Best "CHEAP" space movie

[Barbados Slim]

Someone also listed Screamers and Weird Science. One takes place on another planet and the other takes place in 1980s Shermer, Illinois because it's a Brat Pack movie. And neither are "cheap" which I take the OP meaning a low-budget feature with low-tech effects.

 

[Aragorn]

Starcrash, starring Christopher Plummer and David Hasselhoff -- about two warring factions, an evil count, people who fight with laser swords and a weapon so big it requires a planet to conceal.

 

[Norrin Radd]

What about Star Wars? It would have cost less than 40 mil in 2009.

 

[RobertScorpio]

What about Star Wars? It would have cost less than 40 mil in 2009.

Maybe I should have said CHEAP and CHEESEY

Rob

 

[TheMasterOfOrion]

What the hell classifies a movie as being "cheap". I mean, someone listed Planet of the Apes for fuck's sake!

I think he's talking about the visual Fx, the first movie looked good but you've got lots of sequels like "Conquest of the PlanetoftheApes" which look very dated and kind of flopped at the box office

And didn't Enemy Mine go well over budget?

It's a great film but the Enemy Mine visuals look corny or cheap and dated whereas movies like Terminator-2 and Aliens still look great today. Movies like Enemy Mine got that cult scifi following.

 

[Caliburn24]

Does the Last Starfighter count? It is both cheap and cheesy. And wonderfully good campy fun!

Someday there will be a sequel!

 

[Aragorn]

^ The Next Last Starfighter? Another Last Starfighter? Son of the Last Starfighter?

 

[Colonel Midnight]

Would Serenity fall into this category?

Cheers,
-CM-

 

[Caliburn24]

Well...picking up where the original left off...Brother of the Last Starfighter!

Its gold I tell you! Gold!

 

[Alpha_Geek]

Thank's Mysterion. That movie, especially the cockroaches, gave me night mares for years to come!!! In fact, I stayed in a hotel one night in Norfolk Virgina and had to get up to pee...turned on the lights and the walls had like twenty cockroached on them....I didn't go back to bed.

Rob

How do you think Paul Winfield felt when he discovered his fate in ST2:TWOK??? "Bugs... why is it every sci-fi movie I'm in I get eaten by bugs??? First Damnation Alley, and now this??"

 

[Shawnster]

I would not classfiy Enemy Mine, Gattica, Westworld, Planet of the Apes nor Silent Running as CHEAP sci-fi.

Otherwise the sited movies all fit. I loved Ice Pirates and Space Hunter. Remember seeing both of those in the theater. I own Dark Star (on DVD and BetaMAX). Also remember seeing BBTS in the theater.

 

[cylkoth]

Hm...Battle Beyond The Stars.

If you thought that felt cheap (but I liked it), I also loved a movie called "Space Raiders" - essentially a new story reusing all the ships and special effects (heck, even James Horner's iconic score) from BBTS.

"Goddamn rocks! I hate rocks!"

There was another just like this-the name escapes me, but MST3K ran it. It starred Reb Brown (Captain America tv films, Yor: Hunter from the Future), and used sfx lifted from Battlestar Galactica.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

Hm...Battle Beyond The Stars.

If you thought that felt cheap (but I liked it), I also loved a movie called "Space Raiders" - essentially a new story reusing all the ships and special effects (heck, even James Horner's iconic score) from BBTS.

"Goddamn rocks! I hate rocks!"

There was another just like this-the name escapes me, but MST3K ran it. It starred Reb Brown (Captain America tv films, Yor: Hunter from the Future), and used sfx lifted from Battlestar Galactica.

Space Mutiny. A movie so bad that one character was killed and then mysteriously reappears with no explanation.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Space Truckers

I could go for some square pork right now.

Nightflyers with Katherine Mary "Night of the Comets" Stewart. It's what happens when you try to meld 2001 and Alien. The whole thing has a cheap(er) Event Horizon feel.
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I don't think I've ever seen that one, shame it only seems to be on VHS.

 

[chrisspringob]

"The American Astronaut" is the ultimate in cheap space movies:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfO0S2RJS6I&feature=related

Nothing else even comes close, IMHO.

 

[LutherSloan]

Star Wars (Episode IV: A New Hope) was made for very very little.

It was Lucas' primary motivation for later releasing the Special Editions (except money I guess...).

 

[Aragorn]

When I hear Spacehunter, it also makes me think of Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn. Maybe because they came out the same year. I wonder if I saw them both in the theater, since I was really young. Krull came out the same year. I wonder if all three movies (plus Star Trek II the year before and Star Trek III the year after) shaped my interest in sci fi and fantasy.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

^^ I think they were both presented in 3-D as well.

Like Armageddon/Deep Impact, Leviathan/Deep Star Six and any number of related movie pairs eluding me at the moment that seem to get released together sometimes.

 

[Super Grover]

Another one I thought of? Westworld. Wasn't that a cheapy scifi movie at the time?

Anyone see the sequel: Futureworld

Someone mentioned StarCrash, how about The Green Slime. Schwarzenegger's The Running Man has that cheap feel as well as Total Recall.

 

[FalTorPan]

You want cheap movies, you discount Ed Wood's films, and people submit stuff like Gattaca and The Last Starfighter?

Ooooookay.