These Are My Confessions #1: I Secretly Enjoyed…

Posted by on May 20th, 2010   Filed under: These Are My Confessions

Here is another new column I’m going to start. Every so often I am going to make a confession. Not about my personal life, don’t get too excited. Instead I’ll be making a confession about a movie. Either a movie I secretly hate or secretly love. I’m warning you, some of the things I say may shock and even appal you and I do expect backlash, but everything I write is the truth and are my honest opinions. I have a rather odd taste in film and don’t usually agree with the general consensus on films.

This week’s edition is about a movie I actually liked. My confession is I secretly enjoyed…

Battlefield Earth. Yes you heard me. I enjoyed Battlefield Earth! Now pick up your jaw off the floor and continue reading, just hear me out.

For those of you unfamiliar with Battlefield Earth, it is widely regarded as one of the worst movies of the decade, in fact I’ve even heard people say it’s the worst movie of all time.

Battlefield Earth is a sci-fi film from the year 2000 starring John Travolta and Forest Whitaker. Two pretty good actors, you’d think the film would do well wouldn’t you? The fact of the matter is it completely bombed.

The plot is based on the book of the same name, written by L. Ron Hubbard, founder of scientology. It’s your classic sci-fi tale in which aliens take over earth and a rebel group of human survivors attempt to revolt and fight back.

It really doesn’t sound that bad, a standard sci-fi plot and two decent lead actors, how could it go wrong? It even has Barry Pepper who was outstanding in The Snow Walker.

Unfortunately the critics and general public didn’t feel this was enough to redeem the film. With a 2.3/10 on IMDB (earning it the #91 spot on the 100 Worst Movies of All Time) and a 9/100 score on Metacritic, it is easily one of the worst movie of the decade according to critics. If its scores didn’t make things bad enough it also completely bombed at the box office making only 30 million when it was rumoured to have cost 75 million.

These are the kind of things that have been said about Battlefield Earth:

David Edelstein of Slate said “Here is a picture that will be hailed without controversy as the worst of its kind ever made” and “Visually, Battlefield Earth is a bewildering procession of non sequiturs, held together by the most assaultive soundtrack in cinema history.”

Elvis Mitchell of the New York Times said “”Battlefield Earth,” directed by Roger Christian (“Nostradamus,” “Masterminds”), is beyond conventional criticism. It belongs in the elect pantheon that includes such delights as “Showgirls” and “Revolution”: the Moe Howard School of Melodrama.”

Despite all this I must say I enjoyed it. I’m not saying it was a great movie, not even a good movie, but I did enjoy it.  I enjoyed it because I wasn’t expecting a great movie. I didn’t go into it taking it seriously. I knew I was in for a completely ridiculous film and that’s what I got. Was it completely ridiculous? Yes. But was it enjoyable? Yes.

The acting from both the leads, Travolta and Whitaker is beyond bad. Travolta seems as if he is constantly trying to hard and taking himself and the film way to seriously and Whitaker doesn’t act his role much better. The dialog is also pretty horrible, I mean the movie has lines such as:

“While you were still learning how to spell your name, I was being trained to conquer galaxies!” and “Want some rat? It’s good!”.

It doesn’t get much better from there, just completely ridiculous lines are spoken throughout the movie. The screenplay is a mess, boasting not only terrible lines but plot holes galore.

The director also clearly has a hard on for slow motion as he used it in almost every scene, trying to make the film more epic than it really is. It was used unnecessarily on so many occasions.

I could go on and on about what was wrong with this movie, but in the end, for some reason, I confess, I enjoyed it. I would probably even watch it again. Sure it has a ton of problems but it is most certainly not the worst movie of all time. It’s bad but not that bad, I have seen movies a lot worse.

Discussion: Any other Battlefield Earth fans out here? Anyone with me on this one? Sure it was bad and absolutely ridiculous but I still enjoyed watching it even if I was laughing at how stupid some scenes were. What do you guys think?



