Revenge of the Stolen Stars | |
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Directed by | Ulli Lommel |
Written by | Ben A. Hein Ulli Lommel |
Produced by | Roger Deutsch Kevin M. Kallberg Ulli Lommel Suzanna Love |
Starring | Klaus Kinski Suzanna Love Ulli Lommel |
Cinematography | David Sperling Jürg V. Walther |
Edited by | Warren G. Peters Lynn M. Zook |
Music by | Bob Thiele |
Production companies | A.M.A. Film R. Deutsch Productions Six Stars Production |
Distributed by | DPI (France) |
Release date |
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Running time | 76 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Revenge of the Stolen Stars is a 1985 American comedy fantasy film cowritten and directed by Ulli Lommel and starring Klaus Kinski, Suzanna Love, Barry Hickey and Ulli Lommel. [1]
A young man named Gene McBride inherits a large plantation and a mine of rubies on an island south of the China Sea. Gene moves there with his beloved partner Kelly to search the Six Stars, a famous collection of rubies. However, soon enough the couple find out that they will have to live with the ghost of Donald McBride, the original plantation owner and Gene's uncle, as well as confronting a curse.
Ulli Lommel was initially attached at one point to direct Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984), [2] but instead he ended up shooting Revenge of the Stolen Stars. [2] Lommel was unsure about casting Klaus Kinski, but after the latter's agent convinced Lommel that Kinski had "mellowed" and that he was "a different person now", [2] he decided to meet Kinski at the Chateau Marmont hotel in Los Angeles and found him to be very pleasant, [2] in contrast with Kinski's reputation of being irascible and unstable. But when filming started, Kinski was very hard to work with and constantly complained about the lights and microphones and constantly asked to remove them, [2] so eventually the crew only used a few soft lights and very small microphones in the Kinski scenes, [2] which is why the sound quality changes so much in different shots. [2]
Kinski also didn't want to sit on a chair when camera crew was about to shoot from different angle, so continuity wasn't possible. Because of that Lommel decided to change Kinski's character to a ghost, which was a brilliant idea in Kinski's opinion. [3] [2] Kinski became so elated with Lommel's idea that he also shouted at the moment "Oh my god, you are a fucking genius!", [2] and told Lommel that he wouldn't work in the future with any other director than Lommel, to which Lommel's reply was: "Yeah, right!". [2]
Kinski drank heavily and at one point practically forced the entire crew to shoot almost thirty consecutive hours, so they could finally wrap up his scenes and be done with his involvement. Kinski was so happy with this that two days later he approached Lommel on a beach in Mexico (where an important part of the shooting took place) to show his appreciation, [2] telling the latter that he had a great time while they worked together, and praising his directing style, saying "you have so much imagination!". [2] Lommel's half-soothing and half-ironical answer was "well thanks Klaus, that's very kind of you". [2]
Aguirre, the Wrath of God is a 1972 epic historical drama film produced, written and directed by Werner Herzog. Klaus Kinski stars in the title role of Spanish soldier Lope de Aguirre, who leads a group of conquistadores down the Amazon River in South America in search of the legendary city of gold, El Dorado. The accompanying soundtrack was composed and performed by kosmische musik band Popol Vuh. The film is an international co-production between West Germany and Mexico.
Klaus Kinski was a German actor. Equally renowned for his intense performance style and notorious for his volatile personality, he appeared in over 130 film roles in a career that spanned 40 years, from 1948 to 1988. He is best known for starring in five films directed by Werner Herzog from 1972 to 1987, who would later chronicle their tumultuous relationship in the documentary My Best Fiend.
Fitzcarraldo is a 1982 West German epic adventure-drama film written, produced, and directed by Werner Herzog, and starring Klaus Kinski as would-be rubber baron Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald, an Irishman known in Peru as Fitzcarraldo, who is determined to transport a steamship over the Andes mountains to access a rich rubber territory in the Amazon basin. The character was inspired by Peruvian rubber baron Carlos Fitzcarrald, who once transported a disassembled steamboat over the Isthmus of Fitzcarrald.
Nosferatu the Vampyre is a 1979 gothic horror film written and directed by Werner Herzog. It is set primarily in 19th-century Wismar, Germany and Transylvania, and was conceived as a stylistic adaptation of Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula, taking the title, setting and titular character's design from F. W. Murnau's 1922 film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror. The picture stars Klaus Kinski as Count Dracula, Isabelle Adjani as Lucy Harker, Bruno Ganz as Jonathan Harker, and French artist-writer Roland Topor as Renfield. There are two different versions of the film, one in which the actors speak English, and one in which they speak German.
