A Sci-Fi Remake Of An Akira Kurosawa Samurai Classic Has To Be Seen To Be Believed

I miss Roger Corman for a lot of reasons: he was an unparalleled raconteur, a willing mentor to promising young filmmakers (provided they could work fast and cheap), and, for a time, a great filmmaker in his own right (Corman's "Machine-Gun Kelly" is a B-movie must-see). But having grown up during the summer blockbuster era kicked off by "Jaws," I really wish he were still around to make ultra-low-budget knock-offs of whatever was making nine figures at the box office.

After the success of "Jaws," he swung in with the Joe Dante-directed, John Sayles-scripted "Piranha" (an inventive corker of a film that evokes both laughs and shrieks) and "Humanoids from the Deep" (an unabashedly nasty sexploitation take on Spielberg's smash hit). Meanwhile, "Alien" spawned a whole host of sci-fi horror rip-offs like "Forbidden Planet" (all hail Dawn Dunlap), "Galaxy of Terror," and the underrated "Android." Even when these movies were awful, they were at least short and dripping with gore.

For some reason, the game-changing success of George Lucas' "Star Wars" brought out the ambition in Corman. He ponied up a whole $2 million to make "Battle Beyond the Stars," and put some of his best young talent on it: production designer and art director James Cameron, production manager Gale Anne Hurd, and screenwriter John Sayles. Sayles, who'd already delivered two well-reviewed films for Corman in the John Dillinger crime drama "The Lady in Red" and Dante's "Piranha" (which was also a significant box office hit), was not the first writer on "Battle Beyond the Stars." He was asked to rework a script by one of Corman's assistants that was intended to be a space-bound variation on Akira Kurosawa's "Seven Samurai." Corman's only note to Sayles, "Make it better." Fortunately, John Sayles has long known "better."

John Sayles sticks with the basic narrative hook of "Seven Samurai." The evil Sador (John Saxon) and his Malmori race attack the peaceful farm planet of Akir (ahem), and threaten to return in "seven risings" to steal their harvest and wipe them out. This is a remarkably bad deal for the Akira people, so they endeavor to recruit a group of dangerous mercenaries to protect them. Plucky farm boy Shad (Richard Thomas aka John-Boy from "The Waltons") embarks on this mission, and he assembles a motley crew of warriors that includes the human Cowboy (George Peppard), assassin Gelt (Robert Vaughn, cast in the same role he played in "The Magnificent Seven"), Valkyrie Saint-Exmin (Sybil Danning) and a handful of other weirdo aliens.

The film might've been made on the cheap, but the sets are often quite impressive. James Cameron, of course, went over schedule completing them (his future wife, Gale Ann Hurd, had to lean on him), but his resourcefulness (like building the interior of the main ship out of spray-painted McDonald's containers) likely taught him some valuable lessons on frugality when he set out to make the more ambitious "The Terminator." Cameron's frugality kind of went out the window after that.

Once you get past the low-budget trappings, "Battle Beyond the Stars" is a great, corny time at the movies. There are some witty touches (like Cowboy cooking hot dogs off of two heat-emitting aliens), and a truly rousing score from the late, great James Horner (you'll hear lots of "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" and "Krull" in there). It's so smart and entertaining that it's hardly fair to call it a knock-off. It's just a genuinely thrilling space opera.