Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.0

The Bubble 3D Blu-ray Movie Review

Bubbling up, over and just about every other direction.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman November 8, 2014

One of the nice things about some of the early to mid-sixties fantasy-science fiction television series like The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits is that no matter how strained credulity became, things were never stretched out past the hour mark (and in most of The Twilight Zone offerings, only half that). That required a certain economy of presentation that helped move things along and perhaps aided in the suspension of disbelief. The Bubble, which plays a bit like a cross between the old Twilight Zone episode “Stopover in a Quiet Town” and more contemporary fare like Under the Dome, is hobbled by the fact that the illogical behaviors displayed by the central characters simply go on too long to ever do much more than frustrate the average viewer. To put it another way: if you were a concerned husband whose wife had just given birth under traumatic circumstances, and you found yourself in a town filled with zombie like automatons, not to mention a general ambience that seems to be like a backlot of a movie studio, replete with different eras of buildings and things like “subway entrances” which are cardboard and go nowhere, would you just kind of amble about aimlessly, as if there were nothing serious wrong? That’s one central misfire this Arch Oboler written and directed outing can’t quite escape. The Bubble remains a curio in the annals of 3D exhibitions, being the first of the so-called “Space Vision” offerings (a technique also utilized by Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein), an economical 3D shooting system that “stacked” the left and right elements on top of each other on one frame of film, alleviating the necessity for expensive and bulky older systems. There’s “in your face” entertainment galore throughout The Bubble, something that at least temporarily helps to distract from the fact that the plot of the film is at best labored and at worst fairly ridiculous.

A portentous voice announces over a dark screen that one of the miracles of the modern world is about to unfold, namely Space Vision. Appetites may indeed be whetted by this breathless announcement, only to be somewhat dampened by the fact that Space Vision’s first “miracle” is simply the wing of a small plane poking out of the screen directly at the audience. It’s an obvious disconnect between hucksterism and actual technical achievement, but aside from that disparity, it must be conceded that the plane’s wing really pokes out at the audience, in just the first of several rather florid “in your face” moments that Oboler exploits throughout the film.

Unfortunately, most of what is going on behind that wing (and any of the other splendid 3D effects) is pretty resolutely flat. Michael Cole portrays Mark, a young husband who is desperately trying to get his very pregnant wife Catherine (Deborah Walley) to a hospital as soon as possible, since she’s obviously already well into her labor. Mark and Catherine are being ferried by charter plane by a pilot named Tony Herric (Johnny Desmond). In just the first of many unexplained plot points The Bubble tends to whisk by in search of the next dimensional “popout” moment, it’s never fully detailed just how Mark and Catherine, who were evidently camping in some isolated woods, managed to get a private charter plane to fly them back to civilization.

Alas, civilization is not going to be easy to reach. The plane passes through some kind of freak albeit brief storm, at which point Herric can’t raise any people at the Redlands Airport. He manages to finally see something he thinks is a runway and sets the plane down, only to realize he’s actually landed on a highway. Within seconds a cab shows up, but the cabbie is seemingly sleepwalking (and/or sleepdriving), simply repeating the same phrase over and over again and not interacting with Mark or Herric in any meaningful way. This element will be repeated again and again (and again and again) throughout The Bubble, with none of the “normals” (meaning Mark, Catherine and Herric) so much as batting an eyelid at the peculiarity of it all.

In another piece of discursive storytelling, Catherine somehow manages to magically deliver her baby despite the fact that the doctor attending them is another of the zombiefied folks in this very strange locale (is it mere coincidence he’s rather similar in appearance to Boris Karloff?). Mark isn’t the slightest bit suspicious at this or any of the other patent weirdnesses he’s experienced, and neither is Herric, despite the fact he saw a tray of beer just levitate in front of him for no reason (other than its 3D potential), and that his new “girlfriend”, a dancer at the local saloon, seems to be as somnambulistic as everyone else in these environs. This more than anything else tends to undercut any hint of suspense or tension that The Bubble works furtively to create. If the main characters aren’t freaking out about all of this, why should the audience?

