Battlefield Earth

When watching "Battlefield Earth," it is easy to forget that numerous rich, important and otherwise intelligent people think the author of the book this movie was based on, L. Ron Hubbard, is the Messiah. On the other hand, when reviewing "Battlefield Earth," it is hard to forget that L. Ron Hubbard has numerous diehard followers who, in the event of a bad review, would be only too happy to come by the reviewer's apartment and explain exactly why "Battlefield Earth" is better than "Citizen Kane," possibly using clubs. Well, "Battlefield Earth" is a ludicrously bad film, a movie whose utterly impossible plot, idiotic characterization, scientific ignorance, and reliance on hackneyed, brainless dialogue will win it a prize place on "Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Revival," when that happens. Quasi-religious film or no, there's no excuse for this.

"Battlefield Earth" uses a big, Scientologist-raised budget, the miracles of modern special effects, and a total absence of plain old common sense to achieve heights of impossibility completely unknown when sci-fi B-movies last ruled the screen. The central premise of this film is that the best-trained men and women of the armed forces of our world, fighting with technology they have trained with all their lives, could only put up nine minutes of resistance against the invading Psychlo menace. However, we are then asked to accept that a bunch of agrarian primitives who've never even seen "Top Gun," led by one human who has been made nearly omniscient for no real purpose by the Psychlos, can learn to operate this very same military weaponry flawlessly in a week, and then use it to dispatch not only the Psychlos on this world but all worlds in a thirty-minute climactic sequence. For some reason the Psychlos did not destroy this weaponry when they were dispatching us in nine minutes. Haste makes waste, genocidal aliens!

We are also asked to accept that the Psychlos have a unquenchable desire for gold, which is apparently valuable to a society that has mastered interstellar travel and presumably could fission itself up a million pounds or so of the stuff if it felt like it. Of course, people in the year 3000 talk exactly like they did in the year 2000 ("You better not let anything happen to you out there," Ms. Love Interest says to Mr. Nearly Omniscient at about minute 5 of the movie). And our architecture which was built to survive the ages — malls, office buildings, the "Denver Library" — has survived 1000 years of neglect and erosion surprisingly well, in most cases gaining only a thick coat of dust. In some buildings, even the plate glass windows are still intact, waiting for crusading humans to jump through them to make a dramatic effect!

Yet a catalogue of this movie's faults would not be complete without including the monstrously bad acting. John Travolta, a prominent Scientologist who produced this waste of celluloid, plays the Psychlo Chief of Security, Terl. Terl's character is basically a third grader who's read Machiavelli, saying things like, "You don't want me to kill him? Okay, I won't kill him. Executive Secretary, kill him!" Travolta plays him in a constant, spittle-spraying fever of disdain and superciliousness, which is unintentionally funny when it becomes obvious that Terl is the stupidest alien in movies for some time now. Travolta's thespianic excesses inspire nothing but pity for an otherwise excellent actor. Forest Whitaker, who was so good just a couple months ago in "Ghost Dog," doesn't do too much but needs to read his scripts before agreeing to act in them. Mr. Nearly Omniscient's real name in the movie is Jonnie Goodboy Tyler (would I lie to you?), and his name in real life is Barry Peeper. His character most resembles a resourceful, handsome, rabid dog for most of the movie, until he is educated by the omniscience machine and suddenly discovers geometry and "artistic principles," in what is easily the funniest line of the movie.

When the movie gets to kicking actual alien ass, if you have an incredible burning desire to enjoy something in this film, it almost achieves watchability. Until the movie asserts that blowing up the Psychlo home planet's "atmosphere" would somehow vaporize the whole thing and leave a pretty cloud of Psychlo in the stars.

You will only enjoy this movie if you get hopelessly drunk beforehand and make rude comments about everything stupid that happens. This is a brainless, emotionless, hopeless film, a waste of the time of everyone involved, a symptom of the malaise infecting Hollywood in the 21st century, a real piece of —

Hold on, someone's at the door. Wonder who it could be?

The Diamondback's copy of this is by far the most-linked-to thing I've ever written. Search under "Andrew Lindemann Malone" or "Diamondback Battlefield Earth" and see all the directories I'm in. Or you can just take my word for it.

I brought my sister along to this screening. I cannot tell you how abjectly I apologized to her for doing so. We did eventually give up on the movie and just start making really loud fun of it, as did everyone else in the theater.

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