I recall seeing the TV ads for this fantasy adventure when I was a kid - it came out a few years after Star Wars and seemed to me (even as a kid) that they were trying to ride on the Star Wars bandwagon. But I didn't care - it looked really cool to a 12 year old kid, what with all the spaceships and laserguns and stop-motion animated monsters. Alas, I never made it to the State Theater to see it and for a long time, I all but forgot about it. Then I happened upon the video at a new video shop I was checking out and all of those adolescent memories flooded back and I had to rent it. Well, it reminds me of a cross between Barbarella (in particular the distinctly European feel, including lots of fantastical sets and colored stars in space (much like the rainbow colored starfields that littered the Lou Ferrigno Hercules movies, but that's another review altogether). A lot of it reminded me of Jason of Star Command and other Saturday morning space operas of my youth.
The film opens with a total Star Wars rip-off: a giant ship decends into the shot from above. Shortly we see transluscent red dots all over the place and a bunch of space guys on board the ship get killed by them. It's all quite surreal, actually. Marjoe Gortner (with his feminine features and tight poodle hairdo) and Carolyn Monroe are being chased by the intergalactic cops. They are caught and thrown in jail. Despite all the other inmates being costumed in jumpsuits, Carolyn's jailbird attire consists of a leather bikini. She escapes from jail and after running through an intergalactic cornfield, a spaceship lands on a hill and she goes in to find a green-skinned cop and his black-helmeted robot, who have come to free her so they cam all join up on a secret mission. Christopher Plummer's hologram pops in to explain that the universe has been divided up into two warring factions and The COunt's side developed a weapon that is so powerful, it takes an entire planet to conseal it. THeir mission is to sail to the "haunted stars," find The Count's secret planet and destroy it!
Along the way, they end up on a planet of Amazonian women, who also wear bikini-type outfits. I am telling you, if I had seen this when I was 12, I would've LOVED it. The fact that I saw it when I was over 30 gave me a little different view.
The good news is that is moves along at a good pace - there is always some sort of action going on whether it is explosions, fights, spaceship chases, monsters or just plain running around. The stop motion effects remind me of some of the Sinbad movies, although not nearly as smooth. And of course, Carolyn Monroe looks pretty darned good in her leather bikini thing. The bad news is it was just too silly for me. I really think it is a colorful throwback to Flash Gordon and some of the adventure serials and on that level it works. However, it has the same drawbacks as a lot of those serials do: stilted dialogue, cheap-looking effects and costumes, outlandish concepts and ridiculous things happeneing all over the place. If you can put yourself in that 12-year old state of mind this is a fun ride, but for those who want more science in their fiction and/or want a heapin' helpin' of nudity and gore - this ain't the tape to rent tonight.
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