In the early 1970s, Roger Corman left American International Pictures, gave up directing full time, and settled into the comfortable role of producer and distributor with his new company New World Pictures, co-founded by him and his brother Gene. NWP stuck to the AIP formula of producing low budget b-movies targeted mainly at teenage boys, while also providing American distribution for international films from directors like Akira Kurosawa, who Corman was more than happy to borrow extensively from when it came to making his own Star Wars-style space opera.
Hey, if it worked for George Lucas...
Includes Spoilers!
Say hello to Sador of the Malmori (John Saxon). He's your typical intergalactic tyrant. At least I'm assuming he's a tyrant. I'm not exactly certain if he's actually the leader of the Malmori or just a petty warlord in their empire. The film is never clear on that point. Doesn't really matter either way, this isn't a film that is looking to build a mythos. All you need to know is he's a bad guy, looking to bad things, with a lot of other bad people under his command. He wants to conquer the planet Akir, home to Akira (see what you did there), and because he's a busy guy with other places to conquer and destroy he gives them a few days to think it over. If they don't submit he'll destroy their planet with hisDeath Star Stellar Converter.
The Akira are a beige wearing group of space Quakers who lack the means of fighting back. Their only hope is to steal the plot of Seven Samurai and send one of their own out into space to find some good hearted mercenaries willing to work pro bono. The one chosen for this dangerous mission into the unknown is...some guy. He's a nameless nobody, but not in a cool Man with No Man sort of way. No, the filmmakers just obviously decide that knowing the protagonist's name was just not information the audience needed to know until much later in the movie. All we know about this guy is that he's young, can fly the only spaceship they have, and has a sister. If you think that last part is going to be one of the most important parts of this movie then guess again.
First stop is an old space station, home to an old arms manufacturer named Dr. Hephaestus (Sam Jaffe), who is now stuck in a life support egg. He wants our hero, who we now learn is called Shad, to give up his quest, stay here, and shack up with his daughter Nanelia (Darlanne Fluegel) so they can repopulate the station even though that'll make for a very shallow gene pool. Dude, just because you're named after a Greek god doesn't mean you have to think like one. Shad and Nanelia are both against this plan. Not the having sex part, they're fine with that, just the giving up the quest and living on the space station part. So they make a break for it and recruit more fighters to their cause including:
--George Peppard as Space Cowboy (unknown if his parents named him that), a trucker from Earth who is really into cowboy cosplay and has a Confederate flag painted on his ship so ugh.
--Robert Vaughn as Gelt, essentially reprising his role from The Magnificent Seven for a hefty salary and looking like he regretted it instantly.
--Earl Boen and some other guys as Nestor, a set of clones who share a collective consciousness and join the fight just for the experience.
--B-movie queen Sybil Danning as Saint-Exmin, a Valkyrie right out of some softcore sci-fi version of Wagner's Ring cycle. She's also just in it for the experience, wanting to fight and asking for nothing in return, exactly what Shad is looking for, but he finds her annoying so keeps telling her to take a hike.
--Morgan Woodward as Cayman of the Lazuli, who is basically a space whaler and slave trader, but he wants to kill Sador for wiping out his race so everyone is willing to let that part slide.
If you've seen Seven Samurai or The Magnificent Seven or even suffered through Rebel Moon (my condolences), you'll have a good idea of how the rest of the movie plays out. Battle Beyond the Stars is not a film that really aims to surprise its audience with imaginative narrative twists. It's primary goal is to look enough like Star Wars that people pay to see it, but dissimilar enough that Lucas won't sue. It's a cheap cash-in that knows it's a cheap cash-in and doesn't aspire to be anything else, which makes it difficult to judge too harshly. It has a sense of self that I can't help but admire even if think the majority of the movie is rather bad, if still somewhat moderately entertaining.
Notes and Quotes
--I'll admit, for a low budget Corman production from 45 years ago, the FX aren't too bad, although it is painfully obvious they didn't have enough spaceship shots for a full movie and just kept reusing the same ones again and again and again and...
--One of the things Corman is best remembered for was his keen eye for new talent. Some of the biggest names in Hollywood got their start working for him and this film was no different. James Horner provided the score, John Sayles wrote the script, James Cameron handled the production design and the FX, and even Bill Paxton worked as a carpenter building the sets.
