Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) User Reviews

Seven Samurai in Space

[SnoopyStyle · 6/10 · 15 March 2015]

Space tyrant Sador (John Saxon) threatens the pacifist defenseless agricultural planet of Akir with his weapon Stellar Converter. He pledges to return after the harvest in seven risings of their sun as the planet's new master. The elders send young Shad (Richard Thomas) to find mercenaries willing to fight for limited wealth rewards. He recruits Nanelia (Darlanne Fluegel) escaping from her father in her weaponless ship, Space Cowboy from earth (George Peppard) whose customer has just been destroyed by Sador, rich assassin Gelt (Robert Vaughn) looking for a friendly harbor, a Valkyrie named Saint-Exmin (Sybil Danning) looking to prove herself in battle in her tiny ship, five telepathic alien clones from a single consciousness called Nestor and a reptilian slaver named Cayman looking for revenge.

It's cheap Roger Corman production with the bones of the great 'Seven Samurai' and the energetic F/X work of a newcomer named James Cameron. There is definitely cheesy goodness in this. It's a fun space thrill ride. There are some good performances. The writing isn't bad. The production is half cheese and half fun adventure. It all adds up to a fun competent 'Star Wars' inspired B-movie.

As good now as it was then ... but was it good ?

[mungflesh · 6/10 · 24 October 2011]

Let's pretend we've never heard of Roger Corman nor The Magnificent Seven etc.

As a kid, that was me. I heard about this movie through my friends, when I was about 9 or 10. To us, this was another great space epic, along the lines of Star Wars. It had good effects, plenty of laser blasts and bad guy with a massive ship that could destroy planets. Awesome!

Many years later, I bought this on DVD and, to my pleasant surprise, found that it hadn't aged too badly. The low budget is very apparent but the movie is slickly edited such that it perhaps feels richer that it should. This is however it's biggest drawback because the character development is poor in places and the stars play second-fiddle to the ships and the costumes they inhabit. Gelt and Space Cowboy are perhaps the most fleshed-out of the pack, the remainder either being weak or there to make up the numbers.

The true star of the show is James Horner. It's a great score and all the best moments of Star Trek 2 are audible here first.

It's an inventive film, even if the invention is mainly facsimile, and an entertaining one. In the archives of sci-fi, there's no contest between this and its obvious "raison d'être" influence, as to which film is the better, but it's a noteworthy addition from the same era, what I consider to be the golden-age of special effects.

Roger Corman's MAGNIFICENT SEVEN in Space...

[cariart · 25 October 2003]

BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS, Roger Corman's 'take' of the STAR WARS saga, is a film justly recognized as a cult classic. Shot in his new studio ("The paint was still wet," Corman has joked), in just five weeks, on a budget that would have paid for one of George Lucas' effects, the end result is proof that with the right talent, anything is possible!

A remarkable array of future industry giants participated in the creation of the film; the screenplay was co-written by John Sayles, whose breakthrough film as a maverick writer/director, RETURN OF THE SECAUCUS 7, would be released the same year...young model builder James Cameron impressed Corman so much that he was promoted to Art Director for the film, and it would be the first step in a career that led to TERMINATOR, ALIENS, and eventually, the most Oscar-honored film since BEN-HUR, TITANIC...James Horner, with only three prior film credits, gave Corman the STAR WARS-quality music he wanted, with an orchestra a fraction of the size of John Williams' London Philharmonic; Horner would eventually score two STAR TREK films, and a wide variety of other 'prestige' projects, culminating with two Oscars for TITANIC, and a place as one of America's finest film composers. BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS would have a 'look' and a 'sound' unlike any 'B'-movie ever made.

Based on Akira Kurosawa's THE SEVEN SAMURAI (which was also the source for the classic western, THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN), Sayles tried to keep the film as faithful to the original as possible (a tiny, defenseless village hires warriors to defend them against a band of outlaws), even naming the beleaguered people the Akira, as a homage to the director. As warriors from different races ally to face down the nearly invincible forces of Sador (veteran actor John Saxon), Corman paid tribute to John Sturges' western, as well, casting Robert Vaughn in virtually the same role as he'd played in THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN. Other terrific actors round out the cast; Richard Thomas, still appearing in 'The Waltons' at the time, played young Shad, the film's central character; George Peppard, who was about to achieve a MAJOR career resurgence with 'The A-Team', became boozy Earthman 'Cowboy'; 'B'-movie queen Sybil Danning portrayed Valkyrie-like Saint-Exmin; veteran TV and film 'tough guy' Morgan Woodward was wonderful, if unrecognizable as Cayman of the Lambda Zone; and Darlanne Fluegel, beginning a long career as a popular character actress, was cast as Shad's love, Nanelia. Corman then cast two long-time friends and Hollywood legends in cameo roles; Jeff Corey as blind Zed, who encourages the Akira to fight; and 89-year old Sam Jaffe as the robotics expert who introduces Shad to Nanelia.