  • Ian

    Well … I didn’t really see all of it and I didn’t really like it but it sounds like you honestly didn’t either. I guess it seems kind of odd to confess that you expected a bad movie to be really bad and instead found it moderately tolerable.

    Is this column going to be more about the hype and way that public perception and criticism affects your individual opinions OR is it going to be more about if you really like a movie that others really hate and vice versa? In this case it just sounds like you were apathetic about a movie that others seemed to have a vested interest in hating on.

    No matter what I defnitely look forward to checking out this column in the future, these are great topics.

  • Mike

    Do you know the difference between “to” and “too”?

  • Charlie

    That was great and I look forward to the next installments. Keep up the good work.

  • Alex

    You just explained why the movie is fucking awful and then say, “But I kind of enjoyed it.” You give us no concrete facts as to why the movie is NOT the worst movie of all time. I am confused.

  • Matt, although people seem to think I like bad movies (probably because I admitted to sort of enjoying “Silver Hawk” and “Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever”) and I dislike good movies (because I didn’t care much for “Star Trek”), I’m afraid I can’t back you up on this one. I was hoping that this movie would be so bad that it was good, but I was disappointed. I will admit that I admired Barry Pepper’s earnest performance. I can’t remember if the special effects were any good.

    I’m sort of expecting that your next entry for this column will be an appreciation of “Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen.” :-)

  • Drewsifer

    Now there’s a good movie, the “Citizen Kane” of giant robot movies, and Micheal Bay is the “Stanley Kubrick” of …. Large explosion movies.

  • Werner

    I do enjoy many “bad” movies – but Battlefield Earth is just a pile of poop. It’s totally devoid of any so-bad-it’s-kind-of-funny scenes.

    The first entry in this new column doesn’t explain where this movie was “enjoyable”.
    I hope we get more insights from Matt in the forthcoming instalments.

  • Space Bandito

    I own it. . . but it is simply to laugh at. Was anyone expecting something epic and great from that movie? I saw it in the theater and I don’t remember anyone dressed up in Kiss boots.

  • Tian

    @Matt

    Theres some html scaling going on with those images, Travolta looks ridiculous enough already ;)

  • Matt

    @Mike I wrote this at 2am, I was exhausted, apologies for not catching the mistake

    @ Everyone else: Perhaps I didn’t get my thoughts across clearly enough, I will try to make myself more clear in the next edition. What I was trying to say though was that from a filmmaking point of view I recognised and appreciated that this was a poorly made film but from a movie watcher’s point of view I actually did enjoy it.

    I went in expecting it to be horrible, I thought I’d have to turn it off and I wouldn’t be able to sit through it but by the end it was quite the opposite, while I had realised that what I had just seen was horrible filmmaking I still enjoyed it, it was entertaining. The plot although cliched was somewhat epic (humanity’s last stand against the alien oppressors) and even though Travolta and Whitaker were at their worst, it was fun watching two usually solid actors just act their roles in such a horrible way. It was also enjoyable just laughing at how ridiculous and how poorly put together some scenes were.

    So while I get that from a filmmaker’s point of view it’s a terrible movie, speaking as a movie watcher I would still say that I enjoyed it, it was entertaining, not because the acting or direction was amazing, but for different reasons.

    Hope that kind of clears stuff up

  • Great post and another great column idea, keep ‘em coming.

    And why does Travolta’s package look so gigantic? Looks like there is a nipple on it too.

  • Travolta is smuggling mushrooms.

  • Greg

    Matt, Film Junk readers are tough. Don’t let them see you cry.

  • Matt, please learn how to spell properly! Your grammar in general is a bit poor, though I like your style of writing and your two ideas for columns so far. But before you publish stuff you really should let Sean or someone else have a look at it, just to stay clear of the most obvious mistakes.

  • kyriacos

    I once got arrested for shoplifting..

    …hey at least I am not the one who likes battlefield earth!!

    @Itchy-Finger

    ..its a common genetic variation for his race..
    white aliens carry bigger guns than black aliens..
    And yes its a nipple.