--The most unpleasant part of the movie is the treatment of Shad's sister. She's abducted and raped by a couple of Sador's goons (thankfully off screen) and then killed when Gelt destroys their ship, but Shad never asks about her once upon his return. She's just forgotten about completely by all who knew her.
--Zed is clearly meant to be the Obi-Wan mentor to Shad, but he does very little mentoring, mainly just loans Shad his car. Like all older mentor-like figures he dies, but in a dumb way. Even though he's blind, he's just randomly wandering around the battlefield and gets shot.
--One of most interesting parts of the film is when one of the Nestor clones is captured and used to replace Sador's injured arm and the others try to use their connection to assassinate him, but it's a plan that relines entirely on them knowing that Sador will harvest the clone for parts. The movie never explain why Sador does it, his last line suggest he was just trying to prolong his life and become immortal, but nothing is ever confirmed. There's also never any indication that the good guys know he does this. They've put together this plot to kill him based on information we're never told they even have.
--Zed's ship has a very, ahem, interesting design. Sador's mothership also looks like Cameron watched the opening scene of Star Wars and thought “What if those two ships had a baby?”.
--The production budget was $2m, almost four times what Corman usually spent on a movie, which it made back before a single cinema ticket was sold thanks to him selling the foreign distribution and cable rights for a combined $3.2m.
--Almost all the FX shots, along with Horner's entire score, were reused for Space Raiders (1983) and other Corman produced films.
Gelt: “I sleep with my back to the wall - when I can sleep. I eat serpents seven times a week. There's not a major city in this galaxy where I can show my face, or spend my wealth. Right now, your offer looks very attractive to me... A meal, and a place to hide.”
Saint-Exmin: “Our creed is to live fast, fight well, and have a beautiful ending.”
Shad: “No violent ending is beautiful.”
Saint-Exmin: “You've never seen a Valkyrie go down.”
--Madame please, this is meant to be a PG movie.
Cayman: “I'm only in this for Sador. I want his head.”
Shad: “Oh. Well, you're welcome to it.”
Sador: “Help Akir against me? Hmm! Nobody could be that stupid.”
Saint-Exmin: “I could do wonders for that boy. I would recharge his capacitators... stimulate his solenoid... tingle dingle dangle prangle his transistors! You know... sex!”
Battle Beyond the Stars is not the worst of the many efforts to take advantage of the massive success of Star Wars, but it is still far the best. ⭐⭐
Mark Greig has been writing for Doux Reviews since 2011 More Mark Greig
Say hello to Sador of the Malmori (John Saxon). He's your typical intergalactic tyrant. At least I'm assuming he's a tyrant. I'm not exactly certain if he's actually the leader of the Malmori or just a petty warlord in their empire. The film is never clear on that point. Doesn't really matter either way, this isn't a film that is looking to build a mythos. All you need to know is he's a bad guy, looking to bad things, with a lot of other bad people under his command. He wants to conquer the planet Akir, home to Akira (see what you did there), and because he's a busy guy with other places to conquer and destroy he gives them a few days to think it over. If they don't submit he'll destroy their planet with his
The Akira are a beige wearing group of space Quakers who lack the means of fighting back. Their only hope is to steal the plot of Seven Samurai and send one of their own out into space to find some good hearted mercenaries willing to work pro bono. The one chosen for this dangerous mission into the unknown is...some guy. He's a nameless nobody, but not in a cool Man with No Man sort of way. No, the filmmakers just obviously decide that knowing the protagonist's name was just not information the audience needed to know until much later in the movie. All we know about this guy is that he's young, can fly the only spaceship they have, and has a sister. If you think that last part is going to be one of the most important parts of this movie then guess again.
First stop is an old space station, home to an old arms manufacturer named Dr. Hephaestus (Sam Jaffe), who is now stuck in a life support egg. He wants our hero, who we now learn is called Shad, to give up his quest, stay here, and shack up with his daughter Nanelia (Darlanne Fluegel) so they can repopulate the station even though that'll make for a very shallow gene pool. Dude, just because you're named after a Greek god doesn't mean you have to think like one. Shad and Nanelia are both against this plan. Not the having sex part, they're fine with that, just the giving up the quest and living on the space station part. So they make a break for it and recruit more fighters to their cause including:
--George Peppard as Space Cowboy (unknown if his parents named him that), a trucker from Earth who is really into cowboy cosplay and has a Confederate flag painted on his ship so ugh.
