Dystopian Roller Disco

I had never heard of Solarbabies (1986) when I heard its How Did This Get Made episode (now behind paywall?). It sounded bonkers - but the back story is maybe even better.

The capsule description is teen roller-skaters in post-apocalyptic dystopia meet mystic orb. It takes place in a future where the rains have stopped and water scarcity controls the populace. All children are rounded up and placed into militaristic orphanages. We meet our heroes playing a late night game of centrifugal bumble-puppy - or maybe it's skate lacrosse: two teams on skates with hockey sticks with cups on the blade. You have to pick up the ball and deposit it in a central basket. This is done with much care and very little athleticism. 

Anyway, the orphanage heat, known as the ePolice, show up and our team scatters into the mines they are skating around. By the way, there are a lot of "eSomethings" in this movie, but it stands for "eco". not "electronic". The young deaf team mascot, Lukas Haas, discovers a glowing orb that seems to talk to him, and also cures his deafness. This orb is called Bodhi, which he pronounces to rhyme with "Lodi". He makes this point several times, but it isn't any kind of plot point. He takes this back to the barracks. 

Somehow, the faux-Native American kid, Darkstar (Adrian Pasdar) steals the orb to take back to his gypsy tribe. The voice in his head tells Haas to go rescue the orb. And so our gang goes after him. Although the land is supposed to be a lifeless desert, they do meet up with a number of communities, although none are as colorful as Bartertown.

I haven't mentioned many of the actors involved, because they seem to be pretty much non-entities. The Girl in the group is Jami Gertz. The slightly sympathetic warden of the orphanage is a sweaty Charles Durning. That's about it. 

Now, the backstory. The podcasters got an interview with producer Mel Brooks - yes, that one. It was one of his first projects, and looked like a nice, cheap script for a first time director Alan Johnson. Because Johnson was a first-timer, his costs spun out of control, and Brooks wound up mortgaging his house and putting up a ton of his own money to finish the movie. He wound up $9 million in the hole. But there's a happy ending: little by little over the years, the residuals have come in, and he figures that he finally broke even. 

So go out and buy a copy - Brooks could use the dough.