If you had told Roger Corman that he could have legitimately gone head to head with Star Wars on a $4 million budget, he still wouldn't have spent a dime over $2.2 million.
Robert Vaughn literally played his Magnificent 7 character. In 7, his character was looking for a safe place to stay. In Stars, he wanted a meal and a safe place to sleep.
This movie is as groundbreaking as Star Wars, albeit to a lesser degree. Like Star Wars (and a budget less than 20% of it), it showed major studios what could be accomplished if you're short on cash but not talent. It launched the careers of several people as a result, like James Horner and James Cameron.
Studios already had that idea from pioneers like Mel Brooks. His work on: - Get Smart. One of the cheapest tv shows of its era 1965-1970s to make. - Young Frankenstein. Accidentally buying the wrong film stock, and having to use it, helped make it an instant classic. - Blazing Saddles. The “Cowboys” genre rarely made money, and was actually used mostly for tax write offs as losses. His mockbuster literally outperformed every single John Wayne movie ever made, when you include inflation. Relying on great minds to make up for low budgets has been a Hollywood staple for almost its entire existence. All the current small studios in Nollywood & Bollywood would be nearly indistinguishable from the early days of Hollywood. Before McCarthyist extremists ruined Hollywood storytelling for decades, and gave “former” *Nazi Sympathizers* like Ronald Reagan & Walt Disney almost unlimited power over censorship.
@@ShadowSonic2 It's hard to ignore the fact that Battle runs a tight 104 minutes and tells a better story than Snyder's two Rebel Moon movies at over 250 minutes of boring, pointless blather.
St. Exmin: I am from a warrior race. We exist for battle. Our creed is to live fast, fight well, and have a beautiful ending. Shad: No violent ending is beautiful. St. Exmin: You've never seen a Valkyrie go down.”
7 Samurai in Space George Peppard Robert Vaughn Sybil Danning Earl Boen John Saxon All in ONE film. James Cameron on "production design and art direction" Music by James Horner , A ship with more rack than an average playboy centerfold. What's not to like? 😜😜😜😜
I noticed that *Jame Horner* was not mentioned, which was a shame. This was one of three films Horner scored for Corman, the others being _Krull_ and _Star Raiders,_ the latter being where a lot of the ship clips were used.
Brandon, you surely noticed that John-Boy Shad's planet is named Akir as a blatant Kurosawa reference. Also, I can recall Danning saying "You've never seen a Valkyrie go down." During the battle sequence at the drive-in where I first saw this, that inspired others to enthuse "Go down, Valkyrie, go down!"
This was The Magnificent Seven in space with some serious B movie actors including Danning in it in a skimpy costume and it wasn't that bad, plus well they won in the end. Yay!
Wow... my first unpaid job at New World Pictures. I not only met James Cameron on this but Sybil Danning later hosted a horror convention me and my partners held in LA called "Fright Fest" where we gave Roger Corman a Life Achievement Award in 1981. It was also James Horner's first score which Corman also reused.
Nell, the most feminine spaceship you'll find out there - not only does she have a titanic metal rack, she's a replica of the entire female uterine system! Complete with laser-ovaries!
This is one of my most fave movies of all-time! I first saw it in the theater when it was released and have been a big fan of it ever since. Since then I have watched it dozens of times. It is pure, 80's cheesy, B movie perfection.
@@GoDamnWeird for me, there was a phase when TBS started showing indie films in the 90s. This, Cherry 2000, and a bunch of other cult classics git on national TV for a while.
If you listen to enough of his soundtracks you know it's his, he has a melody with a french horn he puts it into nearly all of the soundtracks he's done. That James Horner sound, he self plagiarizes himself a lot. ua-cam.com/video/YAIIdW62Cjk/v-deo.html
I remember seeing this movie as a kid and loving the shit out of it. Despite all its cheese it's one of the few movies from that time I still have a bunch of good nostalgia for. Thanks for reviewing this and bringing back some good memories!
I always have a fondness for this one and that utterly insane Japanese Star Warsish move "Message From Space". Now there's one Brandon needs to sit down with!
Some people call him Maurice! Love your humor! You remind me of movies I need to see again and sum up movies I'd rather not sit through. You're the best!!!
This is the one Star Wars ripoff that doesn't follow the standard Star Wars trope. I remember feeling sad when the various mercenaries buy it, and I wanted John Saxon to DIE. This is one of my fav sci-fi films for no other reason than it's a fun movie. You forgot to mention that it has a pretty over-the-top score by then unknown James Horner--which, per the standard Roger Corman way, also gets re-used in many of his other offerings. A pretty great film that has withstood the test of time.
at 03:49 the two ladies sitting at the table. At the head of the table the pretty blonde actress is Marta Kristen whom played Judy Robinson in the original Lost in Space TV show. The young actress seated on the left side end of the table is veteran character actress Julia Duffy from Wizards and Warriors and Bob Newhart's show Newhart and from TV sitcom Designing Women.
