Deadheads would go to this movie thinking they're getting a Grateful Dead experience. Instead they got to see very relatable characters floating around in space.

Dark Star and Evil Dead are the benchmarks for what to aspire for as your first film,

As a kid I had a lot of sympathy for Pinback, and I really liked Dan O'Bannon's portrayal -- this was before I knew he went on to be a screenwriter -- thought he could've gone on to be an actor if he wanted.

Saw it first at a sci-fi/fantasy/gaming con in 1978 and understood and appreciated the counterculture notes it was hitting, and laughed my ass off.

The funny part is the whole middle 'filler' plot of the escaped alien beach ball is basically proto 'Alien'!

Dark Star was a major influence on the British sci-fi comedy Red Dwarf, the creators of that one Rob Grant and Doug Naylor actually talk about coming out of a screening of Dark Star saying "I want to make something like THAT." and you can really see it in Red Dwarf, there's a couple of moderately intelligent working class guys flying around the universe in a crappy spaceship with a computer that's gone crazy.

I saw "Dark Star" accidently in 1974. When I was seven, my dad and I went to see a re-showing of "Forbidden Planet", and "Dark Star" was showing as a double-feature. We stayed to see it and  we both enjoyed more than we thought we would.

I saw the ice trays when they were mentioned. And it looks like interesting buttons on a spaceship. That's how James Cameron feels watching his old movies seeing the mistakes.

I love dark star so much. I first saw it as a 6yo around 1980 and thought it was the most terrifying thing I ever saw. saw it again every few years. it took until like 12yo until I first realized it was comedy! :D now I'm 50 and I just love it every time. it always makes me think of 70s european comics which were pretty much the same as the movie.

Wait. this isn't about the Grateful Dead.

“Let’s have some music in here Boiler…”

Reminds when Quentin was going to film a Star Trek film!

I always thought of it as the 3 Stooges in space. I can't think of any higher compliment 🤪

Next up -- Quentin Tarantino spends 32 minutes talking about a Pixar short that itself was only 4.5 minutes long.

I remember watching this on the Sunday afternoon 'Sci-Fi Theater' show on my local NBC affiliate when I was about 10...at the time I thought it was very creepy and weird and the guy frozen and dead in the floor but still somehow revived enough to speak and communicate gave me nightmares...seeing it in my 20's I was much more well equipped emotionally and psychologically speaking, and it's one of my favorite movies...

A popcorn classic

Those "student film qualities" can be done on purpose by even big-budget productions. He couldn't avoid them but failed to imagine that people could intentionally try for that look and that it could be an aesthetic all its own.

Dark Star is so funny and entertaining. It’s almost as funny as Airplane at certain points. Pinback does moral outrage like none other “That’s the cover of the radiator!!”

I saw this movie when I was 13 and thought it was the most intriguing, funniest laugh my guts out, meloencholic, harrowing sci Fi movie I ever saw. It gave me a thirst for Sci Fi comedy and I wanted to find more like it. The Hitchhiker's Guide television series was awesome. There was the Quark Sci Fi comedy TV show, meh. Mork and Mindy kind of counts. Much later Red Dwarf was the stuff that hit the spot. Hyperspace is good too.  Many may despise Dark Star as a revamped low budget student film but it had the right idea. Maybe not the greatest implementation that could satisfy most Sci Fi and comedy fans but to a 13 year old nerd it was a great start.

Pinback was really Pinback. He lied about being bill frug. He has the googly eye glasses and rubber chicken, which were part of the box he was allowed to bring. If he wasn't really pinback, he'd have the box Frug packed