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National Film Vault

OFFICIAL FILM AUTHENTICATION BY CROWN GRADING
A
AUTHENTIC
CROWN CERTIFIED
Film cell NFV-000000332 Tap to enlarge
MOVIESpaceballs Movie Trailer
SCENECOMING SOON TO A THEAT…
FILM FORMAT35MM
YEAR1987
CERTIFICATE IDNFV-000000332
Film Record Public record
Directed by
Mel Brooks
Studio
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer · Brooksfilms · 96 min
Scholarship
Named in the title of 1 peer-reviewed work
Examples
Sources: Wikidata · OpenAlex. The record of the motion picture, not an assessment of this cell.

FILM NOTES

Spaceballs arrived from MGM in 1987, Mel Brooks's parody aimed squarely at the Star Wars trilogy and the broader science fiction boom that had reshaped Hollywood in the preceding decade. Brooks folded in gags referencing Star Trek, Alien, and Planet of the Apes, wrapping the whole enterprise in his familiar brand of broad, self-aware comedy. The film underperformed on initial release but found a lasting audience through home video, eventually becoming one of the more quoted comedies of its decade and a touchstone for fans of both Brooks and the genre it lampooned.

This cell carries the film's own promotional voice rather than a scene from the story itself, the kind of self-referential joke Brooks favored, mocking the very convention of the "coming soon" trailer tag while the audience is still watching the picture. Cells built from title cards and trailer text like this one appeal to collectors interested in the mechanics of a film's marketing and humor rather than its characters, preserving a fragment of how Spaceballs announced and undercut itself in the same breath.

This original motion picture film element has been examined and authenticated by Crown Grading in partnership with National Film Vault, and encapsulated for archival preservation.
Why so little survivesRelease prints were leased to theaters, not sold. When the run ended they went back to the distributor to be destroyed, and most were. What collectors hold today came from the prints that escaped that order, and no new 35mm prints of these films are being struck.
CROWN SERIAL 000059642