@@bryansmith1920 It's about how all the characters are embroiled in a life-or-death struggle, and every time Saint Exmin gets involved, everybody be like: "Uhh, FFS".
And they got James Horner to do the soundtrack! I never knew the budget for this film was a mere 2 million, also, it looks like the ship also has ovaries that shoot lasers, in fact the whole thing looks like a uterus. Well I guess it makes a good counterpart to the rocket ship in Flesh Gordon.
Red Letter Media covered 1983's "Space Raiders" and noted the same thing; all of the Horner soundtrack was clearly early drafts of the tunes he eventually used in WoK. Corman must have cut a deal for the material.
"Hopefully its a little less rapey this time" ...well unless you count the scene where the two villains at 4:46 later abduct a woman from the planet and its implied that they do rape her right before they get shot down by Robert Vaughn at 11:50. I'd say no.
The council scene always reminds me of the similar scene in Heavy Metal. To protect. This is the pact. But when life loses its value and is taken for nought, the pact is... to avenge.
Battle Beyond the Stars stands out in Roger Corman's career like Ayers Rock in the Outback. A lot more money and some great hiring choices (I wonder if these Cameron and Horner chaps did anything else) and ripping off great source material really helped. The character of Cayman sets the "urbane scary looking alien dude" template that Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar in Babylon 5 would later perfect. I would have loved to be in the meeting where they were designing Nell and someone said "think quadriplegic playboy model crossed with Hammerhead Shark". Also Danning may be the one to get the teenage boys to watch but Fluegel is the one to steal your heart.
This movie was a staple of my childhood viewings. We got 3 to 4 channels, and this was played a lot on 3 of them. It has a soft spot in my heart, despite it's flaws.
I LOVE this films, as Star Wars ripoffs go this is one of the best and has a lot of heart and some great characters. Also a lot of behind the scenes talent. Besides Cameron there was a script by John Sayles and a soundtrack by James Horner who was second only to Williams for big action films in a few years. Oh yeah, Corman also re-used his soundtrack more than a few times.
Ah, Sybil Danning. I can remember fondly going in to the movie theatre a fresh faced innocent 10 year old with dreams of Star Wars in my eyes, and walking out not being able to get her strange lady lumps out of my head, then going home all dizzy and confused. Certainly gave a kickstart to my puberty.
I saw this as a kid on a double billing at a drive in with Star Wars. This was the 1st feature, to make sure people didn't just leave and not buy snacks. I never noticed the ship boobs, but then I think I was about 10 at the time.
I watched star raiders the other day on Amazon and I realized that this spaceship is a reused asset, because this movie Battle beyond the stars is one that I have fond memories of for my childhood but all these movies are mixed up in my head because they reuse a lot of the assets if you look at the Wikipedia page the dude reuse things in like five different movies and that's why they're all mashed together.
I watched "Space Raiders" a few days ago and was surprised to see the same space ships from this movie. "Battle Beyond the Stars" was also a favorite when I was growing up. Thanks.
Another funny review! I think I’ll probably buy the movie on dvd or blu ray, this is gonna be the 4th time I buy a movie because of your reviews. You haven’t steered me wrong yet
I loved Battle Beyond the Stars. I seen on TV a couple of times as a kid. Eventually got the VHS and later the DVD. Although the picture quality is better on the DVD, I didn't like the widescreen because it wasn't real widescreen. They just took the full screen version and chopped the bottom and top of the picture off. But other than that, I'd definitely recommend a DVD or Blu-Ray of this movie.
After seeing John Saxon do an excellent job playing the villain in this movie, I can only imagine how great he would have been as an imperial officer in one of the Star Wars movies back then. He also could have been a jedi or a warrior too, with his experience in martial arts as we saw in Enter the Dragon. What could have been, he was the perfect age to play a senior officer or older character in one of the original trilogy Star Wars movies. As for the movie itself, it's definitely a low budget sci-fi B movie with poor and corny dialogue quite a bit. And the costume design is fairly dated too like a Star Trek episode featuring foreign societies with ridiculous clothing. But the ship designs are quite good and varied and have that sort of Firefly feel to them, in the fact that the ships generally look unique and like they would all be constructed and designed a bit differently to fit someone's desired specifications. There are also some really good actors in this movie even with the bits of poor dated dialogue, and the music is also quite good too from James Horner. I'd enjoy seeing the ships in this movie in action with a proper budget, they have some fairly unique aesthetics to them which I feel could translate well into a bigger budget effort.