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The Kalem Company was an early American film studio founded in New York City in 1907. It was one of the first companies to make films abroad and to set up winter production facilities, first in Florida and then in California. Kalem was sold to Vitagraph Studios in 1917.
Ulli Lommel was a German actor and director, noted for his many collaborations with Rainer Werner Fassbinder and his association with the New German Cinema movement. Lommel spent time at The Factory and was a creative associate of Andy Warhol, with whom he made several films and works of art. He moved to the United States in 1977, where he wrote, directed and starred in over 50 films.
Suzanna Potter Love is an American former actress and screenwriter known for her collaborations with her husband, director Ulli Lommel, in the 1980s. She starred in Lommel's supernatural slasher film The Boogeyman (1980) and the psychological thriller Olivia (1983); she also co-wrote and starred in Lommel's horror films BrainWaves (1982) and The Devonsville Terror (1983). She had minor appearances in Lommel's science fiction musical film Strangers in Paradise (1984) and Revenge of the Stolen Stars (1985) before retiring from acting.
Burden of Dreams is a 1982 documentary film directed by Les Blank.
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Billy the Kid is a 1941 American western film, a color remake of the 1930 film of the same name. The film features Robert Taylor as Billy and Brian Donlevy as a fictionalized version of Pat Garrett renamed "Jim Sherwood" in the film. Directed by David Miller and based on the book by Walter Noble Burns, the cast also included Gene Lockhart and Lon Chaney Jr. The film was not as well received as the 1930 original, Billy the Kid, which had starred Johnny Mack Brown and Wallace Beery and been shot in an experimental widescreen process.
The Boogey Man is a 1980 American supernatural slasher film written and directed by Ulli Lommel, and starring Suzanna Love, John Carradine, and Ron James. The film's title refers to the long-held superstition of boogeymen beings, and its plot concerns two siblings who are targeted by the ghost of their mother's deceased boyfriend which has been freed from a mirror.
The Devonsville Terror is a 1983 American supernatural horror film directed by Ulli Lommel and starring Suzanna Love, Donald Pleasence, and Robert Walker. The plot focuses on three different women who arrive in a conservative New England town, one of whom is the reincarnation of a witch who was wrongfully executed along with two others by the town's founding fathers in 1683.
Crawlspace is a 1986 American horror thriller film starring Klaus Kinski as Karl Guenther, the crazed son of a Nazi doctor obsessed with trapping young women and slowly torturing them to death, alongside Talia Balsam, Barbara Whinnery, and Tané McClure. It is written and directed by David Schmoeller, and later became infamous due to the on-set conflicts between Schmoeller and Kinski, with claims that producer Roberto Bessi attempted to have Kinski murdered due to his continued hostility towards the crew.
The Pleasure Girls is a 1965 British drama film directed by Gerry O'Hara and starring Francesca Annis, Ian McShane and Klaus Kinski.
Venus in Furs is a 1969 film directed by Jesús Franco. The plot involves jazz musician James Darren, who becomes obsessed with a mysterious fur-clad Wanda, later finding her dead body washed up on the beach. The film stars James Darren, Barbara McNair, Maria Rohm and Klaus Kinski.
Timestalkers is a 1987 American made-for-television science fiction film directed by Michael Schultz and starring William Devane. The film is based on Ray Brown's story The Tintype.
She Shoots Straight is a 1990 Hong Kong crime action film directed by Corey Yuen, who also writer with Barry Wong and Yuen Kai-chi. The film stars Joyce Godenzi, Carina Lau, and Sammo Hung, who also producer with Chan Pui-wah. The film was released theatrically in Hong Kong on 4 July 1990.
Super 4 is an animated television series that began in 2014, marking the 40th anniversary of the Playmobil toys that inspired it. It features a team of heroes who protect the inhabitants of the disparate worlds of Kingsland, the Enchanted Island, and the City of Technopolis, against calamities and enemies.
BrainWaves is a 1982 American science fiction thriller film co-written and directed by Ulli Lommel, and starring Keir Dullea, Suzanna Love, Vera Miles, Paul Willson, Percy Rodriguez, Tony Curtis, Corinne Wahl, and Eve Brent. It follows a woman whose brain function is restored by a computer, with dangerous consequences.