--Robert Vaughn as Gelt, essentially reprising his role from The Magnificent Seven for a hefty salary and looking like he regretted it instantly.
--Earl Boen and some other guys as Nestor, a set of clones who share a collective consciousness and join the fight just for the experience.
--Morgan Woodward as Cayman of the Lazuli, who is basically a space whaler and slave trader, but he wants to kill Sador for wiping out his race so everyone is willing to let that part slide.
If you've seen Seven Samurai or The Magnificent Seven or even suffered through Rebel Moon (my condolences), you'll have a good idea of how the rest of the movie plays out. Battle Beyond the Stars is not a film that really aims to surprise its audience with imaginative narrative twists. It's primary goal is to look enough like Star Wars that people pay to see it, but dissimilar enough that Lucas won't sue. It's a cheap cash-in that knows it's a cheap cash-in and doesn't aspire to be anything else, which makes it difficult to judge too harshly. It has a sense of self that I can't help but admire even if think the majority of the movie is rather bad, if still somewhat moderately entertaining.
Notes and Quotes
--I'll admit, for a low budget Corman production from 45 years ago, the FX aren't too bad, although it is painfully obvious they didn't have enough spaceship shots for a full movie and just kept reusing the same ones again and again and again and...
--One of the things Corman is best remembered for was his keen eye for new talent. Some of the biggest names in Hollywood got their start working for him and this film was no different. James Horner provided the score, John Sayles wrote the script, James Cameron handled the production design and the FX, and even Bill Paxton worked as a carpenter building the sets.
--The most unpleasant part of the movie is the treatment of Shad's sister. She's abducted and raped by a couple of Sador's goons (thankfully off screen) and then killed when Gelt destroys their ship, but Shad never asks about her once upon his return. She's just forgotten about completely by all who knew her.
--Zed is clearly meant to be the Obi-Wan mentor to Shad, but he does very little mentoring, mainly just loans Shad his car. Like all older mentor-like figures he dies, but in a dumb way. Even though he's blind, he's just randomly wandering around the battlefield and gets shot.
--One of most interesting parts of the film is when one of the Nestor clones is captured and used to replace Sador's injured arm and the others try to use their connection to assassinate him, but it's a plan that relines entirely on them knowing that Sador will harvest the clone for parts. The movie never explain why Sador does it, his last line suggest he was just trying to prolong his life and become immortal, but nothing is ever confirmed. There's also never any indication that the good guys know he does this. They've put together this plot to kill him based on information we're never told they even have.
--Zed's ship has a very, ahem, interesting design. Sador's mothership also looks like Cameron watched the opening scene of Star Wars and thought “What if those two ships had a baby?”.
--The production budget was $2m, almost four times what Corman usually spent on a movie, which it made back before a single cinema ticket was sold thanks to him selling the foreign distribution and cable rights for a combined $3.2m.
--Almost all the FX shots, along with Horner's entire score, were reused for Space Raiders (1983) and other Corman produced films.
Gelt: “I sleep with my back to the wall - when I can sleep. I eat serpents seven times a week. There's not a major city in this galaxy where I can show my face, or spend my wealth. Right now, your offer looks very attractive to me... A meal, and a place to hide.”
Saint-Exmin: “Our creed is to live fast, fight well, and have a beautiful ending.”
Shad: “No violent ending is beautiful.”
Saint-Exmin: “You've never seen a Valkyrie go down.”
--Madame please, this is meant to be a PG movie.
Cayman: “I'm only in this for Sador. I want his head.”
Shad: “Oh. Well, you're welcome to it.”
Sador: “Help Akir against me? Hmm! Nobody could be that stupid.”
Saint-Exmin: “I could do wonders for that boy. I would recharge his capacitators... stimulate his solenoid... tingle dingle dangle prangle his transistors! You know... sex!”
Battle Beyond the Stars is not the worst of the many efforts to take advantage of the massive success of Star Wars, but it is still far the best. ⭐⭐
Mark Greig has been writing for Doux Reviews since 2011 More Mark Greig
Had a lot of fun with this one when I was a small kid. This also surely inspired the creation of the first Star Control.
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