I saw an arcade game game named after this movie. It was about protecting a colony from attacking forces. The game was sort of like missile command, shooting from fixed cannons as aliens swoop trying to blast through the shields of a colony in a crater. I've never seen it since or seen any game play of it on UA-cam. It must be pretty obscure to not even be somewhere on the Internet
this was once played on facebook stream screening in a RLM shitposting group and we all had so much fun but then were ultimately sad when our favorite characters ended up being shot down in the final battle. Mine was the rapey lizard man
Fun fact : Robert Vaughn was also in the A-team with George Peppard. He played a black ops commander who gave the A-team their missions in the last season or two. Sadly, imo Vaughn coming into the show, through no fault of his own, was when the A-team Jumped the Shark :)
Amazingly, both THE MAN FROM UNCLE and THE A-TEAM got sillier as they went, until their final season, when they got MUCH MORE SERIOUS... and then, got cancelled in mid-season. Imagine that happening to Robert Vaughn-- TWICE! Vaughn played a real bastard on THE A-TEAM. It was so funny when, to save their own lives, they had to rescue him from an old friend of his who wanted him DEAD... played by David McCallum.
I remember seeing this movie on cable when I was a kid. LOVED it, but like others have said, I was sad when the mercenaries died, they could have killed just one or two. The theme and battle music scores are also epic!
I always thought this movie was really fun despite its cheesiness and low-budget flaws. It had imaginative, charming and outright strange elements in it, and good music. Being a variation of the Seven Samurai concept also helped a great deal - I love seeing a colorful team coming together and working towards a common goal :-)
8:21 reminds me of Brutal Legend (where the Decapitation sound clip came from) where we recruit Lemmy (yes, that lemmy) and he wont help us until we mention the enemy, and says "oh you're fighitng lyonwyhte huh? why didnt you say so, i hate that bastard"
I remember this and several other of the movies you have reviewed, that used to come on Saturday nights on TNT back when they had absolutely nothing to show. On the one weekend of the month they would have every movie with the little itty bitty Asian twins. it's just good to see other people remember nice movies
At the time this came out there weren't many science fiction movies around or super-hero movies either. It was at the local movie theater when I was a teenager. I and a friend walked there. It was good for what it was. My friend was happy to see John-boy from the Walton. I recognized the others.
Battle Beyond The Stars was an above average Roger Corman film/Star Wars ripoff not only because it had Academy Award winning director James Cameron doing the special effects, it also had frequent James Cameron collaborator and Academy Award winning composer James Horner(Aliens, Star Trek II, Titanic) doing the music, and a screenplay by Academy Award nominated screenwriter John Sayles(The Howling, Piranha, Alligator, Lone Star).
This movie also has a really awesome soundtrack by James Horner... which incidently got stolen for the crap-fest Wizards of the Lost Kingdom, which proudly proclaims its James Horner soundtrack, of which absolutely none of it was written for the movie, simply being stolen from other movies Horner composed music for.
I think thats mostly because, like a lot of movie composers, Horner has a particular style that he tends to always fall back to and it is largely for this reason that specific composers will get hired to work on certain movies.
Wow! Another of my life long friends! Saw this as a kid back in 1980 and its one of those films that has always stayed with me. Production values are very good for a B movie as are the performances from a good cast. Music by Horner is especially good as is the production design by one James Cameron. They wanted to do a space version of Seven samurai/Magnificent seven and they didn't flinch from giving it that desolate, existential edge which makes it a satisfying but rather depressing watch. All you have to do now is cover 'The Humanoid' and 'Buck Rogers in the 25th century' and I'll have the set!
Good video! Man you had me laughing! I'm actually doubly glad I this goofy space battle flick, way back in the day. Strangely, for some reason I don't think I even noticed that the MC space ship so "well endowed". I guess I was still kind of innocent in my youth. Too bad that innocence got murderraped by the 80s and subsequent years😅 Anyway, thanks for one fun video!
Shad's ship look like a Naboo Starfighter from episode 1 and Sedor's ship is a weird mix of a Correllian Corvette and an Imperial Star Destroyer. (The front and the engines are from the Corvette and the middle is from the Star Destroyer, including the hangar bay on the bottom.)
I caught this movie more than any other there's one Exchange What do we do with the food Bury it with him that was the deal a warm meal and a place to hide That is the most badass thing I've ever seen John Boy say
I can no longer find the article that discusses this. So I will just say, rumor has it that sci-fi/erotic artist Hajime Sorayama drew up the original design for Nell. It seems he was approached to design the title space craft and only did it if they allowed him to give it certain endowments.
Watched this a few times back in the 80s (USA - UP all Night!) and just re-watched it about a month ago. You failed to mention that the woman George Peppard was trying to charm was Marta Kristen from Lost in Space.
I saw this movie when it first came out in the 80's (damn, I'm old) and it was love at first sight. I wish someone would remake it. Oh and by the way, James Cameron was part of a team of special effects people who worked on this movie. James didn't do all of it, but, his biggest contribution was...spaceship boobies.