A note about director Jimmy T. Murakami...a veteran animator, BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS marked his directorial debut, and he does an exceptionally good job, considering his budget restraints. After working on HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP, he married an Irish girl and settled in Europe, limiting his subsequent film career to an occasional project that interested him. Roger Corman's 'family' of filmmakers were NEVER dull...

While some of the FX are shaky, the overall production is very impressive, and holds up remarkably well, today. Roger Corman has called BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS one of his favorite films, and he has every right to be proud...the movie is a terrific SF adventure!

Definitely an under-appreciated film

[Mister-6 · 7/10 · 7 October 1998]

Of all the post "Star Wars" films, this one is decidedly the best of its ilk. The dependable storyline, stalwart acting and sometimes humorous special effects (LOVE the female-designed spaceship!) all make for an entertaining film. For all the flak it has received (even getting a "Dog of the Week" label from Siskel and Ebert upon its initial release), it has for all intents and purposes kept itself in the memories of all who have seen it and is most definitely a fantasy that is worthy of seeing again and again.

Help us, John Boy, you're our only hope!

[JoeB131 · 3/10 · 13 June 2007]

This movie was made in 1980, during the height of the popularity of Star Wars and the revival of Star Trek, when anyone could shop a Science Fiction concept past a major studio and not get laughed out the door.

Lo and behold, the king of cheesy movies, Roger Corman, did exactly that in this film, and actually did it with a fairly major budget. I mean, he had stars in this you've actually heard of, like John Saxon and George Peppard and Robert Vaughn. One can almost imagine the pitch. "Well, it's like the Seven Samurai. Oh, wait, that's Japanese, you probably never saw that. Okay, it's like the Maginficent Seven. A planet is threatened by bad guys and they recruit an unlikely crew of hired guns to defend them."

So the bad guys lead by John Saxon threaten this peaceful planet, and a wise old mentor sends out Richard Thomas (aka John Boy Walton) to recruit a bunch of mercenaries (no doubt, because Mark Hamill had better things to do at that time), including Robert Vaughn of original Magnificent Seven fame, and George Peppard, who continued his downward spiral as an actor that would eventually lead him to star in "The A-Team". Also included is Sybil Danning, queen of B-movies, who at least showed enormous restraint and kept her clothes on for the whole movie.

The space battle scenes might be familiar to aficionados of low-rent Science fiction films. That because old Roger, that sly dog, recouped some of his production costs by selling the FX shots to a lot of other B-list movies, and I think one or two porn films. If you think you've seen these shots before, just remember, in this film, THEY ALMOST MAKE SENSE.

There were a lot of interesting SF concepts pitched in this film, such as an alien with collective intelligence, aliens capable of storing radiant energy, a young woman raised entirely by androids, and a few others. Unfortunately, Roger takes no time to dwell on any of them.

Not to say that this film is all bad. It's just that we've seen better. Better acting, better special effects, better concepts.

Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven in Space

[claudio_carvalho · 6/10 · 28 October 2016]

The evil tyrant Sador (John Saxon) and his army of the mutants Malmori threatens the peaceful Akira farmers of the planet Akir with his Stellar Converter weapon and tells that he will return to collect their harvest. The former Akira warrior Zed (Jeff Corey) advises that they should hire mercenaries to protect them from Sador and offers his spaceship to seek them out. However, the Akira can only pay with food and lodging. The young Shad (Richard Thomas) offers to pilot the ship with the computer Nell to look for mercenaries. He meets Dr. Hephaestus (Sam Jaffe) and his beautiful daughter Nanelia (Darlanne Fluegel) in a space station where he unsuccessfully tries to find weapon. Nanelia comes with Shad and he teams up with the earthling Cowboy (George Peppard), who was going to deliver weapons to a planet that was destroyed by Sador and offers to give them to Shad. Then he meets five clones that share the mind of one entity called Nestor that join him. Shad also recruits the lonely and wealthy assassin Gelt (Robert Vaughn) that accepts the proposed payment. Then the sexy and annoying Valkyrie warrior St. Exmin (Sybil Danning) joins the group since she wants to battle. Shad also recruits Cayman (Morgan Woodward) that wants to kill Sador and does not require any payment. They return to Akir and Sador also returns to attack the planet. Who will win the battle?

