Monster of the Day #456

Ouch! Worst SF movie ever, maybe the worst movie ever period.

I couldn’t understand how such a good book could become such a bad movie till I read the review from I think Food over on the old forum – sorry I don’t want to go though all that spam to try to find it. Apparently Verhoven hated the novel and set out to destroy the movie in every way possible.

Maybe this really is some brilliant, deadpan satire, but that doesn’t make the movie any less painful to watch. After all, all you need to do is compare Starship Troopers to a similar movie that’s actually good, Robocop, just to see how much less entertaining it is. Satire or no, you still end up having to endure the tiresome antics of a pack of unappetizing Dawson’s Creek types. Michael Ironside’s brief scenes aren’t enough to ease the hurting.

I do admit that it’s worth a chuckle to see Rico near the end try to act like he’s capable of command, essaying a ludicrous approximation of a tough-guy sneer when he’s sent to find the “smart bug”. Same thing with Doogie Howser trying to sound like Heinrich Himmler.

I can imagine, though, that a guy whose home and family got the shit bombed out of them in actual wartime might not have that much truck with the original material.

Hey all.  No arguments with any of you.  For me, I can separate the wonderful short novel from this movie.  I fully admit all of the bad acting, cheesy dialogue, etc., and yet, still love it.  Love is blind sometimes…

I found one by “GalahadPC”…was that the one, perhaps?  I couldn’t find one by Food.

I maintain that this film works brilliantly if you think of it as a propaganda movie…made from the point of view of the bugs, not the humans.  In that respect, demonstrating that humans are stupid and savage, use stupid tactics and make idiotic decisions, it’s perfect.

As proof, check out how Denise Richards gets speared through the shoulder and is walking around just fine five minutes later.  No human would put a scene like that in film, not even a dumb action movie.  Gotta be the bugs, remember, you can shoot off one of their legs and they’re still effective.

Personal favorite: The giant bugs FARTING so hard they propel asteroids out of orbit at FTL speeds with precise enough targeting to hit cities on Earth. Not only are the farts creating some sort of warp field (to use the Trek term) the bug planet is rotating in space, orbiting it’s sun, and moving around the Milky Way. Earth is doing the same. Yet, the bugs can take this all in effect – I can accept some crazy science but geeze loise!!! 

Hummm…
Regards the movie…yeah, Ironsides should have had help with the acting gig. When a decent actor is outnumbered by the ‘Pretty Brigade”…

Book: I understood where the author was coming from, in principle.
If the only way to get a vote, is putting your ass on the front line, you’d be less likely to got to war because it’s not an abstraction, it’s memories of the pain and sorrow that go along with it. Unless you’re from a culture that loves death. Anyone for Muslem brotherhood?
assuming a basic western style cultural underpinning, as the book does this is less likely. Not impossible, just less likely.

Heh…bug farts…
 

I’d describe ‘ST’ as ‘Atlas Shugged’ but about 1/5th as long and with killer alien space monsters- both pluses IMHO. 

I hate this movie with every fiber of my being.  You could melt planets in the heat of my loathing.  Saw it once, in the theater, then spent the last 15 years pretending it didn’t exist.  I hated the pointless gore and I hated the way it turned the philosophy of the novel on its head. I even sort of vaguely hate Paul Vanhoven by extention, despite never having met the man. I now like Total Recall slightly less for having a tenuous connection to this film by virtue of its director. I already disliked Denise Richards when this came out, this gave me a reason to dislike Casper Van Dien as well.  And that sort of redheaded chick from “Saved by the Bell” who was inexplicably cast as Dizzy. Not Doogie though, nothing will even make me hate Doogie.

What I mean to say is this is my absolute most-hated film ever!

Oh, I also hate the woman who brought her 6 or 7-year-old child to the movie, despite everyone knowing in advance it was a hard R for gore, and stayed through the whole thing despite the fact that the kid was in tearful hysterics for half the film. You, madam, are a vile human being. 

They’re CGI giant bugs, for me that’s always inherently meh. Gimme stop motion model or puppets or guys in suits any day.

I’m with you, believe me, but I rather liked the bugs in this anyway.  I can get behind CGI if it’s done well, and the bugs were pretty good.  I also don’t mind it being used for things practical effects wouldn’t be able to handle; again, the swarms of bugs would’ve been hard to pull off convincingly about it.

The CGI was one of the few good things about ST, in my opinion.

Dina Meyer was in “Saved by the Bell”?  I didn’t know that.

I kind of like her.  I actually watched that terrible “Birds of Prey” show because she was in it.  I can’t say she’s an amazing acting talent, but something about her is compelling to me.  Victoria Pratt from “Cleopatra 2525” is another actress that has that pull on me.

If this week’s theme is “CGI Monsters that worked and/or were from the late 90’s” I approve.

This movie, along with “Deep Rising,” “Mars Attacks,” “Mimic,” and “Jurassic Park” are the ones I would point to when people reflexively say, “CGI is terrible, it never works, practical effects are the True Way.”

Granted, all these films use practical effects, but only to underscore the CGI work.  In all these cases, the CGI creatures really, really work well. 

(It’s only the “I’ve completed the course” CGI effects since that have made CGI so belittled.  The CGI in the films above were done by artists who wanted to use the new medium, not hacks who got the certificate.)

I didn’t see the “Hero of the Federation” sequel, but heard it was done extremely cheap and was massively bad.  “Marauder,” I caught on Netflix.  It was slightly above the level of a Sci-Fi Saturday night movie.  Van Dien was in the movie in the B story while Jolene Blaylock was in it as well in the A side of the story.  It’s watchable but I wouldn’t call it good.

I haven’t seen the cartoon, but yeah, I recall it getting a lot of generally positive word-of-mouth from people who saw it.

This is one detail I recall from the pre-release hype. They were originally going to include the fabled power suits, but the effects budget was already climbing too high. The decision was made to focus the effects budget on the bugs and drop the suits, for including both elements would have stretched the money too far and the whole thing would have looked crappy. Figuring the bugs were the exploitable element, they backed those to the hilt. Again, I haven’t read the book, but I can understand the logic in changing that element for budgetary reasons.

That’s the movie not the book, that was great and I reread it every couple years, it doesn’t get old.  I also like that  verhoven couldn’t “get through” it but all the actors on Aliens were required to read it.  Aliens was a good movie.

Oh, was he in it? Oh, yeah! He was the instructor! I forgot all about him being there! What a forgetful movie.

He didn’t read it.  I think he said he got 2 pages in and stopped caring.

It’s a absolutely terrible adaptation of Starship Troopers.  But if you divorce it from the novel and just watch it as a sci-fi actioner with anti-fascism satire, then it’s pretty freaking fun.

Stuff and nonsense.  The best part of the books was the smart grenade psychological warfare device!

“Hi!  I’m a smart grenade!  I will detonate in ten seconds!”