If there's only one movie I would ever want a prequel for, or several prequels for, it's this one. There were plenty of opportunities with all the mercenaries, Sador, Zed and Dr. Hephaestus. It's really a shame no one has thought of this yet.
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
If you had told Roger Corman that he could have legitimately gone head to head with Star Wars on a $4 million budget, he still wouldn't have spent a dime over $2.2 million.
Robert Vaughn literally played his Magnificent 7 character. In 7, his character was looking for a safe place to stay. In Stars, he wanted a meal and a safe place to sleep.
That was one of my favorite lines he said. Robert Vaughn's character taught a life lesson that was too good for a b-movie.
This movie is as groundbreaking as Star Wars, albeit to a lesser degree. Like Star Wars (and a budget less than 20% of it), it showed major studios what could be accomplished if you're short on cash but not talent. It launched the careers of several people as a result, like James Horner and James Cameron.
Studios already had that idea from pioneers like Mel Brooks. His work on:
- Get Smart. One of the cheapest tv shows of its era 1965-1970s to make.
- Young Frankenstein. Accidentally buying the wrong film stock, and having to use it, helped make it an instant classic.
- Blazing Saddles. The “Cowboys” genre rarely made money, and was actually used mostly for tax write offs as losses. His mockbuster literally outperformed every single John Wayne movie ever made, when you include inflation.
Relying on great minds to make up for low budgets has been a Hollywood staple for almost its entire existence.
All the current small studios in Nollywood & Bollywood would be nearly indistinguishable from the early days of Hollywood. Before McCarthyist extremists ruined Hollywood storytelling for decades, and gave “former” *Nazi Sympathizers* like Ronald Reagan & Walt Disney almost unlimited power over censorship.
18:46 is genuinely moving to me now after John Saxon's passing. It was already sweet, but now I think it's the perfect sentiment to remember Saxon by.
"I was BORN in space!"
"My mother was a black hole!"
I don't know why, but I'm STILL laughing at that one!
WUAJAJA 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣Looking for this comment 👍 👍
"My mother was a black hole!"
"So that's why you suck the fun out of the room"
funny, my aunt says she has a black hole, but thats something a little different
I love how every one of Robert Vaughn's lines in this movie was a tough guy flex.
And the father was a white dwarf.
17:30 I’m so glad you saved your Cowboy Bebop reference for this moment
In two days Snyder's "Rebel Moon" hits Netflix. Somehow I'm instantly reminded of this movie.
Yeah, this shows how you SHOULD do the Rebel Moon plot.
Rebel Moon was terrible ! Both parts. And I usually love/like his movies.
@@ShadowSonic2 It's hard to ignore the fact that Battle runs a tight 104 minutes and tells a better story than Snyder's two Rebel Moon movies at over 250 minutes of boring, pointless blather.
My grandfather took me to see this when I was young. Loved it as a kid. Still has charm, and that great score
I remember watching this when I was a kid. I forgot how goofy that lizard man's battle cry was. 🦎🦎🦎
LÆŽŮ
ŁƏĔĒĖÈĔ
Goofy, but memorable! 😂
I discovered Sybil Danning in this movie... I think it's pretty good, considering the budget.
St. Exmin: I am from a warrior race. We exist for battle. Our creed is to live fast, fight well, and have a beautiful ending.
Shad: No violent ending is beautiful.
St. Exmin: You've never seen a Valkyrie go down.”
7 Samurai in Space
George Peppard
Robert Vaughn
Sybil Danning
Earl Boen
John Saxon
All in ONE film.
James Cameron on "production design and art direction"
Music by James Horner ,
A ship with more rack than an average playboy centerfold.
What's not to like? 😜😜😜😜
I noticed that *Jame Horner* was not mentioned, which was a shame. This was one of three films Horner scored for Corman, the others being _Krull_ and _Star Raiders,_ the latter being where a lot of the ship clips were used.
Johnboyin spaaaace
The ship was modelled after Sybil Danning.
Brandon, you surely noticed that John-Boy Shad's planet is named Akir as a blatant Kurosawa reference. Also, I can recall Danning saying "You've never seen a Valkyrie go down." During the battle sequence at the drive-in where I first saw this, that inspired others to enthuse "Go down, Valkyrie, go down!"
This was The Magnificent Seven in space with some serious B movie actors including Danning in it in a skimpy costume and it wasn't that bad, plus well they won in the end. Yay!
Thomas Kolter magnificent seven was a rip off too...
@@ferdonandebull To be fair, Kurosawa said THE SEVEN SAMURAI was inspired by American Westerns, so it does go back and forth.
