 the last starfighter is a 1984 american space opera film directed by nick castle. the film tells the story of alex rogan (lance guest), an average teenage boy recruited by an alien defense force to fight in an interstellar war. it also featured robert preston, dan o'herlihy, catherine mary stewart, norman snow and kay e. kuter. the last starfighter, along with disney's tron, has the distinction of being one of cinema's earliest films to use extensive computer-generated imagery (cgi) to depict its many starships, environments and battle scenes. the last starfighter was preston's final film role. his character, a "lovable con-man", was a nod to his most famous role as harold hill in the music man.crossing the frontier: making "the last starfighter" (behind-the-scenes retrospective), universal studios home video, 1999. there was a subsequent novelization of the film by alan dean foster, as well as a video game based on the production. in 2004, it was also adapted as an off-broadway musical. ==plot== alex rogan (lance guest) is a teenager living in a trailer park with his mother (barbara bosson) and little brother, louis (chris hebert). alex's main leisure activity is playing starfighter, an arcade game where the player defends "the frontier" from "xur and the ko-dan armada" in a space battle. eventually he becomes the game's highest-scoring player. a short time later, he is approached by the game's inventor, centauri (robert preston) who invites him to take a ride. alex does so, discovering the car is actually a spacecraft. it turns out centauri is a disguised alien who takes him to the faraway planet rylos. so his family and girlfriend, maggie gordon (catherine mary stewart), don't notice his absence, an android duplicate named beta is left to take 
1980s_science_fiction_films 1984_films American_coming-of-age_films American_science_fiction_action_films English-language_films Films_about_computing Films_about_video_games Films_directed_by_Nick_Castle Films_shot_in_California Films_using_computer-generated_imagery Flying_cars_in_fiction Science_fiction_war_films Space_adventure_films Universal_Pictures_films