Dark Star (film)

Dark Star
Theatrical poster
Directed by	John Carpenter
Written by	John Carpenter Dan O'Bannon
Produced by	John Carpenter
Starring	Dan O'Bannon Brian Narelle Cal Kuniholm Dre Pahich
Cinematography	Douglas Knapp
Edited by	Dan O'Bannon
Music by	John Carpenter
Distributed by	Jack H. Harris Enterprises Inc.
Release date	April 1974 (1974-04)
Running time	83 minutes
Country	Template:Film US
Language	English
Budget	USD $60,000

Dark Star is a 1974 American science fiction parody motion picture directed by John Carpenter and co-written with Dan O'Bannon.

Backstory and Plot

In the middle of the 22nd century, humankind has reached a point in its technological advancement to enable colonization of the far reaches of the universe. Armed with artificially intelligent "Thermostellar Triggering Devices", the scout ship Dark Star and its crew have been in space alone for twenty years on a mission to destroy "unstable planets" which might threaten future colonization.

The ship's crew consists of Lt. Doolittle, Sgt. Pinback, Boiler, and Talby. Commander Powell, their superior officer, was killed by a faulty rear seat panel, but remains on board the ship in a state of cryogenic suspension. The crew perform their jobs in a state of abject boredom as the tedium of their task has driven them around the bend, with only each other, an increasing number of (sometimes comical) systems malfunctions (for instance the toilet facilities 'blew up' destroying the ship's entire stock of toilet paper) and the soft-spoken ship's computer for company. They have attempted to create distractions for themselves - Doolittle, formerly an enthusiastic surfer, has constructed a musical bottle organ, Talby spends all his time in the ship's observation dome watching the universe go by, Pinback enjoys playing practical jokes on the other crew members and maintains a video diary of his time on board ship, and Boiler enjoys smoking cigars and target practice with the ship's laser rifle.

In his video diary, Pinback claims to be liquid fuel specialist Bill Frugge, who accidentally takes Pinback's place on the mission after failing to rescue Pinback from committing suicide by wading into a fuel tank before the mission. Pinback has also adopted a ship's mascot in the form of a mischievous alien "beachball" that refuses to stay put in the food locker and forces Pinback to chase it all over the ship.

While navigating a magnetically bound asteroid field en route to their next target, the Dark Star suffers damage, resulting in a malfunction with the bomb drop mechanism. To the utter disinterest of his crewmates, Talby decides to investigate the fault. Discovering a damaged communications laser in the airlock, Talby dons a spacesuit to investigate. While attempting to repair the laser, Talby is blinded and inadvertently triggers a more serious problem, causing extensive damage to the ship's main computer and a major malfunction with Thermostellar Bomb #20, who, on arrival at their target planet, becomes belligerent and refuses to obey orders and drop from the bomb bay.

While stuck in the bomb bay, Bomb #20 refuses to disarm itself - its detonation countdown is in progress and it stubbornly refuses to abort the countdown sequence. The other crew members attempt to talk the bomb out of blowing up. Doolittle revives Commander Powell, who advises them to teach the bomb the rudiments of phenomenology, resulting in a memorable philosophical conversation between Doolittle and the bomb. Bomb #20 aborts its countdown and retreats to the bomb bay for contemplation, and disaster appears to have been averted. Pinback addresses the bomb over the intercom in an attempt to finally disarm it.

The bomb misinterprets Doolittle's phenomenology and believes itself to be God and explodes, killing Pinback and Boiler instantly. Commander Powell is jettisoned into space encased in a large block of ice, Talby is taken away by the Phoenix Asteroids (a cluster of glowing asteroids he had a fascination with) to circle the universe, and Doolittle surfs down to the unstable planet on a piece of debris to burn up in the atmosphere.

Production

Screenplay

Director John Carpenter and Dan O'Bannon wrote the screenplay. Six years later, the basic "Beachball with Claws" subplot of the film was reworked from comedy to horror, and became the basis (along with an unpublished story about gremlins aboard a B-52) for the O'Bannon-scripted science fiction horror classic, Alien.

Filming

Working on an estimated $60,000 budget, Carpenter and O'Bannon had to make production design from scratch. In the "elevator" sequence the bottom of the elevator is actually rolling on the floor. The device used to roll the elevator base was actually a Moviola camera dolly normally used on the small sound stage in the old USC Cinema building (itself once a horse stable). The steering end of the dolly can be seen as part of the "elevator" underside. Talby's starsuit backpack is made from Styrofoam packing material - probably from a TV set - and his spacesuit chestplate is made from a muffin tray. The double rows of large buttons on the bridge consoles are ice cube trays illuminated from beneath. Sergeant Pinback's video diary is an 8-track tape and the machine he uses to read it and record it is a microfiche reader. O'Bannon also starred in the film in the role of Sgt. Pinback.