Wow... my first unpaid job at New World Pictures. I not only met James Cameron on this but Sybil Danning later hosted a horror convention me and my partners held in LA called "Fright Fest" where we gave Roger Corman a Life Achievement Award in 1981. It was also James Horner's first score which Corman also reused.
Nell, the most feminine spaceship you'll find out there - not only does she have a titanic metal rack, she's a replica of the entire female uterine system! Complete with laser-ovaries!
I guess it's only fair since most space ships look like giant dongs
And a bare back like Venus.
I think I would actually *like* to have a ship like that. (playboy logo on the side for "bomber art"....)
Reverend D'Mo And she's a bitch.
*breath's heavily*
That struck me first
This is one of my most fave movies of all-time! I first saw it in the theater when it was released and have been a big fan of it ever since. Since then I have watched it dozens of times. It is pure, 80's cheesy, B movie perfection.
Right there with you.
@@GoDamnWeird for me, there was a phase when TBS started showing indie films in the 90s. This, Cherry 2000, and a bunch of other cult classics git on national TV for a while.
Robert Vaughn worked with George Peppard in the final season of the A-Team
Happy 40th anniversary to “Battle Beyond the Stars”!
Is it just me or does a James Horner score just make any film 10 times better? Rest In Peace, Mr. Horner. You are truly missed
plus it was on the movie "DeathStalker 3: and the warriors from Hell"
He made Braveheart and Titanic a little less painful. RIP.
If you listen to enough of his soundtracks you know it's his, he has a melody with a french horn he puts it into nearly all of the soundtracks he's done. That James Horner sound, he self plagiarizes himself a lot.
ua-cam.com/video/YAIIdW62Cjk/v-deo.html
@@sroberts8560 Not anymore.
Watch the Magnificent Seven remake, Horner goes full circle and features musical cues from BBTS.
Dude, I ve bing watched and still bing watching your episodes while painting my miniatures, and it's a blast, you got a new subscriber here!
I remember seeing this movie as a kid and loving the shit out of it. Despite all its cheese it's one of the few movies from that time I still have a bunch of good nostalgia for. Thanks for reviewing this and bringing back some good memories!
Same here. Saw it in a movie theatre when it came-out. Loved the Hell out of it. (The score is especially good too)
I always have a fondness for this one and that utterly insane Japanese Star Warsish move "Message From Space". Now there's one Brandon needs to sit down with!
Also, same here, saw as a kid and loved it!
I also saw this in the theater in 1980. I've always liked Battle Beyond the Stars. It's campy, but that is what gives BBTS its charm.
This movie is better than ANY of the Disney versions of Star wars.
Yea I'd be interested in a theme park ride featuring Sybil Danning
So, when does Shad start seeing creepy clowns with red balloons on the spaceship?
Some people call him Maurice!
Love your humor!
You remind me of movies I need to see again and sum up movies I'd rather not sit through.
You're the best!!!
This is the one Star Wars ripoff that doesn't follow the standard Star Wars trope. I remember feeling sad when the various mercenaries buy it, and I wanted John Saxon to DIE. This is one of my fav sci-fi films for no other reason than it's a fun movie. You forgot to mention that it has a pretty over-the-top score by then unknown James Horner--which, per the standard Roger Corman way, also gets re-used in many of his other offerings. A pretty great film that has withstood the test of time.
I wonder if Star Wars would like to pay tribute to this movie.
Anyone remember seeing Saxon's ship in Emmanuel In Space, or the Alien Factor:The Sex Files ?
It does, yet it doesn't. As Brandon points out, both movies share Kurosawa influence. Scrappy underdogs against an overwhelming enemy.
at 03:49 the two ladies sitting at the table. At the head of the table the pretty blonde actress is Marta Kristen whom played Judy Robinson in the original Lost in Space TV show.
The young actress seated on the left side end of the table is veteran character actress Julia Duffy from Wizards and Warriors and Bob Newhart's show Newhart and from TV sitcom Designing Women.
Poor Sybil Danning. If the movie doesn't want you, I'll take you.:)
You will need to Explain bro
@@bryansmith1920 It's about how all the characters are embroiled in a life-or-death struggle, and every time Saint Exmin gets involved, everybody be like: "Uhh, FFS".
Vaughn's paraphrasing his dying words in "The Magnificent Seven"
I saw this movie when it first came out. As a kid I really loved it. I liked space cowboy played by George Peppard
the king I did too.
I'm liking for the Hieronymous Bosch reference.
And they got James Horner to do the soundtrack! I never knew the budget for this film was a mere 2 million, also, it looks like the ship also has ovaries that shoot lasers, in fact the whole thing looks like a uterus. Well I guess it makes a good counterpart to the rocket ship in Flesh Gordon.
This was one of Horner's first movie scores, actually.
Wow, never knew that, he's definitely kept that signature style.
