Battle Planet

I have to say, that I find this movie interesting.

Good Science Fiction tells stories that are difficult to tell in traditional drama or action venues; the story in this film does that.

Understanding a bit of the history of this movie, such as that the original title was "The Suit", should give the viewers a better understanding of the story then the one that was chosen by the SciFi Channel (SyFy). SyFy presumably felt that they needed a "SciFi" title to sell the movie, and no doubt put the pressure on.

The story isn't about a planet with lots of battles, but rather the story of a guy who is encased in what is a protective space suit. But the suit is actually a character in the movie. And the real question is, whom is it really protecting?

Since more difficult and subtle plot points are not the forte of the typical SyFy "made for TV movie", this much more nuanced story isn't your typical SyFy fair.

Given budget constraints, the art is quite good and original.

The acting is mixed, with some good performances. There are inherent difficulties in a film where one of the major characters acts inside of space suit, and another major character is an alien in full prosthetic makeup. But they manage to build a believable relationship by the end.

So while this film is not perfect, it has its moments, and its twists. It should keep many Science Fiction fans happy. But if you are looking for elaborate space fighting sequences, or broad fantasy themes, you may not like it. That doesn't mean you shouldn't at least give it a try. It might surprise you.

The rating for this movie is not very good, but I didn't find it "extremely" bad. There are so many worse sci-fi movies. This movie actually held my attention well enough that I kept watching to the end. Although it was not very good, it was "different".

The visuals were the strong point. Nice ships, good props, great planetary scenery and bizarre-looking aliens. I've probably seen all of these things before in different movies. However, when you combine all of them with a guy stuck on a planet ... and stuck in an artificially intelligent suit ... and chasing an alien terrorist ... it's "sort of" interesting.

If you're sick of watching rubber-stamped insect/rat/snake movies on the sci-fi channel, this is a change for the better. If you're looking for high grade sci-fi, this won't exactly do it for you.

the only justification for screening this movie should be to show actor wannabees how not to act!! seriously people if you wanna make a showbiz career than at least take a night course! On the other hand even the great actors when given ridiculous dialogues seem terrible and this movie has both awful screenplay and direction. The third thing at which they excel here is makeup which reminds me of TMNT but bear in mind the turtles makeup was done 20 years ago and it's still better than this one! My advice for the creators in future make your sci-fi flick a comedy not drama! then at least it might pass as a spoof! Finally i'd love to know the people who wrote reviews here using words like excellent and gem towards this movie and awarding it with 10* even if my girlfriend played in this one i'd never give it more than 5/10! it would be indecent!

Seriously, who writes this stuff? Even worse, is the actors pool so shallow that they can't find a reasonably workable cast? The space sequences were passable; certainly no worse than what I could put together on a Mac. The dialogue was painful; obviously written by a freshman during his Movie Theory 101 class. But the portion that caused the most pain was the acting. They scraped together a couple of B/C list actors for the main characters, the female lead wearing enough heavy makeup and costume that you couldn't tell who she was. Neither of them were horrible, and they did the best they could with the laughable story and dialogue. The main character was forced to perform nearly the entire movie inside of a fishbowl. You'll see what I mean. Oh, but the supporting cast...it actually made me wince to listen to them. I've seen and heard local theater actors with better delivery. Bottom line: If there is NOTHING else on it will pass the time, assuming you have a crossword or magazine handy to fill in the blank spots, which will be most of the time. You've been warned. Good luck.

Battle Planet is not a great movie, but I have seen much worse as well. It does have a lot of problems, such as the wooden acting though Zack Ward was at least engaging, the hackneyed dialogue where nothing feels that natural and the clichéd and not very interesting or well-developed characters. I also had mixed feelings on the story, it did hold my attention and was reasonably paced with a decent idea and some nice back story elements, but some of it was silly and suspend-disbelief-inducing. On the other hand, it doesn't look too bad. True, not exactly well-made but much better than many other low-budget movies I've seen recently. The aliens were bizarre but not cheap in look, the plannetry scenery is surprisingly great, the make-up is consistent enough and the effects while not award-worthy are a step-up from other low-budget movies seen recently.

All in all, there is not much outstanding but I did sort of enjoy it and can name much worse movies even without having to look through old notebooks and my past reviews for reference. 6/10 Bethany Cox