It'd be too easy for me to call last year's Battleship a dumb boring piece of shit, but the fact of the matter is, Battleship is a dumb boring piece of shit. I'm a believer that a film isn't bad because of what it is about but of how it is about it. It's easy to make fun of a movie because it's based a board game, that conceit alone is worth all the derision and scorn and make you feel like you're above the movie in every way. And while that's true, Battleship is bad not because it's merely based a board game but because it is a headache inducing bore. It was about the time the aliens' true form was revealed that I realized Battleship is the recent modern equivalent of that fucking Wing Commander movie from 14 years ago. It's everything studios think is cool at the moment; the trailers included dubstep, there's the "Michael Bay-lite" blue-orange saturated cinematography, big flashy special effects, low demeanor humor, the whole "made for the masses" feel, last minute gung-ho patriotism and Rihanna is in it. I feel like a lesser human being after having watched it. Fortunately it is not the inept travesty that was Pearl Harbor but that would have made it more interesting. At least there was comical wrong-headedness bordering on parody about Pearl Harbor, Battleship is just drab by comparison.
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| No one was surprised to how Rihanna showed up to the court proceedings. |
I gave up on the work of Peter Berg after the nonsense that was Hancock, a terrible film that coasts by on the star power and charisma of Will Smith. It makes one wonder if Friday Night Lights and The Kingdom were happy accidents. Both are critical incisive looks at American thought, construction and lifestyle, one is about the over-importance and consequence of small-town sports and the other of American foreign policy. There are theories that suggest Battleship has the same critique and intelligent view of terrorism but about the time that an out-of-commission battleship piloted by a bunch of WWII vets cheer for the fiery destruction of the lizard-cat aliens, all metaphor and theory went out the window. Having "Fortuante Son" be the end credits song of Battleship isn't subversive but stems from the same kind of miscalculation and thought that "Born in the USA" is also a patriotic song. We can take some solace and faith that the film was a domestic flop costing over 200 million and making only 65 million total, you know, only 65 million dollars.
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| A good summation of what it's like watching Battleship. |
If you've seen Top Gun, Transformers, Independence Day, Pearl Harbor, Annapolis, Wing Commander, Super Mario Bros, Street Fighter, or any blockbuster since 1998 then you've probably seen Battleship. Falling star on the rise Taylor Kitch plays some fucking idiot who is forced into the Navy by his brother played by Alexander Skarsgard of True Blood fame. Kitch's character is an over-confident cocky hot-head who is in love with the Admiral's daughter and must prove himself in order to marry her. He does this by learning leadership and blowing up a bunch of aliens. Rihanna plays a terminator, Jesse Plemons stars as Matt Damon and Liam Neeson plays a someone not giving a shit. I won't bother with the plot since the movie didn't either.
What's worth to note is how the aliens operate which is so subtle as to not make any impression at all. They're not a generic malevolent invading force, in fact they seem to do a lot things by accident initially. A pulse sound they emanate presumably for contact purposes is perceived as an attack, the falling debris of their crashing ships destroy half of Hong Kong, many of the on-foot aliens only attack in self-defense. There's just the bare suggestion that the aliens are doing what an American military force would do, set-up communications, destroy roadways, and let the opposing force save their wounded but again by the end all this shit is forgotten. We don't give a shit about understanding or communicating with them, they need to get blowed-up bad, also they look dumb.
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Then the third act happens which includes one of the most sincere earnest crazy over-the-top set-ups to happen ever, after all their ships are destroyed, Kitch and his remaining crew gather on the museum battleship the USS Missouri to find some WWII veterans who are willing to help which leads to a montage set to AC/DC's Thunderstruck. It manages to be shockingly effecting while somehow not pandering but is also both embarrassing and endearing. It's exciting and propulsive in a way the rest of the film isn't. The scene illustrates Berg's respect and admiration for the veterans in a way that Bay wouldn't dare touch, the military are just toys to Bay, for Berg they're people. But again, this doesn't make Battleship a good movie, or even a noteworthy one but I think it's always best to keep in mind, today's trash is tomorrow's cult hit, since that explains what's going on with The Chronicles of Riddick.
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| "How'd I go from Ichi the Killer to this shit? Oh right, I was in Thor." |
