REVIEW
With a cast headed by the Oscar-nominated Christopher Plummer, Bond beauty Caroline Munro, Marjoe Gortner (a former child evangelist-turned actor turned “reality” star), Godfather star Joe Spinell and David “The Hoff” Hasselhoff, not to mention music composed by the late, great John Barry, it does seem inconceivable that such a production could fail so miserably. Perhaps entertaining for all the wrong reasons, Italian-born Luigi Cozzi’s Starcrash (who’s next feature, another sci-fi effort, was the one-time “video nasty” Contamination) produced this ‘shaky’ piece of sci-fi flotsam, literally hot on the heels of Star Wars’ success. With a tight budget, most of which lining the pockets of its cast, filming began with haste in November 1977, to produce “A Sci-Fi adventure beyond your wildest dreams” of which this certainly was not.
Despite its mega- tight budget constraints, which prevented Ms. Munro, who did all her own stunts, from recording her voice for the English-dubbed version, as flying her to Italy was thought to be too expensive. Contrastingly, Plummer’s salary was reported to be $30,000, which wasn’t bad considering he completed all his scenes in a single day!
Originally awarded an uncut ‘A’ certificate, Starcrash was handled by New World Films Ltd, whom also spearheaded Roger Corman’s Deathsport, Anthony Page’s I Never Promised You a Rose Garden and Riding Tall – the latter, directed by one-time filmmaker Patrick J. Murphy, inexplicably required BBFC cuts.
Starcrash’ first appearance on tape was by VIPCO, who unveiled the film in January 1981, alongside Val Guest’s The Diamond Mercenaries and Roger Vadim’s erotic French drama, When a Woman is in Love. With production values that ranged from cheap-looking and shaky sets to spaceship models that appeared to be crafted from various household items, Starcrash was a technical disaster. Despite its many faults however, Cozzi’s film certainly wasn’t without its fans, and the film’s re-emergence on tape, this time in 1987 by Video Gems, was no doubt welcomed by many…
More recently, Cozzi’s psychedelic cheese-filled sci-fi tale has since appeared on the digital format under Roger Corman’s “Cult Classics” label, a sideline of the US-based DVD releasing company Shout! Factory. His film, presented in a brand new two-disc Anamorphic widescreen edition (1.78:1) with DTS 5.1 Surround Sound, features plenty of extras – which should please its legions of fans, worldwide!