"Battle Beyond the Stars" is an enjoyable cult movie with a story based on "Seven Samurai" and its remake "The Magnificent Seven" but in space. Inclusive the Akira is a tribute to Akira Kurosawa. "Battle Beyond the Stars" reuses material from other films ("Space Raiders", "Starquest II", "Dead Space" and "Bachelor Party"); the acting is only reasonable; and the special effects, sets and costumes are poor. But who cares? My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Mercenários das Galáxias" ("Mercenaries of the Galaxies")

Battle Beyond the Stars: Better concept than movie

[Platypuschow · 3/10 · 26 August 2018]

I came across this during a binge of all the Seven Samurai (1954) remakes and was really quite elated to find something this different from the original content.

Unlike many of the other remakes this does resemble the original and I can to an extent appreciate that it is. Trouble is, in this guys opinion it's really not very good at all.

With an all star cast including Richard "John Boy Walton" Thomas, George "A-Team" Peppard, Robert "Everything" Vaughn and John "Nightmare on Elm Street" Saxon. Truth be told seeing this, the concept and the clear budget I was really expecting something special here.

It tells the story of an evil warlord who threatens to destroy a planet and it's people if they don't yield to him. A citizen sets out on a quest to find mercenaries to help combat the warlord which includes a wacky array of characters from a cowboy to a lizard man to a valkyrie to little people who communicate through temprature.

All the stars aligned here to make a truly fantastic movie, so why is it so unashamably bad?

It has poor structure, it isn't engaging, it has messy characterization. It's just an absolute mess of a painting, but made with the highest quality paint.

The Good:

Great cast

Solid concept

The Bad:

Very dated

Disjointed

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Ageism is rife in space

Even in space, people can't see that the confederate flag is inappropriate

Smoking is the worst thing in the world

This was made after star wars. It seems to belong decades before

[flowirin · 4/10 · 4 July 2020]

Maybe if Star Wars did not exist, this low budget, low effort, badly acted and badly shot failure of a movie wouldn't seem as godawful, but I doubt it. The miniatures are nice, and rewatching 40 years later, turns out that I remembered the 'face' of the 'hero's' ship, so that part of the design worked well. But then the hero's ship looks like a dual membered cock and balls. What were they thinking? They obviously reference Star Wars (which seems ever more masterful in comparison) and there's one funny moment, but I think it was a directorial mistake, as It just reminds you how shallow and inept this is by comparison. I'm not sure there are any redeeming features, tbh. Okay, maybe the ships. They are pretty cool and varied. Even so, the plot and interiors make space1999 look good in comparison.

Seven Samurai in Space

[raegan_butcher · 10/10 · 16 July 2006]

John Sayles was asked by Roger Corman to adapt The Seven Samurai into a sci fi picture and the result is this delightfully inventive tongue-in-cheek romp.

What is most enjoyable to me about the film is the fact that every mercenary hired by the peaceful "villagers" has a distinct personality and style and their motivations clearly defined. George Peppard, as the only human among them, is laid back and charming. Morgan Woodward seems to be having a grand old time playing the vengeful lizard-man--dig his gonzo war-cry during the climactic battle! Robert Vaughn does seem a bit bored but he effectively communicates his character's unpleasant coldness. Sybill Danning simply has one of the most stunning bodies to ever be stuffed into a styrofoam viking costume, even if she can't act. Add to these characters two elfin aliens who communicate thru heat (the Kelvin, wink, wink) and a troupe of what looks like Mimes called "Nestor" who operate sort of like the collectivist Borg from Star Trek and in disposition seem to anticipate the infectious optimism and curiosity of Mr Data as well.When first introduced they explain, "We believe you are seeking mercenaries for an adventure. We would like to participate." The costumes, sets and spfx are quite striking though obviously done on a low budget but that hardly detracts from the fun. Special mention must be made of John Saxon who, as the evil scourge of the galaxy Lord Sador, grabs his opportunity to chew the scenery with amusing gusto. Check the sequence where he gets to enact what must be every actors dream since Dr Strangelove: to have a battle with his own rebellious arm! He plays it all-out, with just the right mix of comic book theatrics and menacing humor. It is sometimes just enjoyable to watch veteran actors cut loose and have a good time, the spirit is infectious, as it certainly is with this film. Fun for the whole family as well as bonged-out college students and other usually disparaging types.

