Now that's not to say the film isn't bad. It was poorly received for good reason. Tere's a lot to talk about as far as the film faults go, from hammy acting, to shoddy camera work, to some simply bizarre or awkward shots, to plot devices are are an understatement to call coincidental, the faults of Battlefield Earth outweigh any rights it has...and honestly, I'm not sure if it even has any rights. Well, I think I can come up with a few, I will say that the environment of a post apocalyptic alien taken over world is pretty decently designed. The dome that the Psychlos (yeah...that's the name of the alien race) build is actually pretty cool to look at. And I won't deny...I wouldn't mind tasting that bright lime green drink that they call Kerbango. Serve me one of those in one of those weird glasses! I guess one final thing I can say toward the movies credit is that the film score isn't bad at all. There are times the music does shine through.
But honestly, there's not much else I can say as far as the good in this film, because...it's so very very...bad. When compared to other films I've seen that I absolutely despise or hate such as Last Airbander, Freddy Got Fingered, or anything else in my movie career that I've seen and walked out enraged on, Battlefield Earth just didn't infuriate me. Because it's so very entertaining in all its glorious badness. When it comes to most bad movies, there are two types of actors that tend to get the most of my attention; the actors that are bored out of their minds (such as the majority of Last Airbender), or the actors who simply have no idea what they're doing (such as Troll 2). Now there are other types of actors, those who put their heart and soul into it, but in bad movies, these tend to fall flat on their face, such as in Freddy Got Fingered. But here in Battlefield Earth, almost each and every actor puts their all into this performance, as silly as it is...and it's impossible not to get a laugh out of. This movie has some of the most laughably cheesy lines I've ever heard. From lines like "But there's a bright side! One day, you're going to die, and when you got to hell, it'll at least be a step up from this pace!" To Travolta's infamous "spell your name" line. I cannot help but laugh.
The writing behind the story is actually halfway decent as far as setting up the story is concerned. It's the actual telling of the story where it falls flat on its face. Earth has been under Psychlos rule for 1000 years, and man is an endangered species. Our story centers on what I can only imagine is a character made soley on wish-fulfillment. This movie is based off the novel of the same name by L. Ron Hubbard (though if the movie has anything to do with Scientology, I can't connect the dots), so there might be a small trace of author insertion. Further research into the protagonist only strengthens that claim. I mean the middle name of this guy is literally called "Goodboy". Throughout the film, he's constantly praised as humanity's last hope, and how the love of his life (who literally serves little purpose in this film) always knew that his destiny was to drive the Psychlos away from Earth. These are characters that by the book, I despise. There's barely anything interesting about him. He's just the teacher's pet chosen by Terl to learn things, and it's by this select process that he is educated in the silly way that he is, and becomes the only hope for humanity. His dialogue is clichéd and just all around silly at times.
But if that wasn't enough, the way he fights the Psychlos in this movie can be laughable if not plain stupid. There's a hose scene in the movie near the beginning that serves little purpose at all. Might as well have just cut it out, because it's such an awkward scene, where Jonnie literally fights Psychlos with a firehose. No joke. But that's nothing, try Jonnie leading the resistance against the Psychlos using...military technology that's centuries old. And it all works just fine. Yeah, never mind maintanence on fighter jets, or 1000 year old jet fuel, it's a "piece of cake" to train these men who haven't held a gun in their life to fly fighter jets in two weeks. Two...weeks.... But if that's not silly enough, you got the whole Psychlo atmosphere reacting violently to radiation plot device. Things could not have been simpler for our rat-brained man-animal group who manage to simply beam a nuclear bomb from Earth to the Psychlo's home world. Which upon detonating, destroys the entire planet. Can you see why this story is so dumb? One nuclear bomb is enough to destroy the ENTIRE atmosphere of the Psychlo home planet? Eh, screw it.
There are so many things wrong with Battlefield Earth, that I don't know if I should discuss them all here in this review. From the overuse of Dutch angles, to the overall stupidity of the Psychlo aliens which is probably what makes them lose in this film to begin with, but honestly....I don't know why I should. Everyone knows it's a fundamentally bad film, and I'm probably only repeating what countless other critics have said, but there's something about Battlefield Earth specifically that sets it apart from other bad movies. The heart it has. I've never before seen a film where everyone on board puts their all, their spirit, their heart into doing everything right, only to have the entire thing crash on top of them. I'm actually thouroughly impressed by that standard. The performances are impossible not to laugh at, the story is so dumb, it's impossible not to see for yourself just how dumb it can get, I almost wanna say just how much I very much recommend it. It's balancing perfectly on the "so bad that it's good" line. I cannot in my right mind condemn this film as the worst of the worst when it did so much, so right. I mean that too. There are a lot of things that I feel are actually done right in this film, which is why it's so funny to see just how it crashed. This film needed a lot of tweaking, but there's plenty to enjoy for what it's worth.
Battlefield Earth earns a well earned one star rating out of four. By all accounts I should hate this movie. By all accounts it could have easily earned a half star rating, or even the lowest rating I could give with absolutely no stars at all. All the ingredients are there, but there's enough spice in this silly mess to warrant a better score. I cannot bring myself to hate it. There's just too much of that likable charm, that numerous performance, that silly story that I really wanna just say "go find a copy if you can and see for yourself". Heck I got mine on eBay for three bucks. But I do realize that this film was hyped up by Travolta himself to be on the same lines of Pulp Fiction or Star Wars. He really built this film up as far as the hype was concerned...so I can imagine people being pretty angry with this film for letting them down as it did, but for me personally, it's just a dumb silly movie, with a dumb sci-fi story and dumb sci-fi action. It doesn't do any harm, and left me with a little smile on my face, even if it was for a different reason than most.
Please feel free to make a suggestion for a film I should review. Leave a comment down below telling me your own thoughts on the movie, and as always, thanks for reading.
Final Verdict: 1/4
Hope you all enjoyed my brief intermission from the Star Trek reviews and enjoyed a little blast to the past as I discussed this silly movie....or not. Time to tackle the Next Generation films!
No comments:
Post a Comment