Things get relatively more dramatic once Catherine and the baby get out of the hospital, and she, Mark and Herric start tooling around in a jeep trying to figure out what the frell is going on. Once they discover they’re, well, under the dome (so to speak), and that there is some kind of gargantuan presence overseeing their trials, there’s at least some semblance of angst and even hysteria, as Catherine especially has to come to terms with raising a baby in such an environment. Heroic Mark sets about trying to dig out underneath “the bubble,” but he finds the complacent townspeople not all that interested in escaping.

And it’s here that The Bubble perhaps reveals its mid- to late sixties’ zeitgeist. It may be a fool’s errand to try to read any kind of subtext into a film this basic, but there seems to be a kind of The Prisoner-esque ethos where Mark is fruitlessly trying to tell everyone that they’re not necessarily mindless conformists, and indeed can fight back and escape their lot. But Oboler doesn’t even seem to want to bring the film to a real resolution with regard to this element or even the basic set up. When rain starts falling after a wind, suggesting the dome may have an opening, it at least offers the hint of a happy ending. But Oboler is happy to leave the film with only a hint, ultimately refusing to provide any real answers and therefore making a lot of what has gone before little more than an exercise in cinematic sleepwalking.

The Bubble 3D Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Bubble is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Classics with both an MVC (3D) and AVC (2D) encoded 1080p transfer in 2.55:1. Culled from the original camera negative which was evidently not curated well at all and was in very bad condition (3-D Archive's Bob Furmanek details some of the issues on our Forum thread devoted to The Bubble), extensive restoration work has been done that still cannot completely overcome some source limitations. There's obvious fade here, especially in the early going, where colors have gone decidedly brown and where dirt and dust is especially prevalent in what would have been the film's first couple of reels. Things improve rather markedly however as the film goes on—contrast the brown flesh tones of screenshot 2 (among several others) with those in screenshot 17, for example. Opticals (and there are quite a few in the film) are still fairly grimy looking, but overall grain structure is organic and contrast remains relatively consistent.

The true calling card here, of course, is the 3D presentation, and that is aces, with some of the best "in your face" emergent visuals you're likely to see in any vintage 3D film. As with 3-D Archive's restoration of Dragonfly Squadron 3D, there's occasional negative dirt that shows up as glints of white or silver, usually floating in front of the image, and that can serve as a minor distraction from time to time. But the consistency of the dimensionality in this presentation is really outstanding, and not necessarily limited to the frankly gimmicky shots that Oboler stuffs into the film.

The Bubble 3D Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Bubble's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono mix sounds surprisingly spry, offering really good support for the electronically tinged score of Paul Sawtell and Bert Shefter. Dialogue is also very cleanly presented, and the sound design is quite inventive at times—listen during the scene where Herric and Mark "confront" the dome and how the ingenious mix changes dramatically when the camera is placed either inside or outside of the glass. Fidelity is excellent and there are no real issues here other than a slightly dated and boxy sound.

The Bubble 3D Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Alternate Opening (1080p; 00:31) is available in 2D and 3D versions, and presents the film's 1976 re-release title opening.


• Restoration Demonstration (1080p; 1:42) is similarly available in both 2D and 3D formats and shows before and after examples of the restoration process.


• Essay by Bob Furmanek is accessible via your Blu-ray drive, offering some insight into both the film and the 3D restoration.


• Screenplay Excerpts of Deleted Scenes details the missing sequences that Oboler cut from the film in 1968.


• Stills Gallery (1080p)


• 1966 Original Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 1:41)


• 1976 Reissue Trailer (1080p; 1:12)

The Bubble 3D Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

3-D Archive continues to rescue little remembered 3D films from yesteryear, and they obviously are caring, thorough professionals who have now recently rescued two films from history's dustheap. The fact is neither Dragonfly Squadron nor The Bubble rank as anything close to masterpieces, and so 3-D Archive's efforts will probably be best appreciated for those with an eye toward film history and specifically the long and winding road 3-D took to become 3D (and/or Real-D). The Bubble is frankly a mess from a narrative standpoint, but the 3D effects are so consistently immersive that it's easy to forgive the film its manifest flaws. This is another example of a not great film deserving to be seen for its historical value and for this often stunning 3D restoration. Recommended.