Starship Invasions (Rifftrax)

Film Year:  1977
Genre:  Science Fiction
Director:  Ed Hunt
Starring:  Christopher Lee, Robert Vaughn
Rifftrax Year:  2018
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

The Movie

Well it took some digging but we finally found an alien invasion movie that rivals the ineptitude and unintentional hilarity of Plan 9 from Outer Space.  And wouldn't you know it this one ALSO stars a former Dracula!  Now if we can only get Gary Oldman to do one (and no, Lost in Space doesn't count).

Christopher Lee plays a renegade alien who has lead an insurrection against his people and plans to colonize Earth and wipe out human civilization by transmitting a beam that causes a Happening level suicide epidemic.  UFO expert Robert Vaughn is taken by the peaceful members of the alien race in an effort to stop Lee.  What does Vaughn do?  Well...he sits around and looks worried mostly.  That's a huge help.

Released the same year as Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Starship Invasions was pretty much outdated from the getgo.  Hell, even if those movies weren't released, I'd argue the movie still was outdated upon release.  I'm still not entirely sure what to make of it.  It's a very low budget, very cheap, very silly movie with hysterical performances and an absurd style.  But it's so bloody earnest.  It feels like it's trying real hard to be a real movie.

And through that sincerity there is almost something to like about Starship Invasions.  It's not really a bad idea for a movie.  In fact there are several movies here rolled into one complicated shitstorm.  The warring alien angle fighting over the fate of planet Earth is fine.  I like the idea of the aliens somehow forcing humanity to commit suicide as a form of genocide as well.  Let's be honest, as poor as this movie is it's done waaaaaaaaaaaay better here than it was done in The Happening.  I also have to be honest, as strange as the music in this movie was, it was almost endearing in an odd way.

Starship Invasions is crap, but it's that kind of crap you discover late at night and can't take your eyes off of.  You just sit there thinking to yourself "Wow...somebody made this?"  And somebody did.  And I wouldn't change that for anything.

The Trax

Starship Invasions is something of a perfect target for Rifftrax, though I wonder if it's too perfect.  This movie could be T-Ball, and with the right swing every moment should be over the fence.  It does seem like Mike, Kevin, and Bill are willing to settle with this one.  The movie alone is funny, and they make it funnier, though the resulting commentary feels a bit below their grade-A status.

There are a lot of safe jokes here, more or less pandering to people who remember previous titles Rifftrax has tackled.  Mike does a not-so-subtle burn on Starship Troopers by claiming Invasions is easily "the best movie he's seen with 'Starship' in the title."  They also go on a little bit of a Happening digression when similarities between the two films start to spring up.  These gags are cute, though I prefer the original material and A-game stuff.

At times Rifftrax shines.  This is especially evident as the movie is unfolding early on and the absurd production is coming at us by surprise.  They note in the opening credits the movie was made by Hal Roach Studios, a company that was best known for comedy films and shorts in the 1930's, by hoping the movie was an epic battle between The Little Rascals and Laurel & Hardy IN SPACE!  Then the film offers up cheap effects, lousy costumes, and godawful acting, and the trio delights in it and keeps pace.

The problem is the film doesn't really offer much new in the third act, and by then Mike, Kevin, and Bill are going through the motions and jumping through the same hoops as before.  Starship Invasions is funny and it's worth having in the collection, as the movie is just so silly and the riffing gets good jabs in.  It just doesn't maintain right down to the end, though that's forgivable since it's a good product nonetheless.

Good