ANALYSIS:
Humanity beams out a signal to an alien
planet with Earthlike conditions in 2006 and one man even warns against doing it. Meanwhile,
undisciplined Alex Hopper (Taylor Kitsch) breaks into a convenience store to get a chicken burrito to impress a girl and ends
up getting tasered by the police. His older brother, Stone, demands that Alex
enlists in the Navy (where Stone is already enlisted). Years later, Stone
and Alex are part of an international war games hosted by the United States in Hawaii. During the war games out at sea, Alex and Stone with three naval destroyers
(one of them being from the Japanese Navy) investigate the landing of some alien spaceships in the Pacific Ocean. The aliens create a big energy field around the patch of ocean surrounding Hawaii. It is up to undisciplined slacker Alex Hopper and a crew of sailors to stop the alien
invasion as the clock ticks down for the aliens to send a message to their home world.
BATTLESHIP is a dumb and fun summer popcorn
film in the tradition of Michael Bay
films like ARMAGEDDON and the first TRANSFORMERS. Sometimes, BATTLESHIP is quiet
smart and even gives nods to the board game it is very loosely based on. The
Japanese Captain is one of the smartest characters in the film. Alex seeks wisdom
and experience from the Captain. Too bad Alexander Skarsgaard is underused
in the film as Stone Hopper and so is Liam Nesson with his role as the Admiral whose daughter that Alex is in love with. The relationship and the male pissing matches are just dumb popcorn fodder. What we are really here for when we watch this kind of movie is to see things go boom
while humans fight aliens.
The big trouble BATTLESHIP has is being
released so closely after THE AVENGERS which continues to reign supreme at the box office.
I suggest to Universal Pictures to play up the world box office figures (the film has already made over $200 million
overseas) because I don’t think it will be a big hit in the theaters. Out
of the two films starring Taylor Kitsch, I love JOHN CARTER better which has a more concrete script than BATTLESHIP in addition
to being a throwback to space opera movies like STAR WARS. Meanwhile, BATTLESHIP
is kinda like the child of ARMAGEDDON with Liam Nesson instead of Bruce Willis and Kitsch in place of Ben Affleck. See BATTLESHIP for the dumb and fun popcorn flick it is and don’t worry too much about the
type of script it has. I will definitely buy it on Blu-ray since I enjoyed the
dumb popcorn fun mixed in with some clever bits.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
ALL ACCESS with Director Peter Berg is
like Universal’s version of Warner Brothers’ maximum Movie Mode where Petere shows behind-th-scenes footage while
also giving insight into making BATTLESHIP.
Featurettes exclusive to Blu-ray:
THE VISUAL EFFECTS OF BATTLESHIP- it is
a look at the challenges that the special effects people faced when creating the alien ships, the water effects, and the aliens.
USS MISSOURI VIP TOUR- Peter Berg is taken on a tour of the USS MISSOURI
COMMANDER PETE- Cast and crew talk about
how it is to work with the director.
Featurettes on DVD and Blu-ray-
PREPARING FOR BATTLE-
The origins of the famous board game, how it was made into a movie, and how Peter Berg was elected to be the director of the
movie.
ALL HANDS ON DECK: THE CAST-an overview
of the cast of the film
ENGAGE IN BATTLE- a look at how difficult
it is to film on water.
Best Buy Bonus DVD-
COMBAT IN PARADISE- filming up on Hawaii land
NAVY GAMES- a behind-the-scenes look at
the soccer game in the film
BATTLE STATIONS- how computer and practical effects were used to create the battle scenes on the ships.
THE REAL NAVY- a look at the real navy people who were apart of the movie and help make sure the details were right
for the Navy and the characters.
GREG CADSON AND THE CENTER FOR THE INTREPID-
this featurette is about the double amputee who had no prosthetic legs and also played one of the characters in the film in
addition to a look at the center where amputees are rehabbed,
FINAL ANALYSIS: BATTLESHIP is dumb summer movie popcorn fun. The extras are
there for fans who want to know about the making of BATTLESHIP
This movie review is (c)9-4-2012 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission. Send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com