"I will return in seven risings."

[utgard14 · 6/10 · 23 February 2014]

John Boy from the Waltons goes out and recruits mercenaries to help fight off an evil space warlord. Among those he gets to help are the A-Team's Hannibal, the bad guy from Superman III, and Stirba the werewolf bitch. It's a fun cast. Roger Corman's sci-fi remake of Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven is also the best Star Wars knockoff of the many that came out in the late '70s and early '80s. While many have called this movie cheap-looking, it's actually fairly impressive for a Corman production. He would reuse these sets and some footage for future crappier low-budgeters. This is a fun sci-fi adventure movie that should entertain you if you don't take it all so seriously.

Brittle Beyond Belief

[mk57 · 1/10 · 15 March 2014]

This is a truly dreadful film, actors ( ha ) leaving massive pauses between dialogue, awful special effects and a risible script. So WHAT that this pile of rubbish had a limited budget....That's no excuse for ridiculous performances, totally unbelievable characterisations and dialogue. For all that, it will probably attain cult status for BEING so bad. John Boy's spacecraft is shaped like a 3D womb, very bizarre I must say !

The plot involves trouble in the form of John Saxon ( he of Enter the Dragon alongside Bruce Lee ) a bully boy, planet stealer/destroyer throwing his weight around. Unless the planet surrenders to him within one week, he will return to set it on fire......making you wonder what's the point. John Boy, a human amongst androids, picks himself to save the planet by recruiting anyone who can fight, seeing as he doesn't like to. Escaping from the under threat planet, he meets up with enough to recreate The Magnificent Seven ( including a bored looking and space weary Robert Vaughan who WAS in that film too )....The pacing of BBtS is all over the place but mainly painfully S-L-O-W......

I recommend avoiding this altogether unless you want to spend 104 minutes with your jaw on your chest from shock at how this ever got to be made or from yawning your way through it......There is a third way of watching this but it entails you WANTING it to be as bad as possible....in which case, you will NOT be disappointed.

Lotta bang for little bucks

[jaywolfenstien · 12 October 2004]

Now this is interesting. The movie is another producer's spin on Star Wars; Star Wars obviously being made by George Lucas. The name 'George Lucas' being synonymous with 'epic-scale effects budget.' Battle Beyond the Stars was produced by Roger Corman. The name 'Roger Corman' being synonymous with 'shoe-string budget.'

Let me break from my usual critique style to go over some of the plot - Sador (John Saxon) feels the need to conquer, and he's so powerful that he decides to conquer an essentially helpless (not to mention useless) civilization. But instead of conquering, he courteously shows up to conveniently schedule his conquest a week from now in case they want to mount some sort of defense. (Where's Arnold when you need him? 'I'll be back!')

In response, Shad takes a road trip (space trip?) in Nell the only ship on the planet to round up some misfits (mercenaries--same thing) who happen to be in the neighborhood. Everyone is interestingly (clichély) unique and has their own reasons for wanting to fight, not to mention the actors have a wide range of performances ranging from sliced ham to frighteningly Shakespearian seriousness. And, ah to hell with it, you get the idea. Point is, I have every reason to really hate the plot, hate the characters (Good God, I've hated characters for much much less), hate this movie . . . but I dunno, I don't really mind it.

Through all its narrative faults, Battle Beyond the Stars happens to hit the right goofball mixture of elements from a surprisingly good score by young 'Jamie Horner' to notably weird spaceships and decent effects (for an early 80s low-budget flick) to wacky and tame characters that somehow summons a funky B-movie charm. For the life of me, I can't hate this movie despite the plot that begs me to bash it to oblivion with the Stellar Converter.

The spaceship, Nell, proved to be the highpoint of the film . . . not because of the ship's design, rather because of its personality (no really.)