Special effects

Much of the special effects seen in the movie were done by Dan O'Bannon, ship design by Ron Cobb, model work by O'Bannon and Greg Jein, and animation was by Bob Greenberg.

The bombs are made from an HO scale piggyback trailer kit and parts of 1/25th scale model car kits; "Matra", the name of the car brand, can be seen on some parts in some shots. The space suits are made to resemble the space suit of the Mattel action figure "Major Matt Mason", which was used in slightly modified form as a miniature for effects shots. Cobb drew the original design for the "Dark Star" ship on a napkin while they were eating at the International House of Pancakes.

Distribution, Cinema Release & DVD Releases

Although destined for eventual cinematic release in 1974, this was only possible as a consequence of a successful series of showings at a number of film festivals in 1973. Originally the film was a 45 minute student short filmed on 16mm film. The movie was seen by producer Jack H. Harris, who gained the theatrical distribution rights to the film, and arranged for it to be transferred to 35mm, and paid for the addition of 38 minutes which brought the movie up to feature film length.

For theatrical release, parts of the film were re-edited to make it feel more like a 3-part story and extra footage was filmed to bring it up to a more substantial running time. This included the bottle-playing scene, the alien-chase / elevator scenes and more.

Because Harris annoyed director John Carpenter during filming, Carpenter got revenge by having a computer screen flash "FUCK YOU HARRIS" during the film.

Reception

Dark Star can be considered a black comedy however it was marketed by Harris as more of a serious science fiction film. As a result, most of the cinema-going audience did not expect the humour and Dark Star suffered in properly reaching its intended audience. The home video cassette revolution of the early 1980s saw Dark Star become a cult film among sci-fi fans.

Director's Cut

John Carpenter and Dan O'Bannon re-edited the film into a "director's cut", removing much of the footage shot for the theatrical release and adding new special effects.

DVD

The film was released in special two-disc "Hyperdrive Edition" DVD in 2010 by VCI Entertainment and contains both the Director's Cut and a longer Original Theatrical Release, as well as a long featurette explaining the origins of Dark Star and how it was produced. An insightful fan commentary also provides a lot of trivial information about the film. Dark Star had previously been released on various region DVDs with little or no special features.

Critical response

Rotten Tomatoes gives the film an 80% fresh rating, with the following consensus: "A loopy 2001 satire, Dark Star may not be the most consistent sci-fi comedy, but its portrayal of human eccentricity is a welcome addition to the genre." Roger Ebert gave the film three stars, writing: "Dark Star is one of the damnedest science fiction movies I've ever seen, a berserk combination of space opera, intelligent bombs, and beach balls from other worlds."

Legacy

Dark Star was ranked #95 on Rotten Tomatoes' Journey Through Sci-Fi.

The indie rock band, Pinback, takes its name from a character in the movie, as well as use audio clips of the movie itself in their songs.

The track Bomb 20 by UK rock band Alien Stash Tin is inspired by and quotes from the movie.

Science fiction franchises such as Red Dwarf and Mystery Science Theatre 3000 have claimed Dark Star as partial inspiration.

The movie was adapted into a book by Alan Dean Foster

Analysis

Carpenter has described Dark Star as "Waiting for Godot in space."

Bradbury Tribute

The final sequence of Dark Star owes a certain debt to Ray Bradbury's short story, Kaleidoscope. Kaleidoscope begins with the explosion of a spaceship, evidently between the Earth and the Moon.

In both stories, the observation is made that the men's suits lack propulsion units, and so cannot reach and help one another:

K: ...they hadn’t had time to lock on their force units. With them they could be small lifeboats in space, saving themselves, saving others, collecting together... But without the force units snapped to their shoulders they were meteors, senseless, each going to a separate and irrevocable fate.

DS: "We're both falling, Talby, in opposite directions, away from each other. My -- my jetpack's gone."

In both stories, one of the survivors contemplates his impending death as he enters a planetary atmosphere:

K: It’s Earth for me. Back to old Mother Earth at ten thousand miles per hour. I’ll burn like a match... Tomorrow night I’ll hit Earth's atmosphere. I’ll burn, he thought, and be scattered in ashes . . .When I hit the atmosphere, I’ll burn like a meteor. “I wonder,” he said, “if anyone’ll see me?”

The small boy on the country road looked up and screamed. “Look, Mom, look! A falling star!” The blazing white star fell down the sky of dusk in Illinois. “Make a wish,” said his mother. “Make a wish.”

DS: "Looks like I'm headed for the planet, Talby. Going right toward it."

