We've been admiring some pretty slick Star Wars fan films lately — but what about the old-school, DIY stuff?

When film-maker Jay Scheurle and his buds wanted to have lasers and light-sabers back in the 1970s, they scratched lines directly into their Super-8 film stock. When they wanted to show a robot walker falling down, they used stop-motion animation, painstakingly (well, somewhat painstakingly) posing every split-second of its motion and descent.

This unnamed classic also features King Kong, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Gumby and a few other cult classics in a weird stew of insanity. The Mr. Bill influence is clearly very strong in the claymation and stop-motion sequences — including one disturbing moment where one of the kids makes it look as though he's sliced his arm open. You know, for kicks.

Writes Scheurle:

Back in the time of Star Wars and Close Encounters, Space 1999 and BattleStar Galactica, and Mr. Bill, my buddy Rick Pool and I made movies and used brother Jeff as an extra and stunt-man. There was stop-motion, models on wires, and lasers that were hand-scratched into the Super 8 film-stock. Summer fun...

[Vimeo]