SPACE RAIDERS Producer Roger Corman made one of my favorite low-budget STAR WARS knockoffs with BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS, which was actually a space remake of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (which was a remake of the classic Japanese film THE SEVEN SAMURAI) and cleverly featured a late-career appearance by Robert Vaughan in the exact same role he played in SEVEN, but now in space! I digress a bit, but my point is that Roger Corman knows how to make solid low-budget entertainment and that's exactly what you get with SPACE RAIDERS. In this film, a motley crew of space pirates hijack a ship and find a 10-year-old stowaway. The story is nothing special, but the film does feature some solid special effects and a terrific James Horner score. However, the ever thrifty producer, Corman reused Horner's score, along with many of the special effects, sets, and models, from his prior film, BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS. There are also bits of music from Horner's score on HUMANOID FROM THE DEEP. Overall, SPACE RAIDERS is nothing brilliant, but it is entertaining for fans of this sort of low-budget fare, featuring a cast of washed-up actors (Vince Edwards), character actors (Dick Miller, George Dickerson), and no-name up-and-comers (Luca Bercovici, future director of GHOULIES).
Review of Space Raiders