"When you fall, Doolittle, if there's anyone down there on the planet, somebody may see you. They may see you coming down. What a beautiful way to die... as a falling star..."

In both stories, one of the survivors is evidently captured by an extraordinary meteor cluster:

K: “I’ve got myself into a meteor swarm, some little asteroids.”

“Meteors?”

“I think it’s the Myrmidone cluster that goes out past Mars and in toward Earth once every five years. I’m right in the middle. It's like a big kaleidoscope. You get all kinds of colors and shapes and sizes. God, it's beautiful, all that metal...I’m going with them,” said Stone. “They’re taking me off with them. I’ll be damned.” He laughed.

Hollis looked to see, but saw nothing ... There was a kind of wonder and imagination in the thought of Stone going off in the meteor swarm, out past Mars for years and coming in toward Earth every five years, passing in and out of the planet’s ken for the next million centuries. Stone and the Myrmidone cluster eternal and unending....

DS: "...we may actually find a strange and beautiful thing: the Phoenix Asteroids. They should be passing through there about now... They are a body of asteroids that make a complete circuit of the universe once every 12.3 trillion years. The Phoenix Asteroids...

"From what I've heard, Doolittle, they glow... glow with all the colors of the rainbow. Nobody knows why. They just glow as they drift around the universe. Imagine all the sights they've seen in the time they've been travelling -- the birth and death of stars, things we'll never see. The universe is alive, Doolittle. I thought it was all empty, but it isn't. In between the stars, it's seething with light and gasses and dust. There are little pebbles drifting around, planets no one on Earth has ever seen... No one but the Phoenix Asteroids..."

....

"Doolittle, I'm heading right toward something. It's behind me, in the distance. Something that glows. Doolittle... I think it's the Phoenix Asteroids! It is, Doolittle, it's the Phoenix! They glow with all the colors of the rainbow, just like everybody said. I'm going into them, I'm going to hit them. Doolittle... Doolittle, I'm catching up to the asteroids. I'm going to be a part of them in a minute. Doolittle, I'm going into them. I'm beginning to glow. They're taking me with them, with the Phoenix... going to circle the universe forever. I'm with them now... be back this way again some day."

(emphasis added)

An interesting contrast is that in Kaleidoscope, it is ambiguous whether the Myrmidone Cluster is real or a hallucination, whereas the Phoenix Asteroids are quite real. That is hardly the point though, as the similarity of descriptions is otherwise remarkable.

Also, as each man is consigned to his fate, they lose communication with each other, drifting out of radio range. In contrast, the Kaleidoscope survivors are able to make their last good-byes before: "The voices faded and now all of space was silent. Hollis was alone, falling.", whereas Talby (DS) only manages to say, "There's one last thing I want to tell you...." before losing contact.

Kaleidoscope is a somewhat more profound examination of the situation, and involves a number of other characters and their conversations; it is the whole of the story, rather than the conclusion of a much longer work. Still, Carpenter performed a marvelous tribute and homage to one of science fiction's legendary authors.

http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Dark-Star.html

http://www.scaryforkids.com/kaleidoscope-by-ray-bradbury/

Soundtrack

The music for Dark Star is mostly of a pure electronic style and was done by John Carpenter himself using synthesizers.

The theme song played during the opening and closing credits is "Benson, Arizona". The music was written by John Carpenter, and the lyrics by Bill Taylor, concerning a person who travels the galaxy at light speed and misses their beloved back on Earth. The lead vocal was John Yager, a college friend of Carpenter's. Yager was not a professional musician "apart from being in a band in college."

Further reading

• Holdstock, Robert. Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Octopus Books, 1978, pp. 80–81. ISBN 0-7064-0756-3
• Cinefex magazine, issue 2, Aug 1980. Article by Brad Munson: "Greg Jein, Miniature Giant". (Discusses Dark Star, among other subjects.)
• Fantastic Films magazine, Oct 1978, vol. 1 no. 4, pages 52–58, 68–69. James Delson interviews Greg Jein, about Dark Star and other projects Jein had worked on.
• Fantastic Films magazine, Sep 1979, issue 10, pages 7–17, 29–30. Dan O'Bannon discusses Dark Star and Alien, other subjects. (Article was later reprinted in "The very best of Fantastic Films", Special Edition #22 as well.)
• Fantastic Films magazine, Collector's Edition #17, Jul 1980, pages 16–24, 73, 76–77, 92. (Article: "John Carpenter Overexposed" by Blake Mitchell and James Ferguson. Discusses Dark Star, among other things.)

External links

• Dark Star at IMDb
• Dark Star at AllMovie
• Dark Star at the TCM Movie Database
• Dark Star at The Official John Carpenter
• script of the original short version of Dark Star
• AMC.com - B Movies - Dark Star (Full Streaming Movie)