I've always wanted to see a spaceship with an attitude (the Star Trek equivalent of Kit from Knight Rider?) A perfect counterpoint to the naivety of Shad, flawlessly delivered by Richard Thomas. If I weren't constantly laughing at the characters cluelessness, I'd want to slap that kid around, and I'd sure as hell wouldn't want to charge him with saving my planet. I'd like to die with my dignity, thank you.

Battle Beyond the Stars has a number of positive attributes (especially considering the budget and experience of most people involved on the film at the time), it has a number of reasons to be proud, and it most definitely has a number of charms that surpass its truckload of flaws. I consider Battle Beyond the Stars the spending benchmark for all sci-fi flicks. I mean, if Corman can entertain me with Hollywood pocket change, Lucas, the Wachowskis, and the other heavy spenders better blow my socks off with their ungodly sized budgets . . .

Trying to catch the future without the skills for it

[akicork · 1/10 · 8 September 2019]

When my son was young, we would celebrate his Birthday by going (him and me, not his mum) each year to a film of his choice. For this one, he was thirteen. It was the last time we did it. We had had a great day the year before, with popcorn and frankfurters, watching Clash of the Titans - as it turned out, a farewell to Ray Harryhausen as Special Effects Magician, as his art was overwhelmed by the computer techniques developed by Lucasfilm for Star Wars. I have only ever walked out of two theatrical performances in my life. The first was a presentation of a work by Aristophanes during the Edinburgh Festival sometime (I think) in the 1960s. My father and I agreed that we could take no more, and left. The second was this execrable film - my son and I agreed that we could take no more, and left. That's art.

I see these ships everywhere

[joelhedge · 3/10 · 9 June 2008]

Who can forget that spaceship flown by "Shad" (Richard Walton). It looked like a uterus and ovaries! They must have invested in having many ship designs for this movie. I have seen the same ships in so many other low-budget movies. I think the footage of the spaceship exteriors is getting licensed. I just saw them in "Last Exit to Earth" (1996). It is funny to see the same footage represent good guys in one movie and then bad guys in another movie. All of them are sub par but must be loved for the earnest messes they are. Right when Science Fiction films were becoming big budget blockbusters "Battle Beyond the Stars" was the answer no one asked for. This movie has a shock value derived from it's schlock value. This movie would have been forgotten if it weren't so amateurish that it was available cheap for endless showings on cheap cable channels. I ought to watch it again.

Better than you may think

[pumaye · 7/10 · 14 August 2003]

Good variation on the Star Wars franchise, made in the aftermath of the first movie of the series, this Corman production - one of his finest - is almost a remake of the Magnificent Seven, but it is well-made on a limited budget, full of great ideas about the different alien races, with good characterization and several fine lines for the various protagonists. Fun, fun, fun

If poop could come in the form of a movie...

[morten-76962 · 1/10 · 8 August 2019]

If poop could come in the form of a movie.....this would be a turd that came out after someone has been drinking and eating fast food every day for 6 months!

So cheesy.....no funny.....so Roger Corman.

[zoefan-97714 · 7/10 · 20 March 2017]

Although i am not the biggest fan of Roger Corman even i have some films of his i like...Piranha is one....and this is the other,

"Battle Beyond the Stars"is a classic nineteen eighties cheese-fest and a quite brilliant "Star Wars" rip-off.

Not only did he get a fine cast together(Richard Thomas,John Saxon,Robert Vaughn,Sybil Danning and George Peppard)he also got a then un-known film score composer to score the film....the name of the composer?....the late and sadly missed James Horner. This might have been his film first film score but it's a real cracker.

In short....cheesy?Yes Fun?you bet!

Not cheesy.

[Spleen · 2/10 · 31 July 1999]

This film is not cheese. `Flash Gordon' was cheese (and very tasty cheese, too). This film is a kind of imitation cheese. It's made from the same substance that goes into those `cheese' flavoured snacks that have never so much as been in the same room as real cheese in their lives. The substances from which this film was made don't even have names - at least, not English names, although I presume there is a way of describing them in chemical notation.

I guess what I am trying to express is that everything here leaves a bitter, inorganic aftertaste. `After' taste, my foot: it makes the very surface of my tongue cringe even as I watch it. I long to be looking at something else. And the score ...! James Horner leapt to prominence as a result of it, and this puzzles me. The indescribably vile music that follows the cowboy character around wherever he goes is like a concentrated dose of factory-made raspberry substitute.

