Battle Beyond the Stars (1980)

I have reviewed many science fiction movies from time before Star Wars lately. This is from time after Star Wars. Worst thing Star Wars brought was all the copy cats which replaced more thoughtful science fiction movie. Battle Beyond the Stars is good example of those movie. It is not the worst but you can't call it good either.

It is Roger Corman movie. Roger Corman is famous for making movies with low budget and making money with them. Roger Corman has made taking all out of low budget into art. You probably don't think low budget too much during the movie but after the movie you might realize how low budget changed the story.

Evil space tyrant gives peaceful planet ultimatum. Peaceful planet sends one man to find warriors to fight the tyrant. He returns with random group of warriors who have different reasons to fight. Movie takes story from Seven Samurai (1954) or its western remake The Magnificent Seven (1960) and takes it to space. Instead of samurais or cowboys it has aliens which look more like from Star Trek than from Star Wars.

Low budget shows in final battle. To be honest it shows throughout the movie but it becomes problem in final battle. Each warrior attacks one by one. They have different powers and with combining them they could be more effective but everyone attacks alone. When they die or run out of powers next one attacks alone. This start to feel strange after few times but it continues until there is only one left and he attacks alone.

Battle Beyond the Stars exists to cash on Star Wars mania which it did. It has enough similarities to Star Wars to keep the audience happy. It concentrates more on similarities than the story. It is only good for Star Wars fix when you could not buy Star Wars to watch it on your home or cinematic studies how to use your budget efficiently.