The year is 1980 and you're Roger Corman and you're gonna make a movie.  So you look at the biggest movie of the year, The Empire Strikes Back and you decide, what they hell, let's make a space movie!  That's what it feels like happened when you're watching Battle Beyond The Stars.  

     It stars Richard Thomas, of The Waltons fame, George Peppard, of The A Team fame, John Saxon, soon to be of A Nightmare On Elm Street Fame and let's not leave out Sybil Danning of 'check out that rack' fame.  Now we've got our cast, we've got an idea, but we still need a story.  So, how about The Magnificent Seven in space?  That's right, it's pretty much the same movie.  When a small planet is placed under seige by a huge space ship run by John Saxon, they send one man out to look for mercenaries to protect them.  And although the actual people number over seven, there's still only seven mercenary space ships!  Robert Vaughn is even here playing about the same part he played in The Magnificent Seven, the evil loner who's looking for a place to find some peace.  It's all here, the planet is even a planet of farmers, just like the village in The Magnificent Seven!

     And in true 80s fashion, we were so impressed by the models we could make space ships out of, there's a lot of time spent in space with strange space ships shooting at each other.  And loooooooong shots of the larger ships as they fly past the screen, ala the opening sequence of Star Wars.

     Now, all that said you'd think this was a movie that I'd hate, but you'd be wrong.  Now, it's not just the nostalgia this brought back to me (I remember seeing this at the local dollar theatre when it was first released), and it's not George Peppard as the earth cowboy who has a belt that dispenses Scotch, water AND ice cubes into a glass that he carries all the time.  There's something about this movie that you just want to like.  The story is a classic good versus evil story, the actors are all top shelf, even if the script isn't and I don't care how old I get, hearing Sybil Danning (wearing an outfit that looks like two hands are holding her breasts) talk about Richard Thomas' equipment will never fail to make me laugh.  And yes, I know, but as a guy we never get to old for dick or fart jokes!  And when you're watching it don't forget that for it's time the special effects were considered quite good. 

     So, while some people might look at Battle Beyond The Stars might be to some, just another cheesy 80s space movie made to make money on the 'Star Wars' craze, this will always be one of my favorite b movie memories and I was very happy to revisit it, and you should too!