My streaming gem: why you should watch Starcrash
When the Emperor of the First Circle of the Universe (that is, Christopher Plummer, in a patent leather suit beneath silver armor, a cape and oven mitt-like gloves) wants to calm his worried son (David Hasselhoff) during a climactic moment, he steps forward amid a room full of warriors and slain robots and bellows: “Imperial Battleship – stop the flow of time!!!”
It is an apogee of trash brilliance unrivaled anywhere else in the galaxy.
The Star Wars big bang created a universe that is still expanding, but never was the fiery scream of that first eruption felt more furiously than in the late 1970s. Producers far and wide hitched their fortunes to the Millennium Falcon’s hyperdrive, to varying measures of financial and artistic success.
It got Star Trek (the far superior of the two franchises) back into business, with the curiously terrific Star Trek: The Motion Picture in 1979 and begat Battlestar Galactica in 1978, Flash Gordon in 1980 and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century in 1979.
But these are the more respectable titles. On the lower budget shelf came Battle Beyond the Stars (penned on assignment by John Sayles), Galaxina
(starring Playboy playmate Dorothy Stratten) and one of the all-time pieces of junk, Italy’s Cosmos: War of the Planets.
In the middle of all this is something that demands further study.
Mixing low-budget schlock with genuine design brilliance is Starcrash. Produced at Rome’s Cinecittà Studios in 1978 and distributed by Roger Corman’s New World Pictures, Starcrash was directed and co-written by future Dario Argento collaborator Luigi Cozzi (credited as Lewis Coates)
In addition to Plummer (only in a few scenes, whispering his ludicrous lines with a true thespian’s straight face) and Hasselhoff (dashing, and wielding a cheapo green lightsaber) is a nervous “police robot” with a wacky American Southern drawl, a goon named Thor with green makeup on his face (but not his neck), and the real reason this movie is as remembered as it is: Caroline Munro.
Munro, already known for appearing in Hammer Studio films, the Ray Harryhausen Golden Voyage of Sinbad and as Bond villainess Naomi in The Spy Who Loved Me, is Stella Star, a bikini clad smuggler with Patrick Nagel-like makeup and eternally blown-out hair. Though her voiced is dubbed by Candy Clark (Plummer referred to her accent as “one you could coot with a fookin’ knife” when I asked him about Starcrash in a recent interview), her charisma still blasts through the screen. Yes, it is absurd that all the men are wearing spacesuits or typical high fantasy gowns, but she wears her various skintight, fabric-light outfits with confidence and verve. She is a vision of vertices, a striking image on her own, but even more so against the primary colors of the various interplanetary interiors and spaceship bridges of the film.
At her side is Akton, played by former child preacher (and subject of an Academy Award-winning documentary feature) Marjoe Gortner. Resembling a lovechild of poultry magnate Frank Purdue and Foreigner’s Lou Gramm during his Jukebox Hero peak, Gortner is a baffling pick as a leading man, but he does have access to cool, neon-like laser magic and a red-andblack rubbery outfit.
The plot to Starcrash is submental – a ripoff of Star Wars, which was already a ripoff classic action serials. There’s a gender-swapped rescue mission (David Hasselhoff is Princess Leia) and a big laser beam shoot ’em up at the end. We visit an outer space hard labor prison, a Zardoz-like rocky planet riddled with troglodytes, a frozen realm where clouds zoom across the sky in surreal high speeds and then there’s the evil Count, Zarth Arn, who literally cackles after describing his plan to take over the universe. (It involves something called The Doom Machine.)
In addition to Christopher Plummer, the other grown up in the room, who you’ll notice immediately, is composer John Barry. His inimitable orchestral sweep lends the proceedings a strong boost. While his score to Starcrash
is not going to top On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Out of Africa or the (far more boring post-Star Wars flick) The Black Hole as a personal best, it is undeniably grand music.
And while the dialogue and performances in Starcrash are likely to lead to facepalms and outright laughter, I must state in no uncertain terms that the visual pop of this movie is tremendous. According to lore, production on Starcrash was marred by widespread food poisoning, then the negative was then held for ransom by striking workers. The effort was well worth it.
Starcrash is available on Amazon Prime in the US and UK
check protection program, providing loans to small businesses as an incentive to keep their workers on their payroll. Trump has been singing its praises, claiming that any glitches were immediately fixed while bragging about its popularity.
“That is just classic Trump to try and brag about how in demand an emergency bailout system is,” Oliver said. “If he was captain of the Titanic, you just know he’d be saying: ‘I just want to congratulate everyone, these lifeboats have become so popular.’”
Oliver then detailed some of the “pretty substantial glitches” that have prevented businesses from getting the help they need. “The obvious problem is that if help takes months to come, that’s not going to save a business that’s set to go under in weeks,” he said.
The White House economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, has claimed the process is easy because his wife, a self-employed artist, was able to fill out a form without any problem. Oliver pointed out the obvious holes in this comparison before offering a $20,000 donation to a food bank if someone sells him one of her paintings for $10.
He also spoke about the problems facing so-called essential workers, such as those working at Amazon. In a “patronising” ad with “schmaltzy piano music”, the company claimed that its heroic workers were being treated well through the pandemic. “Many Amazon workers paint a much different picture,” Oliver said.
Reports have shown that there has been an inability to maintain physical distancing guidelines, a lack of protective gear and hand sanitiser and lack of time for employees to clean their hands. Oliver also showed footage of a worker complaining that Amazon is still selling non-essential products, such as dildos.
“Risking your life to get someone a sex toy probably doesn’t feel fair,” Oliver said. “There’s a reason 1917 wasn’t about two soldiers trying to bring Benedict Cumberbatch a dildo he wanted although, yes, the cinematography would still be impressive.”
Amazon claims that to offer paid sick leave to infected workers, they require a positive test. “Testing in New York is so scarce, Amazon’s plan may as well have been you get double pay and free healthcare for your whole family if you can guess what number Jeff Bezos is thinking,” he said.
Oliver stressed the need for all businesses to provide paid sick leave permanently while also exploring the health insurance issues many are facing. He played footage of an EMT who doesn’t have any insurance with his job. While thankful for all of the pizza being donated in recent weeks, he understandably wants something more substantial. “It’s like that old saying about pizza and sex: even when they’re bad, they’re still pretty good. and even when they’re really good, you still need fucking healthcare,” Oliver said.
Talk of a return to normality had Oliver saying: “Things need to change and not go back to normal.”
He continued: “It shouldn’t have taken a pandemic to prove that our unemployment system is a mess, that we need universal healthcare and that workers need benefits, the right to organise and wages that reflect how essential they really are.”
He also mentioned the problems the pandemic has shown us in prisons, how we treat the homeless and also the glaring racal inequalities it has brought to light.
“There is no better argument for a permanent welfare state than watching your government desperately try to build one when it’s already too late,” he said. “The real test here isn’t whether or not our country will get through this – it will – the question is how we get through this and what kind of country we want to be on the other side.”