Three laughs: Starcrash

It is hard to rate some trashy films. Films can be really good entertainment in spite of the quality of the filmmaking. In fact, it might be even harder to create unique trash that keeps surprising you than most "quality" films with which you know what you are going to get. It certainly is an even better pleasure to watvh them. My friend says that he knows a trash film is worth something if it gets three laughs out of me. I mean proper, good belly laughs when you just can't believe what the film is showing to you, scene after scene. That's as good a rating as any for these movies. Any film that has these three laughs has a special place in my heart.

Three Laughs Case #12:
Starcrash (Italy, 1979)
Director: Luigi Cozzi (as Lewis Coates)

I was surprised I had never written anything about this Star Wars ripoff in this blog, since I have loved it for years and years. Luigi Cozzi is a director very prone for the Three laughs -treatment, since many of his movies are bursting with weird ideas and their so-so realization. I guess he would have wanted to make adventure and peplum films like Jason and the Argonauts, to which there is an obvious "tribute" or two in this film as well.

The lovely Caroline Munro plays Stella Star, a skimpily-clad intergalactic outlaw, that gets caught up in a major war between good and evil. If Star is a gender-swapped Han Solo, then the equivalent of Princess Leia is played by none other than David Hasselhoff as a missing space prince whose absence kicks off the plot. Some of the other most memorable of the film's characters include a whiny chauvenistic Southern police robot L and Maniac actor Joe Spinell as the latex-clad and overplaying baddie Zarth Arn. Many of the characters flip their allegiances multiple times.

The film had a rocky and sped-up production and as such, it's good to marvel how good-looking the miniatures and sets are. They serve their daydream-like quality. I think the film works on multiple levels. If you showed this to a small child, they might not realize how cheesy the acting is and how incomprehensible the plot. They would be just excited that Cozzi throws a weird scenario after another, even if at points the slow miniature shots last for quite a bit too long.



Three laughs (SPOILERS):

1. They somehow tricked Christopher Plummer into starring as the Emperor of the Galaxy in this. His performance is something to behold. I can't tell if he's drunk or just holding the entire production in huge contempt. He does chew the scenery, and I really can't tell if he's trying his hardest or just amusing himself until he gets his paycheck. But he does deliver lines such as: "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!"

2. As the characters bumble out of the fire and into the frying pan, it's impossible not to laugh when L exclaims "Look, Amazons on horseback!"  Their horses have been painted pink and have some sort of lizard masks on them. What follows is a rather amazing girl-on-amazons fight scene. The film also has giant robots, killer cavemen and sword-fighting stop motion statues.

3. One revealation shows that one character can see into the future. When asked why he didn't help out with this ability before, he answers, "You would've tried to change the future. And changing the future is against the law!" Can't argue with that.