Dark Star

Dark Star (1974) is a sci-fi comedy you can watch online on iFILM. It is John Carpenter's first feature film, expanded from the thesis project he made as a student.

Four astronauts have spent twenty years drifting through the galaxy aboard the scout ship Dark Star. Their job is to blow up unstable planets so future colonists can move in safely. By now the crew has gone half-feral from boredom: the captain is dead and kept in cold storage, the pilots are bearded and bored stiff, and the ship's pet is a cranky alien that looks like a beach ball with claws. The real trouble starts when one of the smart bombs refuses to detach and begins debating the meaning of its own existence.

Carpenter co-wrote the script with Dan O'Bannon, who also plays Sergeant Pinback and would later dream up Alien. Made on almost no budget, the film became a cult send-up of 2001: A Space Odyssey and a landmark of scrappy 1970s student filmmaking. Stream Dark Star (1974) online on iFILM.