A space mission led by Captain Holland (Robert Forster) encounters a ship thought lost on the edge of a black hole but somehow resisting the massive gravitational forces. After Holland's ship is damaged they land on the mysterious ship and encounter menacing robots as they are taken to Dr Reinhardt (Maximilian Schell). He tells Holland and his crew that he is the only survivor of the original crew. He built an army of robots to replace them and now plans to fly his ship into the black hole and discover the ultimate secret of the universe...
Holland and his team - which includes Anthony Perkins, Yvette Mimeux, Ernest Borgnine but the jolly robot VINCENT (Roddy MacDowall) - soon discover everything is not as it seems. Reinhardt's crew of "robots" are something much darker, and his chief robot Maximilian silent, evil and deadly...
This is a spectacular film with superb sets which really give a sense of scale. The science fiction is fixed with some dark religious imagery. There is also a lot of action, though Reinhardt's robots obviously went to the same shooting school as Imperial stormtroopers. The story can be a bit simplistic and slow at times but the film is a great watch and highly underrated.
