Movies - Spaceballs

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	Movies - Spaceballs

Spaceballs is a 1987 science fiction spoof movie written, directed by, and starring Mel Brooks. Opening on June 28th of that year, it earned only modest returns. Its plot and characters contain numerous parodies of elements from Star Wars and other popular films. Many fans wait eagerly for the possible announced sequel.

Box office

The budget for Spaceballs was 22.7 million dollars. The film grossed 38.1 million dollars during its run, with an opening weekend of 6.6 million dollars.

Cast

Bill Pullman
– Captain Lone Starr
John Candy
– Barfolemew (Barf)
Rick Moranis
– Lord Dark Helmet
Daphne Zuniga
– Princess Vespa of Druidia
Mel Brooks
– President Skroob/Yogurt
George Wyner – Colonel Sandurz
Lorene Yarnell – Dot Matrix
Joan Rivers
– Dot Matrix (voice)
Dick Van Patten
– King Roland, Ruler of Druidia
Michael Winslow
– Radar Technician
Jim J. Bullock – Prince Valium
Dom DeLuise
– Pizza the Hutt (voice)
John Hurt
– Man in diner (character credited as John Hurt)

Plot

On Planet Druidia, Princess Vespa (a parody of Princess Leia) is about to get married to the boring and narcoleptic Prince Valium (who is the last prince in the galaxy, and thus they have to marry despite his characteristics). She runs off from the altar with her droid-of-honor, Dot Matrix (a parody of C-3PO), and escapes into space.

Planet Spaceball has foolishly wasted all of its air and is desperate to find more. President Skroob (an anagram of "Brooks" and pun on screwball, and a parody of Emperor Palpatine, played by Mel Brooks) and his top military leader, Dark Helmet (a parody of Darth Vader), along with his aide Colonel Sandurz (a pun on the creator/mascot for Kentucky Fried Chicken: Colonel Sanders, as well a parody of Imperial Officers like Veers, Tarkin, and Piett), devise a plan to kidnap Princess Vespa and extort Planet Druidia into giving all of its air to the Spaceballs. If they do not comply, they will reverse Vespa's cosmetic surgery, thus restoring her hooked nose.

Meanwhile, Vespa's father, King Roland, hires two rogues: Captain Lone Starr (a parody of Han Solo and Luke Skywalker) from the Ford Galaxy (in reference to a car of the same name, as well as Harrison Ford, the actor who originally played Han Solo) and Barfolomew, aka "Barf" (a mawg, or man-dog halfbreed, who is a parody of Chewbacca), who are desperate for money to pay back their debts to Mafia boss Pizza the Hutt (an obvious parody of Jabba the Hutt, and a pun on the Pizza Hut restaurant chain)—to get Princess Vespa back to Druidia so that she can marry Prince Valium. They are helped by the wise alien sage known as Yogurt (A parody of Yoda) and the mysterious power he possesses, called the Schwartz (parody of the Force; "Schwartz" is a common Ashkenazi Jewish surname).

The movie features a lightsaber duel between Dark Helmet and Lone Starr, but instead of "lightsabers" as in Star Wars, they create a light beam emanating from their Schwartz rings. With their rings initially held in front of their pants, the light beams form an obvious phallic image.

In the end, Lone Starr and Barf are able to rescue the princess, destroy the Spaceballs' spaceship (Spaceball One), and get the Druidian air back. At the end, Lone Starr finds out that he is a prince, and returns to Planet Druidia to marry Princess Vespa. Pizza the Hutt gets trapped in his car and "ate himself to death". As for Skroob, Dark Helmet, and Colonel Sandurz, they survive a crash-landing on the Planet of the Apes.

Selected elements

Antagonist

The main villain, Dark Helmet is played by Rick Moranis. Just as the movie as a whole is largely a parody of Star Wars, Helmet is an obvious takeoff on Darth Vader, the immediate villain of that trilogy.

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