No doubt the makers knew that they were making something bad. Does this excuse them? Of course not: if anything it makes their actions worse. Let me, though, knock down one or two of the makeshift defences usually constructed for this type of movie. If is NOT a cheaply made film that nonetheless looks good. As I have intimated several times it looks surpassingly bad. The art direction is terrible. Neither sets nor costumes nor props look like they were worth the effort of constructing - they look deeply ugly, and there is an end of it. The world created is neither interesting nor, in any sense whatsoever, poetic. There is no beauty even behind the scenes TO shine through the lousy production design; so of course none does. I struggle to think of a single redeeming feature. No doubt the actors do their best under trying circumstances, but the same could be said of a man who's just been thrown into the lion's den.

Oh Johnny Boy, the cheese, the cheese is calling......

[Rob_Taylor · 6/10 · 24 December 2002]

I'll try and summarize this terrible, yet good, movie briefly.

Seven Samurai in Space. Memorable moments such as a spaceship with tits and Sybil Danning with even bigger tits. She was always lying on her back a lot, too.....

Robert Vaughan playing an identical character to his role in The Magnificent Seven. John Saxon hamming it up as Sador, the villain. Some guy in a lizard suit. Some guys in white suits. A couple of midgets/kids in silver suits that look like escapees from a kid's road safety advert. George Peppard playing Hannibal the cowboy.

Lots of special effects, most of which were re-used so often in subsequent films/series that they must have paid for themselves. Oh yeah, and the ultimate in unbelievability....John Boy Walton as the main lead/hero. That's like getting Lindsey Lohan to lecture on why drinking to excess is a bad idea.

So bad, it's good.

A night to remember, with apologies to Walter Lord

[ScottFM1 · 1/10 · 9 June 2002]

I can recall the screening of this film like no other. I was 18 and in love with Sci-fi, I took my then girlfriend to see the movie and she was intrigued to see it having the hype of Star Wars and a new Star Trek film of the past few years be such a part of HS years. So here I am in the theater watching 'Jon-boy' get his characters inspiration from several walnuts telling him to save the universe. After about 45 minutes I could not take it anymore and we walked out. Yes, this is the first movie I ever walked out on! A memorable movie for that fact alone. Do pass this one up!

Don't take it seriously and you gonna have fun.

[badoli · 6/10 · 29 August 2010]

In the wake of Star Wars a lot of movies were produced trying to score on the popularity of sci-fi at the time. Eager studios surprised by the success of the George Lucas movies were all too glad to pour money into these productions for the hope of some fast bucks.

"Battle Beyond the Stars" even goes so far to mimic the title of it's role model, along with several spaceship designs. To mix up the stars'n'lasers-theme they throw in a "seven samurai"-plot, several known actors and a playmate sex bomb as the cherry on top. Alas, the special effects pale in comparison, the design is visibly inferior and the story barely scrapes the surface.

Yet to say that the movie is a plain ripoff wouldn't do it right. There are some funny ideas, interesting characters and some humorous scenes, that can surely be enjoyed. So if you refrain from comparing it with the Star Wars series, you surely can have a fun time here.

Only 2 good things about this film... James Cameron's beautiful sets, and a ship with tits. Well, I guess that's 3 things...

[lathe-of-heaven · 4/10 · 29 January 2024]

Honestly, that's it...

Period.

End of line.

It's so funny the EXTREME contrast of the sets, ships, and sometimes breathtaking design vs. The absolutely HORRIBLE dialog and action.

I mean, that ship with tits... Great idea! Seriously hilarious, if there is such a thing.

I don't know, I'm thinking that if you simply removed all the hideous dialog (especially the computers painfully annoying speech) and just went with the visuals, kind of a la '2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY' where you would have long stretches with just ships flying around and stunning vistas and almost no dialog for long periods of time. It's like if just MAYBE they had gone the more 'Artistic' route and dumped about 90% of the dialog, then you actually might have had something at least visually watchable and mildly, VERY mildly entertaining (even that would be a stretch...)

But hey, a ship with tits... You gotta love it...

This ain't "Star Wars" but it's not too bad.

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 25 December 2015]

While the budget of this Roger Corman production is greater than his usual, it it still far less than a big-time sci-fi production of the era. For example, if you watch any of the three original "Star Wars" films, they are light years ahead of "Battle Beyond the Stars" when it comes to special effects. Clearly, it cannot keep up with these top-notch movies. But, if you accept that its effects are a bit cheesy and this doesn't bother you, the film is surprisingly enjoyable.

