature but the writers have changed the characters around from the original series, which really throws a Doctor Who fan off guard. It is obvious they did this to help those who had never seen Doctor Who before get in to the story. It was as if Disney had a hand in this retelling.
For starters The Doctor is now the inventor of the tardis and seems to be from earth rather than Gallifrey. Susan has regressed in age and Barbara is not her teacher but rather her sister, while Ian (also supposed to be Susans' teacher) is Barbara's clumsy slapstick boyfriend.
In my opinion the writer was either too lazy to think up an ingenious way to keep the storyline in tact, or was kept from doing so by executive types. We should all know how those guys get when profit is involved.
Aside from the fact they butchered the relationships between the Doctor and his companions the story kept true to the first meeting of the Daleks as in the original series.
After removing the thought of Barbara being the Doctors' granddaughter and constantly reminding my self that she and Ian were Susans' teachers; and Susan just looked extremely young for her age, it became quite enjoyable. However if you must see this story look for the William Hartnell, black and white version first, they are essentially the same story.
In conclusion, maybe for the family; my seven year old son preferred the Peter Cushing version, so I am led to believe it may be more enjoyable for the whole family.

Daleks and the Doctor on a bigger screen

2002-12-18
This was the first of the two big-screen adaptions of Dr. Who - with bigger and better special effects than on the show, though taking a different course as to the Dr.'s character. On the show, the Doctor is an alien - a member of an advanced race of humanoids who live extremely long lives, can regenerate their bodies under circumstances that would kill normal muggles like us, and have mastered the science of space-time travel. Carousing through the cosmos, the Doctor's ship is incredibly huge on the inside (actually limitless) but on the outside can look like an object of any size - in the Doctor's case, a London Police call box. Frequent travels brought the Doctor into conflict with the Daleks - machines housing horribly (and never seen) natives of the planet Skaro who descended from the mutated survivors of a global thermo-nuclear war. The most popular of the Doctor's TV-foes, the Daleks were the natural choice to share his leap to the big screen.

While the Daleks' story is unchanged for the film (cold conquerors of a dying world), and though this flick otherwise follows the plot of the serial in which the Daleks were introduced, the flick otherwise changes the Doctor's story. Now, instead of being a time-lord, the Doctor is a curmudgeonly human inventor (named "Doctor Who" - the characters who are his granddaughters are never mentioned by that name) who manages to construct a crude space-time machine which is bigger inside than out, and just happens to look like a Police call box on the outside. Accidentally sending the time/space ship on its way - the Doctor and crew (his two granddaughters and the older one's date) - vanish from Earth and wind up on a blasted alien world. The Doctor tricks his passengers into going out exploring - he's too much of an adventurer to pass the alien world up. When a huge (and seemingly abandoned) city looms nearby, he goes to investigate, hoping - he tells the others - to find extra mercury for a critical fluid link. Instead, when the city proves to be home to nasty sounding Daleks, they are all captured. The Doctor is then forced to learn the nature of these mechanized creatures and find a way to escape and link up with the Thals - green-skinned descendants of the Daleks' ancient enemies. Though the Thals are stubbornly peaceful, you know that the Doctor will lead them to rise up against the Daleks.

This was a great flick - not quite faithful to Who-lore, but confident in its own way. Cushing is an unforgettable Who, though he could have done with the TV incarnation's more hard edged (here he's a kindly old guy with a child's sense of adventure). Being a human inventor raises some questions, but none that get in the way of the fun, and anyway sticking to the TV-show's premise of the Doctor's being a time-lord would complicate things (the story would have to explain his origin AND the Daleks') The Daleks, on the other hand, are faithfully translated to the big-screen - their huge city, their screeching voices and their fascist-style cruelty fit them to a tee (if anything, the movie Daleks are even louder here) The flick ends on a climactic battle that won't dissappoint.

Talking trash cans will rule the earth!! 2002-12-16
Slo-o-o-o-o-o-owwwww moving, mildly campy feature film adapted from the beloved BBC-TV show. Peter Cushing takes a turn as the semi-dotty Doctor, and the Daleks are appropriately awkward and mechanical. You're better off getting your giggles from the original television episodes.