  • Matt

    @ Kasper F. Nielsen Like I said I wrote this at 2am so I was exhausted, just for future reference though can you point out some of the spelling and grammar mistakes I missed just so I know for next time.

  • Jonny Ashley

    Those costumes look really hilarious. I wouldn’t mind giving this movie a shot, at least for comedy’s sake.

  • Well, first off you overuse punctuations instead of using commas in a lot of your sentences. It’s not a big deal or anything, but it’s slightly annoying to read everything like as if it was a letter that was telegraphed in.

    Like mentioned earlier, you also seem unsure about when to use “to” and “too”. I’m wondering if it’s just a mistake, or if you aren’t too sure when to use “its” and “it’s” either? In any case, “it’s” is “it is” pulled together and should only be used when saying “it is” are appropriate. It isn’t appropriate here; If it’s scores didn’t make things bad enough it also completely bombed at the box office making only 30 million when it was rumoured to have cost 75 million.

    It’s also “rumored” and not “rumoured”. There’s more stuff, but never mind about that.

    All in all, it’s nothing horrific or anything, my main problem lies with the overuse of punctuations instead of commas and the “to”/”too” issue. We can all make mistakes, I make a lot too, but those two things just annoyed me :-P

  • Matt

    Hmmm ok thanks for the tips, I’ll keep it in mind for my next article

  • kyriacos

    Matt I really like your oldschool style man..

    Fuck Grammar..

    Grammar is for pussies..

  • @Kasper: Officially, Canadians have adopted the British style of spelling, so we write “rumoured.” Some Canadians have adopted the American way of spelling because most of the world has adopted the American way. Actually, I don’t even know which way Sean and Jay have adopted.

    @Matt: I don’t think your spelling is bad. I’m assuming you use a spell-checker. It’s your use of punctuation that is the main problem. If you really want to improve your writing, then I suggest you consult some grammar books.

  • Charlotte

    @Kasper: You’re from Denmark and you spell rumoured without a ‘u’? When did Europeans start using American spelling?

  • Slix

    I’d be curious to see how faithful this movie was to the source material. No one really talks much about that. This could be the greatest adaptation of a horrible book(s) ever, yet we pan the movie.

    Any Junkies out there read “Battlefield Earth”? I’d love to hear some opinions about this.

  • Somnium

    Why are people so obsessed over grammar? Why just not read and enjoy? Grammar nazis, why do you let it effect you? tee hee. http://www.xkcd./326/

  • DeedeeRio

    HI from Australia (where we spell with the “u” as well)!

    Ok, I didn’t think the movie was quite that bad either. And yes, I read the book and enjoyed it – it was probably the one of the best science fiction books I’ve ever read. It is simply a great story that takes over 1000 pages to play out and probably should not have been attempted as a movie at all, let alone by John (Stayin’ Alive anyone) Travolta!

    As to its faithfulness to the book, it really wasn’t, they’ve just pulled out a bit here, a bit there, chucked it together, grabbed part of the ending, thrown that in too and hoped for the best. If you really want to know how the movie should have been then grab a copy and have a read, if you’re a Science Fiction fan you might actually enjoy it!

    cheers
    Dee

  • Kasper

    @Reed & Charlotte, gotta crawl to the cross and make a confession here, I just do what my spell-checker tells me to. I’ve always used “rumored” and have simply assumed that “rumoured” was a sort of misspelling. I guess it’s just the brit way of doing things, and not exactly a wrong way. My mistake!

    But beyond that, why should someone from Denmark adopt the British way of spelling something as opposed to the American way? What’s the difference? Because England is located in Europe, we should use British English over American English? I don’t get that. Denmark has no ties to England what-so-ever.

  • Charlotte

    @Kasper No assumption whatsoever, more curiosity as I’d never really thought about it before.

    Though I did find it really weird with my entry form to Canada when I had to put my date of birth with the year first.

    The British do seem to find bitching and moaning about this stuff a national pastime, especially when it comes to phrasing.