Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 11:05:29 +0100
From: HNoll@t-online4TAG.de (Horst Noll)
Subject: Re: Space1999: Quick Comments

Hello !

Neither in season 1 nor 2 she behaves like a real doctor. Here main
diagnosis is nearly always "shock", whatever this might be for here. She
seems to use the word "shock" in a very un-medical meaning.

As far as I'm concerned (and I'm a doctor since 1992) nearly everything
she does makes no sense. When I was watching the episodes in the 70's I
liked here very much, because I thought she was very "cool", but now,
knowing more, I like here nevertheless, perhaps because of my
experiences in the 70's.

It's very difficult to to do these medical things in TV right, I know
(recently, they made a film in the hospital where I'm working, and I can
tell you it was very, very difficult to do, what we are doing every day
in a way, that it was convinient for the filming crew).

Horst



Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 09:10:58 -0500 (EST)
From: "Ellen C. Lindow" (sfdxb@scfn.thpl4tag.lib.fl.us)
Subject: Space1999: Helena's Role on Alpha

Anthony and Horst both bring up good points about Helena's role on Alpha.
Obviously, it's difficult to write her as "only" a doctor and have her in
a lot of scenes.  You end up with the "Bones" syndrome where all the
doctor does is check for a pulse and intone, "he's dead, Jim".

Instead, Alpha took a different route, which I have to admit, I prefer.
As the series continued and Koenig firmed up his command, it's obvious
that she became one of his top advisors pretty quickly.  In many ways,
even by the end of Y1 she had become much more an administrator, or one of
the Commander's adjutants, and much less a practicing physician.  And I
believe that as the head of medicine on Alpha that's probably what she was
hired to be, administering both Medical center, Life support and Life
sciences research.

By Y2, she's very much part of the command staff, and doesn't hesitate to
sit in the Commander's chair when he's away.  For example, in AB
Chrysalis, and Immunity Syndrome she's obviously the one in charge.  The
same goes for the beginning of Brian the Brain, but I still consider that
episode someone's alcoholic nightmare of some much more sane encounter.

Personally, I think she'd be the best bet to succeed Koenig should
something happen to him--sorry, Emma-- and even wrote that into one of my
fanfic pieces.



From: "Ariana" (ariana@ndirect4tag.co.uk)
Subject: Re: Space1999: Helena's Role on Alpha
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1998 10:24:41 -0000

Oh, don't worry; I don't seriously think *Tony* would be a good replacement!
But the fact is, there aren't that many good command officers on Alpha. They
were scientists and technicians, not a military command hierarchy. Helena is
nice enough, but I don't believe sleeping with the commander would be enough
to persuade everyone on Alpha to follow her if they thought some passing
Sanderson would do better. I should think the struggle for power would be
pretty chaotic if John dropped dead without making a will (and even
then...).

Emma



From: "Petter Ogland" (petter.ogland@dnmi4tag.no)
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1998 13:30:32 +0000
Subject: Re: Space1999: Quick Comments

> Neither in season 1 nor 2 [Helena] behaves like a real doctor. Here main
> diagnosis is nearly always "shock", whatever this might be for here. She
> seems to use the word "shock" in a very un-medical meaning.

It's nice to hear your appraisals of Barabara Bain, Horst.  While I
know too little about medical treatment to be able to identify what
makes sense and what does not in Bain's portrayal of the doctor, but I've
always liked her very much in the role, Y1 notable, although in the
German versions of the Y2 episodes the choice of voice actor for dubbing
helps magnificently to keep some of her "cool" charm of Y1.

I know that Barbara Bain was extremely popular in Germany due to
her performances in MISSION IMPOSSIBLE and SPACE:1999, her performance
in SPACE:1999 perhaps more approved of in Germany than anywhere else.  This
is at least what I've heard, and I understand it very well as I feel her
style of acting during Y1 comes close to the most brilliant acting I've
ever seen both on television and on the big screen, the sort of magic that
one would normally attribute to the greatest actresses of our time, in my
book that is, such as Hanna Schygulla (DIE EHE DER MARIA BRAUN, 1978),
Gudrun Landgrabe (DIE FLAMBIERTE FRAU, 1984) and Angela Winkler (DIE
BLECHTROMMEL, 1979) to think of a few.

Although she does not have the same amount of sophistication as some of
the above, as a child in 1975 I was deeply impressed by Barbara Bain
and admit that I still am when I see such masterpieces of fine art as
RING AROUND THE MOON which contains a uniformly superb contribution by
Barabara Bain, I feel, and other episodes too, like MATTER OF LIFE AND
DEATH which is a splendid study in grief and deep psychological insight
to the human soul, although unfortunately a bit battered by some
unnecessary sulking in the final act.

For me Barbara Bain created one of the most interesting characters in the
series, the first series anyway.  Although as a man I identify more
naturally with John or Victor, Helena is still very much the centre of
the series for me, the centre in terms of the only person that really
means anything to John and hence make sense out of his actions, and,
perhaps more importantly to my feelings for the series, Helena being one
of the most "real" of the characters in terms of being the most
psychologically complex of the lot.

Nowhere in the series is this so evident that in RING AROUND THE MOON,
I feel, an episode of extreme psychological complexity and depth, dealing
to a greater extent than any other of the episodes, I feel, with real
emotions and real people although the situation is highly abstract,
although not necessarily more abstract than the likes of GUARDIAN OF
PIRI and MISSING LINK.

In fact, one of my reasons for wanting to rewatch the series when
I started to do so in 1997 had much to do with the impression that
Barabara Bain had on me in episodes like RING AROUND THE MOON and
MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH.  I believe I assosiate her even more than anyone
else with the series.  A magnificent actress given the right sort of
material and right guidance, no doubt, and even though I admit she is
perhaps not much of a challenge to what we are used to from French,
Italian and German cinema, she is definetly one of a few handful
American actresses who possess something reminicent of emotional depth
and character, well, in my opinion this is, of course.

I'm highly surprised that Woody Allen hasn't used her, the only American
director, I think, who seem to make films worth watching at the moment,
when he used Martin Landau to such a splendid effect in his CRIMES AND
OTHER MISDEMEANOURS (1988), Landau giving one of his best performances
ever.

There is still much pleasure to be found when watching SPACE:1999. Apart
from her supreme performance in MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH and RING AROUND
THE MOON even more, I find the sequences where she does paperwork in
medical centre at night in the episodes FORCE OF LIFE and THE TROUBLED
SPIRIT extremely fascinating.  With a very limited way of expressing
herself we here see the "real" Helena in a typical situation,
systematically doing research.  Absolutely wonderful!

Petter