Hey Brandon, the voice of the ship is Majel Barret Roddenberry. I would recognize that voice anywhere.
I remember watching this several times as a kid. I still think it holds up pretty good.
The theme , written by James Horner, sounds like a template for his Star Trek Wrath of Khan
Red Letter Media covered 1983's "Space Raiders" and noted the same thing; all of the Horner soundtrack was clearly early drafts of the tunes he eventually used in WoK. Corman must have cut a deal for the material.
A great talent gone way too soon.
"Hopefully its a little less rapey this time" ...well unless you count the scene where the two villains at 4:46 later abduct a woman from the planet and its implied that they do rape her right before they get shot down by Robert Vaughn at 11:50. I'd say no.
I guess not showing it counts as "a little"
A kid would never have realized what was implied. This movie was definitely not for kids.
Kyros Droztamyr well, _Alien_ was pretty much about rape.
@@trollking99 As a kid watching this... I knew exactly what was going on in the other room.
@@NZBigfoot Yes; they were squeezing her boobs while she protested. I don't know what else an eight-year-old is going to imagine is happening.
The council scene always reminds me of the similar scene in Heavy Metal.
To protect. This is the pact. But when life loses its value and is taken for nought, the pact is... to avenge.
Is that the guy from The Waltons?
yup!
Richard Thomas, ladies and germs.
goodnight john boy.
goodnight chief.
I knew I recognised him from somewhere!
Battle Beyond the Stars stands out in Roger Corman's career like Ayers Rock in the Outback. A lot more money and some great hiring choices (I wonder if these Cameron and Horner chaps did anything else) and ripping off great source material really helped. The character of Cayman sets the "urbane scary looking alien dude" template that Andreas Katsulas as G'Kar in Babylon 5 would later perfect. I would have loved to be in the meeting where they were designing Nell and someone said "think quadriplegic playboy model crossed with Hammerhead Shark". Also Danning may be the one to get the teenage boys to watch but Fluegel is the one to steal your heart.
You should review Howling 2. It shows a lot more of Sybil Danning, if you know what I mean and I think you do.
sooo much Sybil tits in the howling 2
I did go through puberty in the late 70s and early 80s. Lynda Carter, Sybil Danning, Jaclyn Smith helped me "handle" puberty.
ya gotta give wardrobe credit too how that outfit kept up
Haha, nice Joe Bob imitation ;)
And get used to the song Howling by Babel because they play it...over and over...throughout the whole damn movie.
This movie was a staple of my childhood viewings. We got 3 to 4 channels, and this was played a lot on 3 of them. It has a soft spot in my heart, despite it's flaws.
The lady at 12:33 is Marta Kristen who was also Judy Robinson from original Lost In Space!
See you in space, cowboy.
Is no one going to talk about how John Boy from the Walton's is the main character?
And he's basically playing John Boy?
I actually kind of like the Southwestern Adobe feel of Space Cowboy's ship. It fits in with his theme and is aesthetically pleasing.
Funny thing was, Robert Vaughn playing the SAME character in the Magnificent Seven AND Battle Beyond the Stars.
14:37 I died at the stormtroopers and gandalf joke XD
I never seen this before, can't believe I missed it all this time. Great job as always. 😮
I LOVE this films, as Star Wars ripoffs go this is one of the best and has a lot of heart and some great characters. Also a lot of behind the scenes talent. Besides Cameron there was a script by John Sayles and a soundtrack by James Horner who was second only to Williams for big action films in a few years. Oh yeah, Corman also re-used his soundtrack more than a few times.
"Lets seal the deal by drinking some blue tampon commercial liquid", made me wake up laughing last night
Ah, Sybil Danning. I can remember fondly going in to the movie theatre a fresh faced innocent 10 year old with dreams of Star Wars in my eyes, and walking out not being able to get her strange lady lumps out of my head, then going home all dizzy and confused. Certainly gave a kickstart to my puberty.
Now I wonder that if there was a Star Wars thing based on this what kinds of characters would be involved.
I saw this as a kid on a double billing at a drive in with Star Wars. This was the 1st feature, to make sure people didn't just leave and not buy snacks.
I never noticed the ship boobs, but then I think I was about 10 at the time.
I watched star raiders the other day on Amazon and I realized that this spaceship is a reused asset, because this movie Battle beyond the stars is one that I have fond memories of for my childhood but all these movies are mixed up in my head because they reuse a lot of the assets if you look at the Wikipedia page the dude reuse things in like five different movies and that's why they're all mashed together.
I watched "Space Raiders" a few days ago and was surprised to see the same space ships from this movie. "Battle Beyond the Stars" was also a favorite when I was growing up. Thanks.
