Evil robot overlord Zygon forces his human slaves to live a miserable existence toiling away in a subterranean mining world. Brave young Orin discovers a sword hilt with mysterious magical powers that holds the key to freeing his people from a life of bleak servitude, but he must first find the blade of said hilt in order to accomplish this particular goal. Orin is assisted in his quest by gutsy and rugged rogue smuggler Dagg, sassy fembot Silica, and feisty and fetching princess Aviana. Director Steve Hahn, working from a compact script by Jeffrey Scott, relates the fun and engrossing story at a snappy pace, maintains a generally serious tone throughout, tosses in some surprisingly brutal bits of violence, and delivers plenty of dynamic and exciting action. Moreover, the characters are cool and colorful: Orin is an appealingly naive and determined wide-eyed innocent hero, Zygon makes for a perfectly ruthless and wicked villain, Arthur the whiny ship computer provides hilarious comic relief, and Dagg almost steals the whole show with his cocky cigar-chomping swagger and bold'n'brash Humphrey Bogart-like tough guy attitude. This film further benefits from such inspired funky touches as a helpful star fly that comes to Orin's aid and a memorably grotesque gang of hideous mandroids made out of scrappy spare parts. The fluid and vivid animation remains impressive even by today's more sophisticated standards. Andrew Belling's rich, lush, and spirited full-bore combo orchestral and synthesizer score hits the stirring spot. Best of all, this movie is done with a crackling verve and engaging sincerity that's impossible to either resist or dislike. An immensely entertaining cartoon feature.

I remember watching this in the cinema when I was 10 years old, with 3d glasses as well. I don't know about anyone else, but during the early 80s, some movies were shown on TV in 3D here in the UK. TV guides included the red and green 3D glasses to watch them with. It was all rather naff, and the movies were usually the cheesy ones made in the 50s or 60s.However, when Starchaser came out, the glasses we were given in the cinema were clear cellophane, so you could watch it in the movie's intended colours. I have to say it made the movie a very decent watch. When I watched it again a few years later on video, the 3d effect was lost, but the movie was still watchable, unlike other 80s fare, like Jaws 3, which has extremely poor viewing quality on TV.As far as I know, this has never been on telly, which is a shame, I wouldn't mind seeing it again, and exercising my nostalgia!

Man I was exactly the same. I seen this movie when i was a kid. I couldn't remember the name . only images. I wasn't sure myself if it existed. Anyways when the net started gaining popularity in 96-97 i tried everything to find this movie, after a few months of searching i found it. I remembered the name orin, and searched the name, and the movie popped up. Anyways i found an old school movie store that had totally old cartoons, like He-Man, Thundercats, etc.. and they had tgis movie. I was shocked and i rented it, totally brought back some memories, Great movie, and nostalgic. But tuff as hell to find now that everything is dvds.

So I have been searching the net trying to figure out what the heck this 3D sci-fi cartoon was that I saw in 1985, and I am thrilled to say I've found it in Starchaser. I saw the film at the ripe young age of 11. I have found a copy of it and just watched it again last night and here are my thoughts on it 19 years after its release.Before watching it I had only vague recollections that this was a pretty cool film and a fantastic film-going experience, being a 3D film at the local AMC cinema. This 3d thing was not very common at the time--especially at an AMC mainstream theatre. I remember it being fairly dark for my 11 year old sensibilities and it was definitely influenced by Star Wars, which I personally like. It also reminded me of Logan's Run and of THX1138 a bit. It has a look not unlike Thundar the Barbarian or some of the other cartoons of that era: space ghost, He-man, etc. I saw that Matt Damon-voiced cartoon Titan AE not too long ago and couldn't help but feel like they were somehow similar in style or tone. I don't know... I was 11, like I said. I will say that overall I remember leaving the theatre with my brother who was 16 and we both liked it a lot. What's not to like about the human young hero kid trying to stop the super-villain and his army of robots?? I think there was even some sort of light-sabre sword thing that the kid had to struggle to use. That's all I can dig from the cobwebs of my memory. Don't blame me if it sucks.Starchaser today… So I received my copy of Starchaser. It looks pretty official and I find it hard to believe, looking at this box that this is an unofficial copy of it. It looks pretty authentic.Anyway, about the movie… Yes, it was okay. It was pretty much as I remembered it. It was pretty decent in its own way. You have to simply put the thing into context. Look at when it was made and most importantly, look at what it was made to be—a 3D sci-fi adventure. Seeing it like this… in 2D on my 16 inch TV, it doesn't really live up to what it was supposed to be, originally. I think being able to see it in 3D would be a great thing. I don't know if or how that could happen, but it should. I think this film could have a nice little cult following if it was re-released or released on DVD now with some 3D glasses in the box. It's a gem in its own way.Yes, it does steal from Star Wars—and A LOT—but so does everything else. And really, it's not like George ever stole—hello, DUNE, anyone?! I don't really mind the stealing. And they stole from all sorts of places. There were quite a few sources referenced by these filmmakers: maybe a bit of Tron, Empire Strikes Back, Thundar the Barbarian, Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom, The Black Hole, THX1138, Logan's Run… But you know what? I liked it. I think that overall, they succeeded with what they were trying to do at the time. I think there were some weak spots. Some of the animation looked a little lame at times, the writing was a bit flat, there were blatant moments heisted from other scripts, but they put together an interesting film overall. It was fun, it was an adventure. And if you like the nostalgia that comes with watching something older, you'll probably enjoy it. The performances are pretty decent, and it was pretty well held together by the director. I give it a thumbs up out of a sense of nostalgia and a pretty good effort on their part, at that time, knowing what they probably had to go through in order to make this 3D adventure happen.Yes, I noticed a few damns, a son of a bitch, a bastard, a death of a principal character early on, violence towards children, some scary and mean robots and cyborgs, some sexually charged moments (no nudity), and some adult humor. I think most of that was pretty tame by modern standards and would pass over most kids' heads. I thought that it was totally appropriate and if I had kids of any age, I'd let them watch it without question.