Classic Review: Dark Star (1974)

Imagine stripping away all the tension and terror of Alien (1979) and replacing it with a babbling, stoner vibe and that is, pretty much, what you find in Dark Star (1974). Co-written, starring and edited by Alien co-creator Dan O'Bannon and directed by John Carpenter, Dark Star is a rough edged film about a low-rent crew working their fingers to the bone in deep space, destroying planets for The Man.

The space crew workers' ever-malfunctioning ship (with its lack of toilet paper) faces increasing obstacles, like a pesky alien mascot (the art director's painted beach ball) who won't go where he's told and the quarrelsome sentience of one of their world-killing bombs. The film also features bearded space hippies trying to calm down this freaked-out “Thermostellar Triggering Device” through a dialogue of rather heavy post-grad philosophy. This is indeed a cult classic to remember.

While the director's later films such as The Thing (1982) and Escape From New York (1981) would feature memorable endings of their own, few films in the Carpenter collection can compare with mass death spawned by robotic Cartesian doubt. Carpenter's early synthesizer score only makes it better.

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