STAR CRASH (1978) - The Italian Star Wars

DIRECTED by Luigi Cozzi.

SCREENPLAY by Luigi Cozzi, Nat Wachsberger & R.A. Dillon.

STARRING  - Caroline Munroe as Stella Star,  Marjoe Gortner as Akton,  Judd Hamilton as Elle,  David Hasselhoff as Prince Simon,  Christopher Plummer as The Emperor,  Joe Spinell as Count Zarth Arn,  Robert Tessier as Thor,  Nadia Cassini as Corelia.

PLOT -  In a galaxy far, far away, an Imperial starship is tracking down the location of the evil renegade, Count Zarth Arn. The ship is attacked by a weapon of Zarth Arn's which drives the crew insane, causing the crew to ransack thier own ship. Three escape pods are fired into space...

Intergalactic smugglers, Stella Star and Akton, are captured by the space police and sent on a deadly mission to find the escape pods, destroy Count Zarth Arn's mysterious new weapon and if possible find out if the Emperor's son, Prince Simon, is still alive (he was onboard the starship when it was attacked).

Accompanied by space police officer Thor (who is secretly working for Zarth Arn) and the robotic cop, Elle, Stella and Akton must fulfill thier mission if they want to be fully pardoned for thier crimes.

A whole galaxy of dangers stands in thier way...

DIALOUGE  - The Emperor  - "You know my son, I wouldn't be Emperor of the Galaxy if I didn't have some powers at my disposal...Imperial battleship...HALT THE FLOW OF TIME !"

PERFORMANCES  - Star Crash is one of those movies where you get a cast of talented performers acting deliberately bad. Every performance is ramped up by one hundred and ten percent. We have just entered the realms of high camp and may never leave...

At first, I though that Caroline Munroe had taken this way too far as some of her line delivery is truly awful, however, I then found out that her voice was over dubbed by another actress, Candy Clark, so it's Clark who sounds like shes acting in a school play NOT Monroe.  

Anyway, Monroe plays Stella Star (sounds like the name a pub singer in a northern working men's club would adopt, I bet she does a mean cover version of 'Yes sir, I can boogie', accompanied by a Hammond organ, naturally...). Stella is the film's main heroine and her character is as two dimensional as you would imagine, but thats OK as all the other characters are cardboard cutouts too. Everybody is a comic book style archetype. Monroe gets to dress in a variety of sexy outfits that would make Barbarella blush and kick lots of ass with a laser gun...

We also get Marjoe Gortner as Akton, a fuzzy permed space smuggler, he's basically the Han Solo character but also appears to have the powers of a Jedi. He even comes equipped with his own Light Sab...erm...Laser Sword (cough...cough).

We also get Judd Hamilton as Elle, a robot policeman who minces about like an S&M dressed C3PO. For some reason they've dubbed his voice with an actor called Hamilton Camp who gives him a Texan accent. Then there's Robert Tessier as Thor, the traitor in the party, he hardly ever speaks and is so obviously a snake in the grass from the second he steps onboard Stella's ship that it makes you wonder why she doesn't eject him from the nearest airlock right away.

Then we get David Hasselhoff as Prince Simon (they couldn't have given him a less space age sounding name if they tried). This is a very early role for the Hoff, he looks ridiculously young. He's a bit wooden in this if I'm being fair, but he at least gets to fight some robots with a Light Sabre.

Rounding out the good guys we get respected character actor Christopher Plummer playing The Emperor. He brings the requisite gravitas to the role even though he's clearly slumming it by even being in this film. When asked about this film years later, Plummer went on record as saying he only bothered to be in it because he knew it was being filmed in Italy and fancied a free holiday there. You've got to admire that level of honesty.

Perhaps the "best" performance belongs to Joe Spinell as the evil Count Zarth Arn who is basically Space Dracula meets Darth Vader. He spends the entire movie poncing about in a big cape, laughing like a maniac and shouting lines of dialogue like "UNLEASH...The DOOM MACHINE !!!", All the while he has this expression on his face...

Seriously, it never changes. He's constantly staring into the middle distance, eyes bulging from his head. It's hilarious to watch. He's quite possibly one of the most ridiculously camp O.T.T. villains there has ever been and he's absolutely great.

Oh, and he also has a space station that's shaped like a giant claw...

THAT'S what you call class.

SFX - If you're looking for Star Wars level special effects forget it. What we get here are very obvious plastic models floating about in psychedelic starscapes. It's cheesy and colourful and about as subtle as a brick in the side of your head but it all has a strange beauty about it.

We also get some stop motion robots which are nowhere near Ray Harryhausen standard (they move a lot more jerkilly than anything he would have put his name to), it's nice to see them all the same.

There's also a giant female robot in a scene which completely rips off the battle with the giant stone warrior, Talos, in Jason And The Argonauts (1963)...

SEX & VIOLENCE - You want sex appeal in your movie ? How about Caroline Munroe in outfits like this...

Rolling about in positions like this...

Enough said.

The violence mainly consists of various evil minions getting zapped by lasers and emitting earsplitting, operatic screams as they disintigrate into 70's disco lights.

RATING  - Star Crash is an "everything but the kitchen sink" type of film. The filmmakers have taken the opportunity to fill the various planets that the characters visit with all kinds of madness. You want a planet full of amazon warrior women ? You get one here, Giant warrior robots ? You're all good, Rapey cavemen ? Check, an Ice Planet where you'll freeze instantly to death if you set foot outside at night ? Luigi Cozzi and friends have you covered.

This film is absolutely mental on all levels - the performances, the ideas, the dodgy but strangely beautiful special effects. Even the John Barry soundtrack that sounds like something from a lost Bond movie. It's all a grand mess that doesn't quite work but you'll enjoy it all the same. It reminds me in many ways of the 1980 Flash Gordon movie, its not as good as that film, it doesn't get the adrenaline pumping in the same way when you watch it, but it's still a fine example of high camp at its most gaudily insane.

I'm giving this 4 and a half Doom Machine's out of 5. Switch your brain off and enjoy the ride. If you've ever wanted to see a post pubescent David Hasselhoff fight robots with a Light Sabre (and who hasn't ?) then this is the movie for you.

VHS/DVD/POSTER ART