“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!” Yup. That could come in handy. Join your faithful Grue Crew – Doc Rotten, Chad Hunt, Bill Mulligan, and Jeff Mohr – as they check out Starcrash (1978), starring Caroline Munro, Christopher Plummer, Marjoe Gortner, David Hasselhoff, and Joe Spinell. What’s not to like?
Decades of Horror 1970s
Episode 169 – Starcrash (1978)
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An outlaw smuggler and her alien companion are recruited by the Emperor of the Galaxy to rescue his son and destroy a mysterious superweapon designed by the evil Count Zarth Arn
Director: Luigi Cozzi (credited in the US as Lewis Coates) Writers. Luigi Cozzi & Nat Wachsberger (screenplay); R.A. Dillon (additional dialogue) Music by: John Barry Selected cast: Caroline Munro as Stella Star Candy Clark as Stella Star (voice) (uncredited) Marjoe Gortner as Akton Judd Hamilton as Elle Hamilton Camp as Elle (voice) David Hasselhoff as Prince Simon Christopher Plummer as The Emperor Joe Spinell as Count Zarth Arn Robert Tessier as Thor Nadia Cassini as Corelia Salvatore Baccaro as Neanderthal Man (uncredited) Omero Capanna as Spaceship Guard (uncredited) Hélène Chauvin as Amazon (uncredited)Bill picked this one and he remembers originally liking Starcrash a lot more than he does this time around. Caroline Munro is still fetching, even though Candy Clark dubs her, but every actor seems to be acting in a different movie. There is a colorful, comic-book style to this weird oddball movie, but as Bill points out, sometimes you can’t go back again.
Jeff has been wanting to see Starcrash since Decades of Horror 1980s covered Maniac, another film starring Caroline Munro and Joe Spinell. Jeff sees the obvious similarities to the recently released Star Wars (1977), but the bad dialogue and long, drawn-out fight scenes cause Starcrash to… crash. Doc remembers great-looking stills in magazines of the time, but their quality does not lead to a good film. The dubbing is laughably bad and the movie is just awful. Still, there is a sort of weird charm to it.
If you have a hankering for late-70s, cheesy, space opera, Starcrash is available to stream with ads from multiple services, and on physical media as a Shout Factory! Blu-ray.
Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror 1970s is part of the Decades of Horror two-week rotation with The Classic Era and the 1980s. In two weeks, the next episode in their very flexible schedule, chosen by Chad, will be H. G. Wells’ Empire of the Ants (1977), starring Joan Collins and Robert Lansing.
We want to hear from you – the coolest, grooviest fans: comment on the site or email the Decades of Horror 1970s podcast hosts at feedback@gruesomemagazine.com.