Yep. It's bad. 2002-07-28
... I was hoping for the best when I picked up a copy of Dr Who and the Daleks. This fool wishes he had not parted with his money.
It's obvious that this movie was targeted to the American audience. The Doctor's character was simplified to an eccentric old inventor to simplify the backstory. I'm guessing that Dick Van Dyke must have been popular at the time because there's a lookalike doing his best to fall over stuff without taking down the walls of the plastic sets.
You'll get value for your money, as the 80 min running time feels a lot longer due to slow pacing.
At least the Daleks look cool

DR. Who and The Daleks 2007-08-03
While still markedly different from the BRITISH SERIES Peter Cushing's performance as (the human) DOCTOR WHO is still fun.

It's a Dalektable lark 2007-02-13
This 1965 film and it's 1966 sequel "Daleks-Invasion Earth 2150 A.D.". Were made cheaply and quickly to capitilise on the immense success the Daleks were having on the kids of Britain at that time.(Myself included)
You could buy Dalek toys, sweets, wallpaper, Pyjamas and slippers, sounds familiar doesn't it?
The reason the Doctor was changed to an eccentric "Professor type" from an Alien were for reasons of simplicity. At that time the Doctor Who TV show was not playing in as many countries as it is now, so no complicated and time consuming back story would be needed.
Plus it made audience identification that much easier with the various members of the cast.
(The only demographical group missing from this Tardis crew is an ethnic one, but it was the much more free sixties afterall.)
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The producers, Subotsky and Rosenberg approached the BBC to see if they could use the TV show's distinctive theme music and opening graphics, but due to the high price the Beeb wanted, that idea was dropped.
This film is an edited version of the first Dalek story shown on TV in 1963, with marginally better production values, and did much better at the box office then the more action orientated sequel.
As a long time Doctor Who fan,(Episode six,Dalek Invasion of Earth, December 1964 was my first episode.), I have to admit the Daleks in these films are a long way more visually impressive then they were on the TV show.
Happy memories, I can still remember my Mother taking me to the Pictures to see this Movie and the sequel.
Both films were made for a family audience, so get a big tub of popcorn, lower the lights, and watch them with your children!
(To see who the real stars are in this film notice the size of text "Doctor Who" get's compared to "The Daleks" on my house poster picture!)
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Who-Trek connections:~ The actor Barry Ingham who plays Alydon the Thal in this film, plays Danilo O'Dell in the second season Star Trek next generation story, Up the long ladder.

A curiosity piece for Doctor Who fans 2006-09-01
Although I'm a great fan of Peter Cushing, I would have much preferred the original cast of the show in this feature film version of the Doctor's first encounter with The Daleks. My biggest complaint is the way the character of the Doctor has been rewritten for the movie. Instead of a Time Lord from another world, in the movie you get the impression that the Doctor is nothing more than an eccentric inventor. He is not nearly as interesting a character. Cushing plays the Doctor as a lovable, doddering old man. It's a shame because this movie could have been quite good. Instead, it's not much more than a curiousity piece for the die-hard Doctor Who fan.

new and old 2005-12-18
the daleks are strong but they could never take over a planet with staires they could not walk up them for years and years this has been the daleks weakness when the time war was in place beetween the daleks and the timelords different time machines were destroyed a red phonebox who beolonged to this is true the dentist the red phonebox was known as the margate the tardis being known as the last time machine was also the most famous was prosumed to be destroyed the doctor a timelord the last of the timelords every dalek was an enemy to the timelords but they most feared the doctor because they ran into him the most and over time they were all wiped out one by one whitch made them all scared of him remember the timelords all wiped out giveing there lives the save the intire universe and the doctor still keeps to his duty trying to save the universe with no help from his people DID I MENTION IT ALSO TRAVELS IN TIME?

A Sad Recreation 2004-04-23
Overall, this movie was not impressive. The characters seemed to be too stereotypical for my tastes, with the eccentric inventor, the hapless but cute girls, and the clutsy but well-meaning guy.
Gone is the mystery of the Doctor and Susan's origins. Gone is the darkness of the script. I know, I know, the original series was a bit lame, but that's because of the budget. The script by itself was suspenseful. This recreation had none of that.
In fact, the only thing I find likable about this was the TARDIS' interior. It was an interesting change.