Richard Thomas stars as an alien living on a very peaceful planet. They are so peaceful when an intergalactic baddie threatens to destroy them, his people don't have the first idea about how to fight back and protect themselves. So, he goes on a mission to hire fighters who will protect them....and he comes up with a rag-tag group of heroes. Can these assorted heroes somehow fight back against this baddie and ignore, at least temporarily, Sybil Danning and her ever-present and very noticeable cleavage?!

The film offers quite a few B-list actors--a surprising number. In fact, apparently that is where they spent most of the money for the film hiring the likes of George Peppard, Robert Vaughn and the like. Overall, this is probably a film more for kids and die-hard sci-fi fans but it's reasonably entertaining and offers a few interesting characters.

It's niche so it has limited appeal

[ChrisinDesMoines · 5/10 · 31 January 2021]

Unless you've been alive for about a half a century it's hard to imagine what life was like pre Star Wars and the impact that it had on cinema. Sure, there was some award winning Sci-fi flicks like 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes that got lots of critical attention and if you were a true Sci-Fi fanatic you knew about Silent Running, The Day the Earth Stood Still and Forbidden Planet but most Sci-fi fare was little on intellect and large on rubber monster suits.

After Star Wars though, Hollywood tried desperately to cash in on the Space Opera craze and as a result we got movies like Battle Beyond the Stars.

If you read the description and think it sounds familiar that's because it is. It's a remake of the Magnificent Seven which is in itself a remake of Seven Samurai and even Pixar's A Bug's Life which would come almost two decades later used this same plot. If you think it's odd to take a "Western" story and apply it to a Sci-fi movie, its not as crazy as you would think. Some of the scenes from Star Wars was inspired from several War and Western genre movies, most notably the scene when Luke rides up onto his farm and see's that its been attacked and burned down was taken almost shot by shot from the movie "The Searchers" so it shouldn't be much of a surprise that a classic western film was used as an inspiration for a Science Fiction movie.

This film has gained itself a bit of a cult following and its not hard to understand why. Most of the main characters were well known actors in their day. Richard Thomas was on the popular TV show The Waltons, Robert Vaughn was himself a well known actor, even playing the exact same role in Battle Beyond the Stars as he did in the 1960's Magnificent Seven while John Saxon was a teenage heartthrob in the 50's and George Peppard was in several well known movies in the 60's and was about to hit it big on the popular TV show The A-Team playing the team leader Hannibal Smith. Of course not all of the actors were as well known, or as good, some of the acting is subpar, but in some ways that actually helps play into its "cult movie" status.

As an avid Sci-fi fan and even as a growing Western fan, I can say that I'm glad I watched it on Roku the other day. Attempts to watch it in the past has always resulted in interruptions for some odd reason, including during my youth in the mid to late 80s when it was shown on Cinemax, so seeing it available with VOD made it much easier to ensure that I could watch it all the way through this time.

This movie is going to have a very niche audience, mostly those who like to watch Science Fiction where there's space battles and those who have a taste for low budget cult status films, the special effects are okay but haven't aged well but that all plays into the well earned cult film status. If you are one of those individuals then grab a bowl of popcorn, fill up a giant cup with soda, kick back in the recliner and enjoy the movie. If you're a fan of any of the actors then you'll likely enjoy it, their acting is just as good here as you would find in previous or later movies. If you're interested in watching a remake of Seven Samurai or The Magnificent Seven, forget it. Watch A Bug's Life instead, you'll enjoy it more.

Beyond Star (Wars)

[kosmasp · 6/10 · 1 June 2020]

Roger Corman is a very well known producer - to any film afficionado that is. He made a lot of low budget movies and he also helped a lot of now very well established directors. The art director here? James Cameron ... just to name one person. And he is a very important one. This may be some peoples favorite over Star Wars - but it had nowhere near the budget.

So while this also has some fine actors in it and it does try to have an original story (though does lean in to steal/borrow from foreign cultures and other things), it will depend on your suspension of disbelief. This is not a great movie, but it can be a fun one (especially with some of the characters and some of the dialog - like the tasting of hot dog to name one). Bits and pieces and quite funny overall, if you let it.