Henry Spencer
In the 21st Century. After six months, the spacecraft MK 31 commanded by Captain Hamilton is on the return flight to Earth, having successfully carried out a special space mission. When the on-board computer receives strange radio signals, the crew pays no attention at first. But from earth comes the order to investigate the signals. Reluctantly, Captain Hamilton obeys the instructions from earth-base. Suddenly, the MK 31 is attacked by alien spaceships with laser weapons. Hamilton loses control of the ship and it rushes toward a planet on which it will be smashed to pieces. Miraculously the dive is stopped at the last moment: "The spaceship is sustained by an anti-gravitational force of unknown origin", reports the on-board computer. Once the crew has overcome the initial shock, a landing party is assembled to investigate the planet, which has an Earth-like atmosphere. Here, however, they are soon attacked by a giant robot, who kills several astronauts with his energy weapon. Hamilton and the rest of the crew discover a large stone gate, which turns out to be a kind of transmitter. As they walk through it, they are transported into a cave from which the mysterious radio signals are coming. As they investigate the cave, they are captured by humanoid aliens. The leader of the aliens, who are actually peacefully minded towards mankind, recounts what has happened to his race. In their highly developed civilization, intelligent computer and machines played an important role in daily life. One day there was a "Rise of the Machines", which ended in a nuclear disaster. Humans evolved back into an "animal state" and retreated back into the caves beneath the planet. From the machines, a supercomputer emerged, who still terrorizes the aliens and whose aim is to conquer the universe. However, in a collaborative effort the humans and the aliens succeed in destroying the computer. This triggered a massive explosion that leads to a chain reaction which will destroy the entire planet, and with it the race of the aliens. At the last second, the MK 31 spacecraft launched back into space, leaving the bursting planet behind. But one of the aliens could be rescued and taken on board. On the flight back to Earth, the liberated, evil power of the supercomputer takes possession of one of the crew members, who transforms into a kind of zombie. He attacks the last survivor of the alien race and kills him. BATTAGLIE NEGLI SPAZI STELLARI is one of five low-budget sci-fi films that the late Italian director Alfonso Brescia staged in one go in the years 1977 and 1978, in response to the immense success of STAR WARS. For all movies he used the same, slightly modified sets and costumes, the same optical effects and animated sequences and the actors are largely the same in all the films, with only some different actors in the main parts. Of course, the technicians behind the scenes are largely identical for all the films. This extremely low-cost production method allowed Brescia to stage five films for the price of one, so to speak. The other four movies of this quintet are: ANNO ZERO - GUERRA NELLO SPAZIO (77), SETTE UOMINI D'ORO NELLO SPAZIO (78), LA GUERRA DEI ROBOT (78) and LA BESTIA NELLO SPAZIO (78). That such an approach, however, can not produce high-caliber films is obvious. And therefore, BATTAGLIE NEGLI SPAZI STELLARI is an involuntarily comic space-opera, with protagonists in funny outfits, cheap special effects, an oblique synth soundtrack and silly dialogs. The actors were put in light gray "pajamas", with extra wide belts and red inserts, a red cap, which extends up to the ears and gray boots. Simply chic! The humanoid aliens in turn are bald, have a bluish metallic skin and pointy ears a la "Mr.Spock". The set design as a whole looks at least quite expensive. Because of the idea to use the sets for four more films, the producers have probably invested a little more money into it. It seems, that the art director was allowed to let his imagination loose, because the sets are almost overloaded with a plethora of wild flashing and flickering lights, consoles and screens. On the other hand, in case of the tools the astronauts are using, it looks as if probably the red pencil again was used, and so the set decorator has had to shop at the nearest hardware store (metal detector) or the store for auto parts (hazard warning lamp). As luck would have it (for the producers at least), the surface of the alien planet is almost entirely blurred in darkness, and as the viewer does not see much anyway, the producers thought it was not necessary to evoke the illusion of an alien world. Saved money again! The already mentioned electronic music is a mix of classic elements (Bach) and noisy synthesizer sounds in the style of Raymond Scott and his "Soothing Sounds for Baby." The story of the film makes little sense, and something like suspense does not even arise. The dialog, however, are sometimes quite funny, for example when one of the astronauts exclaims indignantly, "Hey, how does that guy know our language?". In another scene, a male astronaut and a female astronaut practicing "Cosmic Love", for which they sit side by side on a bed, connected to a "virtual sex machine" and have sex with each other without even get in touch. Bleak outlook!
classicsoncall
My summary line above is an actual quote from the movie. The surprise of course is whether you ever make it through the entire flick. Let's see - 1977, "Star Wars", and 1977, "Cosmos:War of the Planets". One is a landmark movie that took sci-fi film making into the twenty first century, the other set back the progress of civilization for time immemorial.My question is - Is this movie about anything at all? It's virtually an endless stream of darkened scenes where crew members of a space ship called 'MK 31' attempt to defeat an alien intelligence that threatens Earth. The alien intelligence actually states to Captain Hamilton (John Richardson) that it will conquer the galaxy when he repairs a bad circuit board. So what does he do - he repairs the bad circuit board!!!! The only redeeming factor for this mess is the go-go style space suits, all white with a red skull cap and trim that look particularly fine on the good looking female crew members. Other than that, this film goes where no film has gone before, and will stay there by the look of the comments already posted. Fortunately or not as the case may be, this was the last movie left to view of my fifty DVD sci-fi collection from Mill Creek/Tree Line Films. A bargain at about twenty five bucks, this is the kind of movie that demands a refund, even if it's only fifty cents.
mstomaso
I am tempted to mention the fact that The Film "Mission to Mars", directed by Brian DePalma, bears a strong similarity to this film.... there, I've mentioned it! One of the most remarkable things about this film is the fact that "Star Wars: A New Hope" came out in the same year. Despite the title, this film bears no resemblance whatsoever to Star Wars. However, I should note that its own title is completely unrelated to the film as well. There is no war, really. But films without plots are hard to name, so c'est la vie.This film stars a lot of good looking actors (both male and female), though they are all too thin, just like the script, and the special effects. The technology depicted in the film is reminiscent of the first Star Trek series or even Lost in Space. The special effects are variable. Some are actually fairly decent miniature shots, but then there are a few cardboard cut-out sequences reminiscent of some of Terry Gilliam's animations in Mont Python's Flying Circus. The behavior of the actors is sometimes inexplicable, but the dialog is so bad that you hardly even notice. For example, every time the entire crew of the spaceship is about to die (and this happens a lot), they all stand up and cheers and hug each other when they survive. various subplots are developed and then abandoned (just as well IMO) and, towards the end, it almost seems as if we are going to get a coherent story-line. Maybe they ran out of film? This film is a hoot. I recommend it highly for bad film buffs and MST3K fans. MST3K probably avoided this because it was a too-easy target.
