Terre, champ de bataille

It is the year 3000. Many years have passed since the world was conquered by an evil race called the Psychlos in order that they would strip it of its resources just as they had countless other planets. Man has been forced back to the Stone Age, slowly dying out in small, ineffective pockets of resistance around the world. Sent out from his community, Jonnie Goodboy Tyler stumbles across two other survivors who tell him of a place of the gods – a place that turns out to be a former city. While resting overnight the group is come across by the Psychlos and both Jonnie and Carlo are captured. A plot by one of the Psychlos to outsmart his bosses (who have deserted him on earth by turning down his bid for a transfer) opens the door for Jonnie to learn a great deal about his new masters and gradually he becomes the last real hope for mankind.

Being a film critic must be a hard job to do at times. Many of the films you watch will not be brilliant, nor will they be terrible – most will be OK and nothing more. Therefore when reviewers get a chance to gush, they generally take it. Likewise, when a bad film does come to the big screen and reviewers get to see it, they often will take great pleasure in putting the boot it – we see it with at least one big budget film each year (2004 was Catwoman). So I usually will try and view a really panned film because I am aware that sometimes the critics are just being unfair – however, most of the time I'll wait until it comes to TV to make that decision. With Battlefield Earth, I must concede that it is a pretty bad film – but maybe not as bad as the many critics all said, although it would be easy to just keep kicking it in the same way as everyone else does.

The film does have some very basic ideas that offer potential but these are squandered with a script that bulks out with bad dialogue, poor story development and an overall poor delivery that makes it a film that is certainly a mess, if not 'the worst film of all time™'. The story quickly goes wrong by making massive plot jumps with its two threads (Jonnie and Terl) that it quickly becomes tiresome. It is not just that major parts of it make little sense (even if you are trying to get into it) it is also that the film makes it harder for itself by taking itself so seriously. If the film had been exciting and entertaining then I could have forgiven these jumps but the way it holds itself in such high regard means we have to meet it on its own terms – something that I found nigh on impossible to do with this. Whenever we are asked to accept that planes would have survived intact over 1000 years, or that anyone could learn to fly them in a matter of days then it is really asking too much if it also expects me to take it 100% seriously at the same time.

The film has clearly had money spent on it, and it isn't that the effects look bad, it is more that they feel over-designed. The Psychlos (cr*p name) look like nobody knew when to stop adding bits and they do look a bit absurd – like a Klingon but with more bits! Similarly the transport craft and alien sets all feel like somebody has just ripped off other films and then tried to combine them; the end result is the look of a cheap sci-fi that looks like it is a sci-fi film as opposed to a 'real' futuristic world. It is hard to describe and maybe I'm doing it badly but to me the film looked like the alien future's of a thousand sci-fi movies, not an alien future that exists outside of late night TV and, as such, it was even less engaging. Of course it didn't help that the direction was so ham fisted that Christian should be asked to return his Oscar out of good will. The opening action scene is delivered in a terrible slow motion that sucked all the potential out of it – a technique that is sadly used for most of the action scenes. The stuff with the harriers near the end is so silly that even a good director couldn't have saved it; but Christian is not a good director here and he makes it worse and robs it of any excitement or pace it may have had.

With such a poor product to sell to us, even an all star cast would have struggled – so imagine the trouble that one fading star and a collection of minor support actors have with it. Travolta tries hard but he can find nothing of value. He looks terrible and his performance is just so…obvious and easy – there is nothing to watch here, partly due to him but also to the wider failings of the film. Pepper was a very strange choice for such a big role and, try as he might, he cannot get past the absurdity of the whole thing and he comes across as part of the silliness, taking his character way too seriously for the material – but I suppose he was only matching the mood of the film. Whitaker has nothing to do and even an appearance from the likable, low-rent baddie Kim Coates brought nothing to the film. I don't even know the rest of the cast by name but suffice to say that none of them can do anything worth seeing.

Overall this is a very poor film and, although I don't wish to join the mob by just kicking it, I didn't find any reason not to. The direction is awful but is at its worst in the action scenes. The effects are not awful, they just feel like generic, overdone sci-fi fare with little or no imagination – a big surprise when you consider that the director was nominated for an Oscar for Alien and won one for Star Wars for the very discipline of art direction! The script is clunky and the story full of moments that are, at best, illogical and, at worst, silly, stupid and laughable. The end result is a product that is a real mess with almost nothing of value in it. It is relentlessly shoddy and I almost wish the 'worst film ever' hype would drop off just so that this film could slowly fade from our memory and be lost in time.

