Who would have thought a few months ago, with the likes of Dune and 2010
dominating the list of impending yuletide spectacles, that the most satisfying
of the season's movies would turn out to be John Carpenter's alien-comes-to
earth saga, Starman?
But there you have it.
Of course, Starman earns the honor partially by default. The only serious
competition among this Christmas' crop of croppers is Eddie Murphy's Beverly
Hills Cop. They're both good, but Starman is ultimately the more resonant and
affecting.
It's a small movie by the standards of the aforementioned science-fiction
spectacles, and surprisingly sweet. It keeps its attention focused on humans;
the big moments are epiphanic and character-related. It goes for the heart
instead of the gut, and hits it.
Carpenter may cadge shamelessly from other directors - particularly some
overt visual lifts from Steven Spielberg - and during the last 20 minutes the
symbolism may seem annoyingly pious and messianic. But he keeps things crisp
and gives the movie - yet another tale of innocence vs. the modern world - its
own distinctive voice. Various moments may remind you of things that you've
seen before, but the movie as a whole has a unique, satisfying flavor.
Starman begins with the unmanned Voyager 2 spacecraft hurtling through deep
space, where it is picked up by a gigantic alien spaceship that looks something
like the planet Saturn. The Voyager's contents, a brief summary of life on
Earth and an invitation to come visit is taken to heart by the aliens, who
dispatch one of their number to investigate.
When the alien ship enters U.S. air space, it's mistaken for an errant
missile and blasted out of the sky, crashing in a fireball in remote Wisconsin.
The alien - a weird, floating blue light - wafts into the nearby cabin of a
lonely, young woman (Karen Allen) and, using a strand of hair in a scrapbook,
clones itself into an exact duplicate of her recently deceased husband (Jeff
Bridges).
From there, the movie becomes a cross-country chase as Allen drives the
alien to a rendezvous with his mothership in the desert of northern New Mexico
while insidious agents of the U.S. government try to track them down.
Bridges is enormously effective in the difficult, thankless role of the
Christlike alien. He has to convey a rather corny combination of innocence and
superintelligence, and he does it shrewdly. It's a physical performance. He
jerks his body around as though he's just learning how to use it, and
punctuates his robotlike dialogue with an odd tilt of the head. The character
is able to shift successfully from menacing to endearing because Bridges has
cannily set a foundation for the transformation. It's easily his best work on
the screen.
The performance is aided immensely by the strong support of Karen Allen. She
keeps her emotions sharply drawn and is able to economically convey her rather
complex relationship with the alien. At first she is repelled by his weird ways
and frightening resemblance to her husband, but this melts into a sad sort of
affection as the alien reveals its noble nature and reminds her in small ways
of the man she misses so much.
The special effects are a odd grab bag - some work, others are patently
phony. But Carpenter holds the movie together by giving it a strong narrative
line and introducing lots of interesting bit characters during the cross
country escape. Basically, Starman is a road movie with outer-space
connotations.
And at the end, when the alien tells a government agent what it is that he
finds to admire about the human race, it's genuinely uplifting.
John Carpenter is an immensely talented journeyman director probably best
known for his blood-and-guts horror movies - 1978's trend-setting Halloween,
1982's nauseatingly gory The Thing and last Christmas' enormously effective
adaptation of Stephen King's Christine. He isn't necessarily the director that
you would hire to make a sweet, sci-fi love story, and definitely not the type
you would expect to pull it off.
But there you have it.
STARMAN
Produced by Larry J. Franco, directed by John Carpenter, written by Bruce A.
Evans and Raynold Gideon, photography by Donald M. Norgan, music by Jack
Nitzsche and distributed by Columbia Pictures; running time: 1 hour, 45
minutes. ***
Starman - Jeff Bridges
Jenny Hayden - Karen Allen
Mark Shermin - Charles Martin Smith
George Fox - Richard Jaeckel
Maj. Bell - Robert Phalen
Sgt. Lemon - Tony Edwards
Parents' guide: PG (mild violence, adult situations)
Copyright © 1993 Philadelphia Inquirer