Starman (film)

Infobox_Film
name= John Carpenter's
Starman


caption="Starman" theatrical poster
director=John Carpenter
starring=Jeff Bridges Karen Allen
writer= Bruce A. Evans Raynold Gideon Dean Riesner
(Uncredited)
cinematography = Donald M. Morgan
editing= Marion Rothman
producer= Larry J. Franco
Michael Douglas
music=Jack Nitzsche
distributor=Columbia Pictures
released=December 14, 1984
country=USA
language=English
budget=$24 million USD
runtime=115 min.
amg_id = 1:46664
imdb_id=0088172

"John Carpenter's Starman" is a 1984 science fiction and fantasy film directed by John Carpenter which tells the story of an alien from another planet (Jeff Bridges) who has come to earth in response to the invitation found on the gold phonograph record installed on one of the Voyager space probes.

The screenplay was written by Bruce A. Evans, Raynold Gideon and Dean Riesner (uncredited). Bridges was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor. The film inspired a short-lived, 1986 television series of the same name which starred Robert Hays and Christopher Daniel Barnes.

An unsolicited script by Irish screenwriter Brad Hansen for a sequel to the film "Starman" was written in 1998, but remains unproduced. Jeff Bridges expressed an interest in reprising the title role, and is heard stating this on the "Starman" DVD commentary.

Plot

Upon arriving within earth's lower atmosphere, the Starman's ship is attacked by military aircraft, forcing it to crash-land close by the cabin of a young woman named Jenny Hayden (Karen Allen). After reminiscing about her dead husband Scott by watching old movies and looking through photo albums, Jenny has fallen asleep from drinking too much in an attempt to drown her sorrows. The visitor, incidentally, exists only as a blue cloud of energy at this stage. Whether this is because his physical body was destroyed in the crash or because he arrived in this condition remains unclear. He finds a lock of Scott's hair in a photo album, samples the DNA from it, replicates it into a fully adult, cloned physical body in a matter of minutes and then takes up residence. After getting over the initial shock of the encounter with her dead husband's clone Jenny reluctantly agrees to drive him from Wisconsin to Meteor Crater in Arizona, where his mother ship will be picking him up. She sees herself more as a victim at first but eventually loses all fear of the celestial visitor and resolves to assist him whatever the cost.

Along the way the couple is pursued by the United States Army who detected the crash. The Army contingent is led by a cold-blooded NSA Chief Fox (Richard Jaeckel) who is reluctantly assisted by a decidedly more humane civilian scientist named Mark Shermin (Charles Martin Smith).

Over the course of the journey, the Starman learns about humanity (and "being" human) through direct experience and from some explanations by Jenny, who in turn learns more about him when his communication skills improve, finding that he is a tender, sincere, vulnerable and loving being. By the end of the journey, when the ailing Starman is retrieved by his fellow extraterrestrials, he has saved Jenny's life, they have fallen in love and her biological inability to conceive has been rectified.

Cast

External links

*
* [http://www.theofficialjohncarpenter.com/pages/themovies/st/st.html Starman at theofficialjohncarpenter.com]
* [http://www.dareland.com/emulsionalproblems/carpenterjohn.htm LA Weekly interview with John Carpenter on the making of "Starman"]
* [http://www.acmewebpages.com/karen_a/index.html Karen Allen: An ACME Page - includes a Starman page]