This movie should have been a 'Project Redlight'. John Travolta is out of his head and hopelessly devoted to L. Ron Hubbard. That he was able to con 10 other people into investing $80 million towards the making of this movie is the only real impressive angle I can work for this review. Perhaps Travolta wanted to work with Tarrantino again and thought the only way that that could happen is if his own career fell into the tank? Or perhaps he felt it was his duty to make the film in order to get a better seat in 'Dianetics Heaven'? Let's hope that Tom Cruise can learn from Barbarino's mistake.

I don't think it will matter too much to point out everything that is bad about this film, but the acting, the dialog, the special effects, the plausibility of the cave people's quick learning development, and of course, the hair extensions will just have to suffice.

I would have given the movie a 1 out 10 rating, but I did laugh at the movie quite a few times and that should be worth something, I think. The version I watched was on the USA network and it was modified for teevee, so I may have missed some key plot elements that were cut from the original vision of its director, but then again I may have seen some really good Levitra adds in its place. The end credits whizzed by so quickly that it would appear that no one really wanted to have anything to do with this movie except Travolta.

'In preparing a judgment of worth,

I proclaim this lame movie to be worst'

Don't forget that 'I told ya'

to blame John Travolta

and L. Ron for Battlefield Earth.

Oh, if it were only a musical. 2/10.

Clark Richards

BATTLEFIELD EARTH (2000) 1/2 * John Travolta, Barry Pepper, Forest Whitaker, Kim Coates, Richard Tyson, Sabine Karsenti, Michael MacRae, Michael Byrne, Sean Hewitt, Kelly Preston (unbilled cameo). My candidate for worst film for the new millennium: atrociously awful Travolta vehicle (who is totally to blame for his co-producing this pet project due to his Scientology ties) in bringing L. Ron Hubbard's cult sci-fi novel to fruition is just one God-forsaken mess from start to finish in what feels like the ultimate Ed Wood film with a dire need for the gang from MST3K to show up and provide apt ridicule: Travolta stars as 9 foot tall alien Terl, a Psychlo who commands his rampaging race in wiping out mankind in the year 3000 with only rebel Pepper out to thwart his nefarious plans of mining gold for his own just rewards. Ridiculous from the get go: the make-up of the Psychlos: a combination of dreadlocks a la Jar Jar Binks to the 'Coneheads' to the costume rejects of any speed metal band of the 1990s; the dim lighting and production design; the cheezy special effects (except for the climax of Terl's planet - who the HELL cares if I'm giving away the ending?!! IT SUCKS!!!) - which looked kinda cool!) and laugh-out loud dialogue: ('Rat-brains' is the often reviled retort by Terl to the 'man-animals' he despises). Travolta better get his mind straight because his post-'Pulp Fiction' comeback is running on jet vapors at this point and don't even get me started on his evil Vincent Price-inspired chortle! UGGGHH!!! (Dir: Roger Christian)

Actually, was anyone involved with this total disaster thinking at all? My personal guess: no, and if they were, I'd rather not know about what.

None of the reviews have done BE justice. Having heard what a start to finish mess this was, my brother and I decided to watch it, just for fun. It was horrible beyond all our expectations - and not in a fun way. And so I can now tell anyone who's interested: You must see this movie yourself to realize the sheer magnitude of its badness, stupidity, and ineptitude.

I've heard that BE cost about 70 million dollars to make - though how anyone could have greenlighted it is a great mystery. Since there was nothing on screen to indicate why it had cost that much, my brother and I have also worked out how the budget was allocated:

* Travolta's salary, plus assorted managers and hangers on: 40 million.

* Special effects, film, sets, costumes, makeup and hair extensions: 25 million.

* all other salaries: $4,999,888.

* script: $112 and change.

Though that still doesn't begin to explain the end result. I give up. I'll never understand how Travolta managed to get BE made, or released, for that matter. Why is he tanking his career again? Who knows? After this, why should anyone care? Ah, well. I hope he finds something better to act in in the future; I honestly can't see how he could come up with something worse.

I never thought I'd give anything a 1, but this is indeed as worthy a candidate as I've ever seen. So, * is my vote, and I'd rate it lower if it were possible. Just... incredible. Watch and learn.

Has to be the worst film ever made, nothing makes actually sense, the filming, framing, style, tone filters, audio, editing, just about everything in this film is horrendous. 2.5 is too high for this film, this is the moment you wished a negative would pop up magically so you could push it further down.