Toomorrow
Toomorrow (1970)
Toomorrow (1970)
BFI BluRay BFIB1569-TM also Apple TV and Amazon Prime from 13th July 2026
Out from 22nd June 2026 a full 4K restoration on BFBluRay, kitsch kurio ‘Toomorrow’ is sure to interest fans of sci-fi and bubblegum pop from what is arguably the golden of both genres. Languishing in limbo for over fifty years, it could have launched the film career of Olivia Newton-John sooner.
Basically, an attempt by music mogul Don Kirschner and James Bond producer Harry Saltzman to create a Monkees-style pop group for the new decade, ‘Toomorrow’ pitches itself firmly in the fun camp as a group of college students, playing gigs in their spare time with their ‘Tonaliser’ synth adding to their guitar and organ based warblings.
Singer Olivia (Olivia Newton-John) and her male cohorts live in what was then considered comfortable lodgings and go through all the usual rites of youthful passage in their modern red brick college. Student unrest is touched on, with Carl Rigg playing the main agitator and Olivia’s love interest. Vic Cooper plays the band’s other mainstay, turning in a strong performance as go-getter guitarist and vocalist, Vic. What the band are unaware of is that their music has come to the attention of a resident alien (Roy Dotrice) who has been detailed to observe earthlings and report on what he sees. Disguised as a normal earthman, our alien cottons on to the potential rejuvenating power of Toomorrow’s music and sets about trying to get the band to come back to his world and do their musical magic on his kind. He invites them to his Hampstead mansion to record on his Revox tape recorder, conjured from thin air, naturally.
It’s absolute nonsense of course, but hugely enjoyable from start to finish. The multi-coloured crystalline alien craft is a departure from the flying disks and cavernous hangars of other sci-fi pictures of the period. The idea of an earth resident monitor alien will probably remind viewers of a certain age of Mork from Ork and Roy Dotrice does inject a lot of light comedy into his portrayal, at least when in human guise. The band’s abduction into the alien craft utilizes the kind of special effects which are forever associated with BBC TV’s Top of the Pops, with the exception of a reverse ageing trick which comes across as borderline creepy.
There are cameos from many of the familiar faces of youth genre pictures of the period and the disk includes a grab bag of short films like ‘Tomorrow Night in London (1969) – worth the price of the disk alone - and an enlightening vintage interview with Val Guest.
Scenester
21/6/26
