# The Last Star Fighter **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 15, 2007, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162 "2007-04-15T00:47:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/21 "2007-04-16T00:17:31Z")
Haven’t found a picture yet, but I did find someone selling the press photos on Ebay but they only show one of 11 photos. I asked if they had one of Xur and the scepter. ---
**Author:** ![tanstaafl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ba8739/32.png) [@tanstaafl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tanstaafl)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/22 "2007-04-16T02:07:39Z")
I must confess, The Last Starfighter contains my favorite movie exchange of all time. Alex: How many starfighters do we have left? Grig: Counting yourself? Alex: Yes. Grig: One. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/23 "2007-04-16T02:34:19Z")
My favorite exchange: **Grig** : [Happy and confident] Don’t worry, Alex, I’ll have it all figured out by the time we reach the Frontier. [alarm sounds and Grig’s face falls] **Alex** : What’s that? **Grig** : [Grimly] The Frontier. IMO this is a movie that should be re-released with a new enhanced edition. Oh, and I noticed that right now one can see it in the favorite streaming internet video site. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/24 "2007-04-16T02:54:12Z")
[QUOTE=Cerowyn] Wasn’t it the first movie with only CGI special effects? [/QUOTE] Not counting _Tron_. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/25 "2007-04-16T03:07:33Z")
[QUOTE=Lute Skywatcher] Not counting _Tron_. 😉 [/QUOTE] I was gonna throw in to the mix _Young Sherlock Holmes_. But, it’s a tad too late. YSH: 1985 TLSF: 1984 Tron: 1982 But, which one was the first _completely_ CGI for special effects? I can’t find a definite cite. In the trivia page for Tron, IMDb says: > [@](#): > > The movie was passed over for an Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects because the Academy felt TRON “cheated” by using a computer. (Seven years later, The Abyss (1989) would win for its computer visual effects.) ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/26 "2007-04-16T03:13:17Z")
The trivia page for \*\*The Last Starfighter \*\* on imdb (I know–not always accurate) says: “The first movie to do all special effects (except makeup and explosions) on a computer. All shots of spacecraft, space, etc were generated on a Cray X-MP computer.” ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/27 "2007-04-16T03:18:59Z")
IMDb trivia page for Young Sherlock Holmes: > [@](#): > > First feature film to have a completely CGI (computer graphics image) character: the knight coming out of the stained glass window. Industrial Light and Magic animated the scene. I’m wondering if we will find a definitive answer not based on Wiki or IMDb. Perhaps it will end up depending on how specific we make the question. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/28 "2007-04-16T03:51:08Z")
My mistake; _Tron_ was the first movie to use CGI but most of the effects were optical. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/29 "2007-04-16T03:58:48Z")
[QUOTE=Lute Skywatcher] My mistake; _Tron_ was the first movie to use CGI but most of the effects were optical. [/QUOTE] Well, even that above quoted trivia tidbit for TLSF says that the explosions were not CGI. So, it wasn’t (according to that cite) the first all CGI FX movie. So, perhaps we’re all missing something. So, what was the first movie to use only CGI for all of its special effects? (We all seem to keep hitting on partials in our findings) ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/30 "2007-04-16T04:07:45Z")
**Toy Story** 😉 ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/31 "2007-04-16T04:11:43Z")
[QUOTE=NoClueBoy] So, what was the first movie to use only CGI for all of its special effects? (We all seem to keep hitting on partials in our findings) [/QUOTE] Has there been one yet? Even The Matrixes and Star Wars use some small practical effects still, don’t they? Maybe that craptacular one with the skyships from a few years ago with all CG sets? I’m blanking on the name. \*slaps \*\*Tangent \*_with a CG trout_ ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/32 "2007-04-16T04:23:42Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] Maybe that craptacular one with the skyships from a few years ago with all CG sets? I’m blanking on the name. [/quote] Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow > [@](#): > > \*slaps \*\*Tangent \*_with a CG trout_ 😛 ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/33 "2007-04-16T12:21:03Z")
