Jack H. Harris Presents Dark Star!

If ever there was a movie about entropy it's Dark Star. Some of its creators refer to it as a version of Waiting for Godot but in space. It's not quite that, but it's close. It's a movie in which space travel has become so mundane and commonplace that the thrill of being among the stars is lacking from most of these astronauts. Their job in space is pretty thrilling really, exploding planets which seem unstable or pose some risk to potential colonizers. But they've been doing it so long, it's lost its romantic luster. The creators imagined truck drivers in space, but really these guys are more like bulldozer and crane operators. They plow the way forward and make the path smooth for those to come. 

When we encounter them, they have been twenty years in space in Earth time but for these blokes only about three years have passed thanks to the mysteries of faster-than-light travel. They have blown up eighteen planets using intelligent talking bombs which trigger a chain reaction on the planet in question shattering it to smithereens. We see them drop "Bomb 19" and then speed out of the way of the result. After this momentary thrill the ennui of unchanging experience traps them once again inside their flawed personalities. The excitement heats up when they try to drop "Bomb 20". We worry about A.I., well this movie shows that dilemma off in spades. 

"Captain Powell" has "died" though they keep him on ice for extreme emergencies. The second in command is named "Dolittle" and lives up to his name, constantly shirking his responsibilities and pining for home. There's "Talby" who lives apart from the others aboard a ship which is bigger than it appears (Tardis anyone?) and is the only one of this sordid batch who looks to the stars for inspiration.  "Boiler" is a taciturn ogre who is just trying to live minute to minute with pointless and violent diversions. And finally, there's "Pinback" who is not really Pinback but a low-level service tech named "Froog" who stumbled into the mission when the real Pinback committed suicide in front of him. Pinback is a constant whiner who bemoans most all aspects of his fate and reads romance comics. But weirdly he's the only one who still cares about the mission. There's an alien too, but it has to be seen to be believed. 

I find Dark Star a delightful satire which uses men in space to showcase men and women on Earth who approach life with different strategies and most of which are ultimately of little comfort. Made by John Carpenter and the late Dan O'Bannon with much help from their friends this is a student movie that escaped the USC campus (with some help from Carpenter himself by raiding the USC film vault it seems) and with some doctoring by the ubiquitous Jack Harris tiptoed into theaters and made little money. Harris is the only distributer who showed any interest in the movie, and while he and Carpenter have different reflections of their time together, Carpenter admits the movie and possibly his career might have taken a different turn. All you folks who love Halloween the movie, tip your hat to Jack H. Harris. 

Cal Kuniholm (Boiler) and Brian Narelle (Dolittle) above 

Dan O'Bannon (Pinback) and John Carpenter kneeling

O'Bannon who played Pinback seems to be the heart and soul of this project and it's due to his efforts that the movie has remained viable long enough for a cult audience to discover and cherish it. I'm among that number.

Be back next week for another John Carpenter project (of sorts) which Jack H. Harris was instrumental in -- The Eyes of Laura Mars. 

Rip Off