Another funny review! I think I’ll probably buy the movie on dvd or blu ray, this is gonna be the 4th time I buy a movie because of your reviews. You haven’t steered me wrong yet
I loved Battle Beyond the Stars. I seen on TV a couple of times as a kid. Eventually got the VHS and later the DVD. Although the picture quality is better on the DVD, I didn't like the widescreen because it wasn't real widescreen. They just took the full screen version and chopped the bottom and top of the picture off. But other than that, I'd definitely recommend a DVD or Blu-Ray of this movie.
After seeing John Saxon do an excellent job playing the villain in this movie, I can only imagine how great he would have been as an imperial officer in one of the Star Wars movies back then. He also could have been a jedi or a warrior too, with his experience in martial arts as we saw in Enter the Dragon. What could have been, he was the perfect age to play a senior officer or older character in one of the original trilogy Star Wars movies.
As for the movie itself, it's definitely a low budget sci-fi B movie with poor and corny dialogue quite a bit. And the costume design is fairly dated too like a Star Trek episode featuring foreign societies with ridiculous clothing. But the ship designs are quite good and varied and have that sort of Firefly feel to them, in the fact that the ships generally look unique and like they would all be constructed and designed a bit differently to fit someone's desired specifications. There are also some really good actors in this movie even with the bits of poor dated dialogue, and the music is also quite good too from James Horner. I'd enjoy seeing the ships in this movie in action with a proper budget, they have some fairly unique aesthetics to them which I feel could translate well into a bigger budget effort.
17:42 "Cobra-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-lah!!!"
I saw an arcade game game named after this movie. It was about protecting a colony from attacking forces. The game was sort of like missile command, shooting from fixed cannons as aliens swoop trying to blast through the shields of a colony in a crater. I've never seen it since or seen any game play of it on UA-cam. It must be pretty obscure to not even be somewhere on the Internet
this was once played on facebook stream screening in a RLM shitposting group and we all had so much fun but then were ultimately sad when our favorite characters ended up being shot down in the final battle. Mine was the rapey lizard man
17:11 all i heard was "hello boys... III'm baaaaack!" from Independents Day lmao
I remember seeing this in the theater when I was a kid. I walked out thinking "At least it wasn't Star Crash."
Fun fact : Robert Vaughn was also in the A-team with George Peppard. He played a black ops commander who gave the A-team their missions in the last season or two. Sadly, imo Vaughn coming into the show, through no fault of his own, was when the A-team Jumped the Shark :)
Amazingly, both THE MAN FROM UNCLE and THE A-TEAM got sillier as they went, until their final season, when they got MUCH MORE SERIOUS... and then, got cancelled in mid-season. Imagine that happening to Robert Vaughn-- TWICE! Vaughn played a real bastard on THE A-TEAM. It was so funny when, to save their own lives, they had to rescue him from an old friend of his who wanted him DEAD... played by David McCallum.
I remember seeing this movie on cable when I was a kid. LOVED it, but like others have said, I was sad when the mercenaries died, they could have killed just one or two. The theme and battle music scores are also epic!
maybe at least just one of the nestors, or one of those little twins
Oh my!! Ms. Danning how I recall those late night "Chained Heat" pause-and-toss-a-thons
"Potatoes are what we fly!", whispered the music
The weapons fire combined with Sybil Danning’s scream at 16:30 reminded me of weapons fire from Flash Gordon. 🤣
I always thought this movie was really fun despite its cheesiness and low-budget flaws. It had imaginative, charming and outright strange elements in it, and good music. Being a variation of the Seven Samurai concept also helped a great deal - I love seeing a colorful team coming together and working towards a common goal :-)
8:21 reminds me of Brutal Legend (where the Decapitation sound clip came from) where we recruit Lemmy (yes, that lemmy) and he wont help us until we mention the enemy, and says "oh you're fighitng lyonwyhte huh? why didnt you say so, i hate that bastard"
I remember this and several other of the movies you have reviewed, that used to come on Saturday nights on TNT back when they had absolutely nothing to show. On the one weekend of the month they would have every movie with the little itty bitty Asian twins. it's just good to see other people remember nice movies
Hey, that "Space Cowboy, gangster of love" joke was great. Don't let the boos get you down.
Alternative title - John Boy Saves the World!
John Boy in Spaaace!
At the time this came out there weren't many science fiction movies around or super-hero movies either. It was at the local movie theater when I was a teenager. I and a friend walked there. It was good for what it was. My friend was happy to see John-boy from the Walton. I recognized the others.
6:43 The origin of the Terran Confederacy from starcraft
Battle Beyond The Stars was an above average Roger Corman film/Star Wars ripoff not only because it had Academy Award winning director James Cameron doing the special effects, it also had frequent James Cameron collaborator and Academy Award winning composer James Horner(Aliens, Star Trek II, Titanic) doing the music, and a screenplay by Academy Award nominated screenwriter John Sayles(The Howling, Piranha, Alligator, Lone Star).