I liked The Last Starfighter – it took an idea that was an Urban Legend at the time (the idea that the military or somebody was using video games to test potential fighters) and ran with it, threw in Robert Preston’s “Music Man” con man character, and added CGI effects that were pretty good for the time. A few notes: 1.) **Tron** may have been created with the help of computers, but so were the Hamnna-Barbera cartoons of the late 1950s and early 1960s. All of those computer scenes in Tron were drawn over and colored by hand, if memory serves – that’s what all those people at “Cuckoo Nest Studios”, with their names written only in oriental characters in the closing credits were doing. I think that **the Last Starfighter** really _was_ the first majhor movie with all CGI effects, therefore. 2.) The guys who made TLS tried to interest Lucas in doing the spacecraft effects for **Return of the Jedi** using their CGI, and went so far as to do some demos. Lucas judged them not as good as the models they were using, and passed. The guys were just a bit early, of course – CGI hadn’t matured enough and looked too cartoony. But lucas did eventually use CGI starships ijn the retrofit on his original trilogy. 3.) When you looked at the still figures of the ships in TLS, they looked _great_ (So did their still renders of the X-wings from Star Wars). For some reason they looked cartoony and unconvincing in motion. I’m still not clear on why. 4.) Despite what **Christpopher** remembers, the black guy wasn’t the janitor at the trailer park – Alex took care od cleanup, as is made abundantly clear in the dialogue. The black guy was just another resident, and there was no racial put-down in the film. The past is still good. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/34 "2007-04-16T12:28:45Z")
I dunno, reluctant kid with special ability gets recruited by a wizened codger, who dies but not really, and he hits the big alien vessel in the one vulnerable spot yet the main bad guy escapes… If there’d been a sequel, would we learn Alex and Maggie were siblings? ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/35 "2007-04-16T13:00:14Z")
[QUOTE=Autolycus] Can you tell I like this movie? 😃 [/QUOTE] Either that or you like reading the [quotes from IMDB] ([http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087597/quotes](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087597/quotes)) ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/36 "2007-04-16T13:39:15Z")
[QUOTE=CalMeacham] 3.) When you looked at the still figures of the ships in TLS, they looked _great_ (So did their still renders of the X-wings from Star Wars). For some reason they looked cartoony and unconvincing in motion. I’m still not clear on why. [/QUOTE] The objects had no textures. They just had digital surfaces, which looks nice and sharp and clean in a still image, but look digital and harsh and artificial in motion. ---
**Author:** ![Constant\_Reader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8edcca/32.png) [@Constant\_Reader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Constant_Reader)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/37 "2007-04-16T13:55:48Z")
Loved The Last Starfighter. The only part that ever bothered me was the clone Alex forming in the bunk bed. His girlfriend was played by Catherine Mary Stewart who was also a main character in my other favorite movie from that time…Night of the Comet. I have watched both of those films more times than I can count. I was ten years old and they were awesome. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/38 "2007-04-16T14:02:04Z")
> [@](#): > > The objects had no textures. They just had digital surfaces, which looks nice and sharp and clean in a still image, but look digital and harsh and artificial in motion. But the stills that were published in magazines had _plenty_ of texture – that’s why they looked so realistic! I don’t know if they dispensed with textures for the moving scenes (hard to believe), or if some feature of moving ships made them look unrealistic. But the still shots of the Starfighters and the X-wings they did looked photorealistic. ---
**Author:** ![WarmNPrickly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/d78d45/32.png) [@WarmNPrickly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WarmNPrickly)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/39 "2007-04-16T17:36:41Z")
> [@](#): > > 4.) Despite what Christpopher remembers, the black guy wasn’t the janitor at the trailer park – Alex took care od cleanup, as is made abundantly clear in the dialogue. The black guy was just another resident, and there was no racial put-down in the film. The past is still good. I could’ve sworn he was the janitor. I could be wrong. Nevertheless, something felt a little off about that character. Perhaps I was being a bit sensitive at the time. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Ashtar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ea924/32.png) [@Lord\_Ashtar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Ashtar)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2007, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162/40 "2007-04-16T17:51:51Z")
“Centauri! I thought you were dead!” “Who, me? Die? And miss all the excitement?” “Well, yeah. I saw you die.” “But then I would’ve missed all the excitement. We can’t have that.” “That doesn’t make any sense. What are you, a Jedi or something?” “A what?” “You know, a Jedi. An old fart who pulled an unsuspecting kid out of his boring life, led him on to something greater, only to die and yet continue to lead him somehow.” “You play too many video games, kid. Now run along back to Earth and pick up that hot piece of ass girlfriend of yours.” Dialogue changed just for kicks. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-last-star-fighter/400162.md?page=3)