By Jonathan Klotz
| Published
Sci-fi can be applied to any genre to create something new and different, from detective noir with Altered Carbon to Westerns with Firefly, but there’s one combination that hasn’t been topped in over 40 years: sci-fi romance. Starman, a 1984 sci-fi romance starring Jeff Bridges and Karen Allen, perfected the story of an alien falling in love with a human to the point that it still holds up today despite the dated special effects. There were stories before and stories after of alien/human love, but no one has balanced the two different genres as expertly as legendary horror director John Carpenter.
A Cross-Country Trip With Starman
Starman picks up with an alien race responding to the message found within the Voyager 2 probe, but assuming it was an invitation to come visit the alien scout, is unprepared for the military to fire on his craft and it crashlands in Wisconsin. Using a strand of hair, the energy-being inside creates a body for itself and turns into Jeff Bridges (Starman, not actually Jeff Bridges), the dead husband of Jenny Hayden (Karen Allen). Unable to get across his true intentions to Jenny, she believes at first that the alien is kidnapping her on its way to Arizona and a planned meeting with an alien spacecraft.
Together, Jenny and Starman travel cross-country as they evade the authorities and start to bond. They’re kept safe thanks to the alien’s spheres, incredibly advanced devices capable of performing miracles, from bringing a deer back to life to saving them from an explosion, and each act of kindness brings the alien closer to Jenny’s heart. With only a limited number of spheres, the pair’s options dwindle as they get closer to their goal and the full force of the military starts to move in, which is a complete cliche, but it’s rarely done as well as it is here.
The genre shift from sci-fi to romance and back again flows with the story and the end result is far more graceful and elegant than more recent sci-fi romance films like Passengers or About Time. Carpenter, two years removed from releasing the cult hit The Thing, had never made a romantic film before, and he never would again, but he clearly had the talent for it. The director was able to get a Golden Globe and Oscar-nominated performance from Jeff Bridges, a rarity for a sci-fi film, and he ended up winning a Saturn award for Best Actor.
A Landmark Sci-Fi Movie From The Master Of Horror
Three years before Starman, Karen Allen found the role of a lifetime as Marion Ravenwood in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, and it’s not a big stretch to consider Jenny her second-greatest role ever. Allen has the ability to convey real human emotion in outlandish situations, making it a shame she didn’t do more genre work in her long and historic career. Critics at the time thought so too, with both Allen and Bridges receiving praise for their performances as the film went on to earn $28 million during its theatrical run, barely squeaking past its $24 million budget, but turning a profit thanks to video rentals.
The 80s were a landmark decade for sci-fi films, Starman even debuted alongside David Lynch’s Dune to give an idea how packed the year was with genre films. In the ensuing decades, Carpenter’s sci-fi romance has aged like a fine wine, and ever since, no director has been able to outdo what the Master of Horror accomplished in his one and only shot at the genre. In fact, the film is held in such high regard, that Shawn Levy, the director of Deadpool & Wolverine, gave up trying to remake the film, declaring that no script could match the original.
Starman is currently available via Video on Demand through Amazon Prime Video, Google Play, AppleTV, and Fandango At Home.
