The opening credits say, "You are about to be HURLED..." Truer words were never spoken.
Italians know how to do Westerns better than Americans, they understand the mythology of the Old West better than the country of its origin. Giallo and Italians horror films are popular, Mario Bava and Dario Argento are known to many Americans. Italians know how to make entertaining movies, so it is strange that their Sci Fi is so... so bad. These movies are painted with such a large brush, that they sometimes not always manages to transcend their campiness and become a kind of poetry.
Star Crash has these moments of campy transcendence. It may be the bright colors, or the cheap costumes, which looked like something your mom sewed for you; they have the charm of an Elementary School Christmas pageant. Caroline Munroe, my favorite B-Movie actress, is beautiful as Stella Star. The design of Stella's robot companion is interesting, but then he opens his mouth and starts speaking with a Miner-Forty Niner old prospector dialect. C'mon Stella, I reckon we gotta run! The preposterous and long-winded plot is pretty much good guys versus bad guys, but one gets the feeling that the heroine, Stella Star, a space smuggler or something, dips into morally ambivalent territory. Think old-school Han Solo, when he shot Greedo first.
I always conflate other Spaghetti Sci Fi movies, like War of the Robots and Star Odyssey. They re-use costumes, props, and scenes from different movies. Aliens – or we're they robots?– with blond, Prince Valient wigs, were really popular. I remember watching these films on UHF stations, but I can't tell you what they were about. Most of the time, the plots were so tedious and rambling, that I forced myself to watch them.
When these awful movies were on TV, my friend would call me, "Are you watching this?" Even in Junior High School, when we were desperate and forgiving of all sci fi and fantasy movies, we couldn't stand these films.
Costumes. Yeah, we got 'em.
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