Rating: Summary: Astoundingly bad Review: This movie is highly entertaining...just not intentionally. To be fair, the production design is excellent and well-done, and Forest Whitaker is clearly having a blast and not taking this seriously, which loosens Travolta up considerably.But the stuff this movie asks us to accept at face value is just ridiculous (WARNING SPOILERS AHEAD). Those superior aliens and their technology are apparently barely a fighting match for our millenium old military equipment when 1000 years ago, when the stuff was new, they took over in nine minutes. These amazingly greedy aliens, in a universe where gold is the most valuable metal of all, somehow skip over the nation's gold reserve. My personal favorite is the evil aliens' "breath gas." Apparently, when exposed to radiation, this stuff explodes. Which means planet Psychlo must have no sun (and thus arguably no humanoid life), otherwise the planet would have blown up before water could condense. Radiation is everywhere, and if even trace amounts of it set off the "breath gas", the Psychlos wouldn't be in their stunning position of breathtaking power. They wouldn't even be on Earth. Roger Christian's direction is barely worth a mention. This is generally just a bad, bad movie, one considerably improved by a group of friends, yelling comments at the screen. Buy the intentionally funny, much more self-aware "Starship Troopers", if you have to buy a movie like this.
Rating: Summary: The worst science fiction movie I have ever seen Review: This is the worst science fiction movie that I have ever seen, which is saying a lot. Shortly after it first came out, I read the book, Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard, and enjoyed it. It was written in the style of science fiction in the early years of the twentieth century and had an engaging plot, although the ending was absurd. This movie only loosely follows the book and the plot is a joke. The ending is even worse than that of the book, which was pretty bad. Giant aliens invade Earth, killing off nearly all humans and enslaving the rest. John Travolta plays the leader of the aliens, whose subordinates are very disloyal, and he has a thirst for gold. The remaining humans lay a trap with the gold at Fort Knox and manage to defeat the aliens. However, along the way the plot was so disjointed that I was not sure what was occurring. Some ask why Travolta made this movie. If memory serves me correct, he is a follower of the Scientology religion, which was founded by Hubbard. That no doubt explains why he would be involved in such a waste of film and his acting talents.
Rating: Summary: Battlefield Earth , what more can be said? Review: This movie single-handedly has the ability to question the existence of God himself for why would God even allow this film to be made. If God re-wrote his commandments he would include the following suggestion, " Thou shall not part way with thy money to rent, own Battlefield Earth. He among us so eager to watch this movie deserves to be in hell". Actually sitting thru this film gives you a real good indication of what hell feels like.
Rating: Summary: Awsome! Review: Man-animals battle aliens using leverage and good old-fashioned caveman know-how. I have watched this movie over 10 times now, and it just gets funnier each damn time. The whole movie is shot at an angle, so bring a pillow to support your head.
Rating: Summary: As Expected, it Sucks! Review: Hollywood is incapable of making a good movie out of any book even if it's short. Since this book (which I rate as four stars) consists of over 1,000 pages, Hollywood was far out of its league. Not only did they do a miserable job of condensing the material, and not only was the acting terrible, they also managed to screw up the meaning of the whole thing. Do not touch this movie in any format under any circumstances.
Rating: Summary: Surprisingly enjoyable. Review: Battlefield Earth surprised me immensely. Sure, it's got a lot of hokey and absurd moments, along with a lot of plot holes and logic flaws, but no more so than Kevin Costner's post-apocalyptic films, and they're considerably more dull than Battlefield Earth, which is a movie that's quite dumb, but is a lot of fun to watch. The sets are amazing to look at, with the ruins of Denver and Washington, D.C. a truly dazzling sight. The lead performance from Barry Pepper is quite good, and while the rest of the supporting cast isn't, Pepper handles the weight quite well and gets some help from two hilarious over-the-top performances from John Travolta and Forest Whitaker. The action scenes are decent, but suffer too much slow motion and fast editing. Still, this is an enjoyable treat and I really wouldn't mind a sequel.
Rating: Summary: New classic! Review: This abomination is what Ed Wood would have created if someone gave him 70 million dollars and a lot of booze. At first my tortured mind recoiled in horror and I could actually see myself watching a clumsy looking John Travolta stomp around in platform boots terrorizing petty humans. Battlefield Earth is SO bad had to watch it four times in a row just to get my confused brain to accept what it was being forced to watch. After the shock wore off, Battlefield Earth gust got funnier and funnier. Like, how did the ape-like humans learn to fly complex jump jets in one short lesson? Why would such an advanced civilization need gold so badly? Why did the aliens have beaded dreadlocks? If the aliens were so smart, why didn't they find Fort Knox on their own? Was Travolta's character supposed to be the new Darth Vader? Did at least one studio executive loose their job for giving this a green light? I don't know if it was intentional, but there is actually an Ed Wood line in the film. An amused alien played by Travolta calls the inhabitants of earth "stupid humans". Too funny.
Rating: Summary: An even worse adaption of a mediocre book series. Review: Don't waste your time with either this movie or the books. Sadly, you will not be entertained, and to make matters worse, your money will just go to help the cult of scientology hurt more people.
Rating: Summary: "Rat Brain!" Review: You would have to have a "rat brain" to enjoy this film. I still can't believe they spent $70 million to make this movie. The acting is atrocious, the special effects are simple and make Stargate SG-1's special effects look cutting-edge, not to mention that I value my personal time a lot higher than the $4 I spent on this rental. I almost gave this film an additional half-star merely for attempting to bring such a huge novel to the screen. I love science fiction films, James Cameron's "Aliens" still ranking as one of my all-time favorites, so don't think for a second that I'm trashing this just because I despise the genre. I love the genre. What I despise is low-quality filmmaking on every level, which is what we have here. After viewing this film there was little doubt as to why it shares the record for the most Golden Raspberry Awards ever won. It shares the record with "Showgirls." "This is a warning from the Emergency Broadcast System. This is not a test." If this had been a test you may have purchased this DVD. God help you if you do.
Rating: Summary: Why did they make this? Review: All the things you've heard about this movie is true. It is terrible. It's not the worst movie ever, but very close. I don't know what Travolta was thinking, although then again it's travolta, and this is a pathetic, annoying, and stupid movie. Now attention to the creators of MST3K: GET BACK TOGETHER AND RIP THIS MOVIE TO SHREDS!!! That is all this drivel is worth, so if you love making fun of REALLY bad movies, then this is a must!
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