Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) – Review

There have been several films that have “borrowed” from Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, the most notable being The Magnificent Seven by Preston Sturges, but I doubt even Kurosawa could have dreamed someone would take his premise and re-imagine it with aliens, laser battles and a spaceship with large breasts.

The movie opens with Evil Space Man Sador (John Saxon) giving the people of Akir a chilling ultimatum: submit to his rule and become part of his empire, or get vaporized when he returns with his stellar converter, a weapon capable of turning entire planets into glitter dust. The villagers of Akir respond in the only logical way: send the shyest, most inexperienced guy they can find on a galaxy-wide mission to find mercenaries. Enter Shad (Richard Thomas), a sweet farm boy now tasked with finding mercenaries to defend their homeworld. But he’s not sent off alone, he’s travelling the galaxy in a talking spaceship shaped like… well, let’s just say Freud would have had a field day. Nell (the ship voiced by Lynn Carlin) moans, groans, and sasses, making you question every life decision that led you here, but before our hero can round up those much-needed mercs, he must make a pit stop at the space station of Doctor Hephaestus (Sam Jaffe) with the hope of acquiring weapons. 

 

This guy looks totally trustworthy.

Unfortunately, the doctor wants Shad to mate with his daughter Nanelia (Darlanne Fluegel), by force if necessary. Needless to say, Shad is not too keen on becoming breeding stock, and he convinces Nanelia to let him go and join in the fight. It should be noted that while she provides no weapons, she does bring along a highly advanced computer system that can help predict Sador’s attacks. More importantly, she’s the closest thing this film has to a love interest and, unlike Princess Leia, she won’t turn out to be the hero’s sister. The two quickly split up to look for more mercenaries, all with varying degrees of skills.

 

“I’m not exactly magnificent, but I am drunk.”

• Cowboy (George Peppard): He’s not a soldier, not a mercenary—just a laser-rigged delivery driver for Earth’s weapons supply. But when he sees Shad in trouble, he doesn’t hesitate to jump in, bringing his cargo of heavy-duty firepower and down-home wisdom.
• Gelt (Robert Vaughn): A Jaded Assassin with a Heart of… something. He has mad sniper skills, dry sarcasm, extreme moral ambiguity and offers to fight for the villagers in exchange for “a meal and a place to hide.”
• Cayman of The Lambda Zone (Morgan Woodward): Reptilian-looking alien whose skills include blowing things up, being surprisingly noble, and he hates Sador for wiping out his race and fights with style, guts, and scales.
• Nestor (Earl Boen et al.) A hive-mind collective that shares one brain. Nestor is… well, Nestors. They’re a race of identical white alien clones who share thoughts, senses, and their only fear is becoming bored to death.
• Saint-Exmin (Sybil Danning): An Intergalactic glamazon with a plunging neckline and a death wish, looking to prove herself in battle. 

 

Fun Fact: Her costume uses more metal than her ship.

The ragtag defenders of Akir return just in time to prepare for Sador’s arrival. They train the locals, set traps, and do their best to turn farmers into fighters. What follows is a surprisingly ambitious space battle—especially for a movie made on a shoestring budget—with laser dogfights, kamikaze maneuvers, and more model spaceship explosions than you can shake a proton blaster at. Each mercenary gets a hero moment. Cayman rams a ship, Exmin goes out in a blaze of laser glory on her way to Valhalla, Cowboy dies the way he lived—coolly and with bourbon, and Gelt finally finds peace in the arms of death.

 

“Don’t worry, I’ve booked a part in Superman III.”

Shad finally faces off against Sador in a last-ditch, underdog showdown. With Nell damaged and many of his allies gone, and Nell caught in a tractor beam, Shad activates Nell’s self-destruct program, which explodes and causes the Stellar Converter to backfire and rip apart Sador’s flagship. The Akira are saved. Most of the mercenaries are dead, but are remembered as heroes. Shad and Nanelia decide to rebuild—romantically and agriculturally. The moral of the story? Always be nice to assassins, never underestimate a farm boy, and never trust a mutant with a stellar converter.

 

“I wanted to live forever!”

Stray Observations:

• The natives of Akir are known as the Akira. An obvious nod to Seven Samurai director Akira Kurosawa.
• Cowboy offers to help with the ground defences, but despite his skill and cargo of handguns, I don’t see that being all that useful when Sador’s “Stellar Converter” can destroy a planet from orbit.
• Robert Vaughn’s Gelt is similar to his character in The Magnificent Seven, with some of his dialogue lifted almost verbatim from that film.
• Fans of classic science fiction television may recognize the actress who plays Lux, an Akira who hooks up with Cowboy, as actress Marta Kristen, who played Judy Robinson on Lost in Space.
• The space battle footage was so expensive and well done (for the price) that it was recycled in other Corman films throughout the 1980s and even appeared in some TV shows.
• The film has a wonderful alien cast. You’ve got a hive-mind lizard, a glowing telepath, a mutant with interchangeable heads, and a mercenary with a grudge. Basically, the Star Wars cantina after karaoke night.

 

“I’m taking you to Jabba’s palace.”

Produced by Roger Corman and directed by Jimmy T. Murakami, Battle Beyond the Stars may be another cash-in on the success of Star Wars with a plot borrowed from The Magnificent Seven, but beneath the spandex and Styrofoam, there’s a lot of heart. The film knows exactly what it is and leans into the absurdity with glee. It’s not trying to be Star Wars—it’s trying to be a good time. And on that front, it delivers. Loudly. Cheesily. Gloriously. As for the special effects? Honestly, for a Corman film, they’re shockingly decent, thanks to young James Cameron working in the art department before he went off to build Titanic-sized careers. The spaceship designs are creative (if occasionally questionable—Nell’s, um, anatomy is… bold), and the laser battles are charmingly outdated.

 

Millennium Falcon, eat your heart out.

The soundtrack, composed by James Horner before he ascended to Hollywood legend status, goes way harder than the film probably deserves. You’ll find yourself wondering why a movie that features a spaceship with breasts has music worthy of a Shakespearean tragedy. But here’s the thing: Battle Beyond the Stars doesn’t care what you think. It’s having fun. It’s earnest, it’s scrappy, and it’s full of heart. It’s the kind of movie where every dollar of its $2 cheeseball budget is stretched to $2.50 through sheer enthusiasm. It wants to be a space epic—and in its own gloriously goofy way, it kind of is.

 

“Please get writer John Sayles on the phone.”

While the plot of this film is recycled from Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven, years later Zack Snyder would take his own crack at it with his Netflix offering Rebel Moon, but where Battle Beyond the Stars cost a whopping $2 million, Snyder’s film had a combined budget of $166 million. That means Zack Snyder’s budget was 8,200% higher than Roger Corman’s flick. Visually, Rebel Moon is a showcase of epic landscapes, massive ships, and high-tech warfare. But the polish doesn’t always translate to engagement. In many places, the film feels sterile, more focused on image-building than world-building. Where Battle makes you wonder how they pulled it off, Rebel Moon makes you wonder why you don’t care more.

 

You can’t put a price tag on charm.

In conclusion, Battle Beyond the Stars is a scrappy, energetic sci-fi cult classic. It’s a patchwork quilt of genres: one part Western, one part samurai film, three parts space nonsense. And that’s why we love it. It’s a cosmic B-movie love letter to the power of imagination, duct tape, and just enough budget to be dangerous.