Among Willie Nelson’s 152 and counting albums, there are naturally some clunkers. But even at his worse, starting with the three albums he made with crooner/golf pro Don Cherry and continuing through the 1984 Angel Eyes, marred by the mismatched guitar pyrotechnics of Jackie King, Nelson brings a reliable professionalism to the studio and the stage. His film career is another matter. For every well-received performance like Barbarosa or endearing cameo appearance on Monk (though it remains a mystery why the neurotic detective seemed unperturbed by the shabby condition of Nelson’s beloved Trigger), Nelson’s dozens of credits as an actor, even playing himself, are a much higher risk for cringe-free motion picture value. The nadir of his entire career as an entertainer may be the 1996 science fiction feature Starlight, which seems for all the world like a straight-to-VHS throwaway but improbably got an actual theatrical release. The ecologically minded dystopia may be the worst thing in the careers of both Nelson and co-star Rae Dawn Chong, and one of them made a David DeCoteau movie.
The ridiculous plot revolves around the alluring alien woman Arianna (Chong), who visits Earth in search of a half-human who may be her son and who may be the only person who can save the planet from ecological destruction. Arianna also fears for her life, as she is being hunted by the evil Pallas (Alex Diakun), who wants the woman dead for some incomprehensible space reason that probably has something to do with the melting polar caps.
Chong communicates with earth by means of crystals that she picks from an apple-like device that sits in what looks like an ottoman-sized rancid corn muffin. Because she speaks a mental language beyond the ken of earthlings, title cards in a futuristic block font help with the exposition. So before she travels to a faraway planet, we can read, “The crystals will mark the time you will be capable of surviving in earth’s poisoned atmosphere.” No predictions are made on how long the viewer will be capable of surviving Starlight, especially given the poor quality of the VHS screener on YouTube.
When we meet Kieran (Billy Wirth, for some reason top-billed), the savior of the world, we find him in his natural element: shirtless and playing the flute out the window of his big city apartment while a taxidermied owl looks on. That’s the level of discourse we’re working with here, and if you think Kieran looks silly at home, wait till you see him riding a motorcycle. For young Kieran is born to wander America’s heartland, where he rides to meet his sweetie (Deanna Milligan), mumbling sweet non-conformities to her to win her rebel-loving heart.
But humans are small in the scheme of things, and among Kieran’s visions are of a spaceship and eagle flying out of space rays, rendered in graphics that make the Teletubbies’ bear on a carousel look like Ray Harryhausen. Granted, there’s an endearing moment when Kieran mind- melds with a wolf, his face dissolving into the animal’s, and that’s one of the highlights.
Nelson plays Grandpa Lium, an elder who seems to have healing powers, and honestly one isn’t sure what he’s doing there. Though the answer may lie in one of director Jonathon Kay’s subsequent projects: Nelson appears in a 1999 episode of Kay’s Walking After Midnight, a series in which celebrities are interviewed about reincarnation and angelic encounters. (Note that Kay, bless his generous heart, was at one point active on the Airbnb-like service Couchsurfing, offering the use of his pad in Captain Hook, Hawaii under the username magicdolphin.) To his credit, Nelson doesn’t treat the muddled scenario like it’s the dumbest thing in the history of cinema, dumber even than that clip of Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock juggling clues till the answer reveals itself. Sadly, there are no answers in Starlight, though there is something like triumph, and if you like the flute, there’s plenty of that too.
If you’re curious about Starlight at all, its most likely for the mystic possibilities of Willie Nelson shooting lasers out of his eyes. He does this marvelous parlor trick with great purpose: the laser eyes, shooting from Nelson’s glowing peepers at the perfectly dignified totem pole, release a beam that transports Kieran, Arianna and a magical child back into space towards a more benign home. It’s true—even after having seen it, multiple times, I can’t quite believe it myself.
In 1996, Willie Nelson released three albums: the well-regarded Spirit, the gospel album How Great Thou Art and the live quickie Greatest Hits: Live in Concert, coincidentally the subject of a Bargain Bin column in these pages. Starlight was the creative nadir of that and of any year in his storied, laser-eyed output.
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