Still a better Star Wars cash in then Rebel Moon.
Fun note. Richard Thomas is a cigar smoker. I met him when working at a shop in New Orleans. He is a pretty cool, and pleasant guy.
This movie also has a really awesome soundtrack by James Horner... which incidently got stolen for the crap-fest Wizards of the Lost Kingdom, which proudly proclaims its James Horner soundtrack, of which absolutely none of it was written for the movie, simply being stolen from other movies Horner composed music for.
The soundtrack reminds me a lot of Star Trek II's soundtrack. Not surprising considering they were both composed by James Horner.
I think thats mostly because, like a lot of movie composers, Horner has a particular style that he tends to always fall back to and it is largely for this reason that specific composers will get hired to work on certain movies.
To be fair Wizards of the Lost Kingdom was also produced by Rodger Corman so the music was stolen but reused/recycled. Corman did that a _lot._
They also added some of his Corman scores to the movie Raptor, which featured stock footage from all 3 Carnosaur movies.
This was also one of the late James Horner's earliest film scores.
Wow! Another of my life long friends! Saw this as a kid back in 1980 and its one of those films that has always stayed with me. Production values are very good for a B movie as are the performances from a good cast. Music by Horner is especially good as is the production design by one James Cameron. They wanted to do a space version of Seven samurai/Magnificent seven and they didn't flinch from giving it that desolate, existential edge which makes it a satisfying but rather depressing watch. All you have to do now is cover 'The Humanoid' and 'Buck Rogers in the 25th century' and I'll have the set!
Good video! Man you had me laughing! I'm actually doubly glad I this goofy space battle flick, way back in the day.
Strangely, for some reason I don't think I even noticed that the MC space ship so "well endowed". I guess I was still kind of innocent in my youth. Too bad that innocence got murderraped by the 80s and subsequent years😅 Anyway, thanks for one fun video!
Still a better sci-fi remake of Seven Samurai than Rebel Moon.
I'm surprised there weren't any John-Boy jokes!
Hmm, based on the Seven Samurai, eh? That would mean Syble Danning is playing Kikuchiyo, Toshiro Mifune's character.
I actually watched this one as a kid. And I like it. I knew at the time it was no Star Wars, but it was still fun.
I always thought the ship with boobs reminded of a moose sitting on the ground with its legs under it.
Remember seeing this on TV as a little kid one lazy afternoon. Now I have to hunt it up again!
Michael Martin
It’s available on Blu-Ray and DVD.
Wow this is very good for a remake/knock off
Saw this at the drive in. Many moons ago. Loved it.
R.I.P. Roger Corman
Shad's ship look like a Naboo Starfighter from episode 1 and Sedor's ship is a weird mix of a Correllian Corvette and an Imperial Star Destroyer. (The front and the engines are from the Corvette and the middle is from the Star Destroyer, including the hangar bay on the bottom.)
I caught this movie more than any other there's one Exchange
What do we do with the food
Bury it with him that was the deal a warm meal and a place to hide
That is the most badass thing I've ever seen John Boy say
I can no longer find the article that discusses this. So I will just say, rumor has it that sci-fi/erotic artist Hajime Sorayama drew up the original design for Nell. It seems he was approached to design the title space craft and only did it if they allowed him to give it certain endowments.
Watched this a few times back in the 80s (USA - UP all Night!) and just re-watched it about a month ago. You failed to mention that the woman George Peppard was trying to charm was Marta Kristen from Lost in Space.
MrAlumni72 I miss USA UP all night. Especially the goofy hosts.
Wow, you're right! How could I not notice that. I always thought she looked familiar, but I never made the connection.
And now we have Rebel Moon
Never noticed the flag on the ship. That makes this even better.
Argus 1:
@@argus0118 Easy when you can fly mach 2 plus.
@@cipherthedemonlord8057 XD Yo buddy you getting ace combat 7?
2:15 This ship is mixture/fusioned between a Star Destroyer and Tantive IV.
I saw this movie when it first came out in the 80's (damn, I'm old) and it was love at first sight. I wish someone would remake it. Oh and by the way, James Cameron was part of a team of special effects people who worked on this movie. James didn't do all of it, but, his biggest contribution was...spaceship boobies.
I think Disney took the idea of every character getting killed and made "rogue one" out of this.
This movie would be complete if one of the enemy ships shot space jizz on Nell's ship knockers.
Considering this is a Roger Corman film, I'm surprised that wasn't in the movie.
If there's only one movie I would ever want a prequel for, or several prequels for, it's this one. There were plenty of opportunities with all the mercenaries, Sador, Zed and Dr. Hephaestus. It's really a shame no one has thought of this yet.
I remember being really bummed out about the ending... Felt more bitter than sweet.