SPACEBALLS (1987)

SPACEBALLS (1987)

So back in 1987 I was just getting into high school. I remember this movie coming out and pretty much like most other people, just completely blowing it off. At some point it came on cable, and I probably watch this thing 100 times. Now I own it, and I have already watched it 3 times this year alone. If I watch a movie that many times, it means it was either on 1 million times on cable when I was a kid… or it means I freakin loved it. 

SPACEBALLS is loosely a spoof on the first 3 STARWARS movies with a few awesome nods to other films. The movie involves a group of aliens on another planet named SPACEBALLS that are running out of air. The idea is that they are just going to suck the air from some other planet in order to survive. The next (or first) victim is planet Druidia. On Druidia their king (played by Dick Van Patten) is trying to marry off his daughter Princess Vespa (played by Daphne Zuniga) to the only prince they can find and this dude is just a sleepy mess. Princess Vespa and her robot (a female throwback to C3PO from STARWARS) decide to bail. At that point a Han Solo like mercenary named Lone Starr (played by Bill Pullman) and his partner in crime, a half human half dog named Barf (played by John Candy) are hired to go find Vespa. While all this is going on Dark Helmet (played by the legendary Rick Moranis) are trying to hunt down Lone Star because Dark Helmet has a vendetta against him, and he really wants Vespa for himself. Everybody got that?

To this day this movie remains just another one of those fantastically funny classics, that feels a little bit all over the place but still manages to work. I mean, this thing has a scene where the spoof counterparts to Yoda and the Jawa’s are both on the same desert planet. It contains references to both ALIENS and PLANET OF THE APES, so you kind of get the gist of what’s going on. This doesn’t follow as close to STAR WARS as say what "Family Guy" did with their STAR WARS spoofs. 

Everyone in the movie is even keel, not trying overly hard to make this thing work. While there are more than a few scenes that don’t seem to make any sense at all, others are fall on the floor and roll around laughing funny. Over the years this movie has still maintained enough timeless humor to work on almost all counts, especially for anyone that isn’t particularly PC. For a comedy the effects are actually pretty great, with the exception of a scene that involved an alien dancing after popping out of someone’s chest, (the scene is pretty tame) and another scene where a mirror prop is used to reflect the sand underneath a desert vehicle to make it look like it’s floating. There is also a bear in one scene that is clearly a dude in a suit. Having said all that, most of this is to be expected. This movie isn’t even remotely trying to take itself seriously and that is part of what makes it so epically fantastic. 

Because of a few needless departures from the storyline that didn’t add much to the film, I am going to give this movie a 6 out of 7. It’s not absolutely mind-blowing, but it’s an amazing effort that is just as watchable today as it was when it came out.

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF MGM AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.  

Please check out the link below by clicking on the picture. Because no one should die buttonless. Until next time.