Hands out armored vests to Cervaise, lissener and me.
Brilliant. I’ll have to get Showgirls now, but that was reallly good. Cervaise’s deconstruction helped a lot, so did the director’s commentary.
For those people that shat on Verhoeven Reconsidered," I offer this transcript of the director’s commentary:
PV: The voice you are hearing here, now, is Paul Verhoeven, the director of Starship Troopers.
EN: And this is Ed Neumeier, the writer of Starship Troopers.
PV: And we are here in the middle of controversy, immediately. It’s interesting; I’m quoting here, an article of Richard Schickel in Time Magazine, who said that “maybe it’s saying that war inevitably makes fascists of us all”. Then of course he says that the best guess is that the filmmakers didn’t think of anything like that at all because they were “only concerned with the special effects”. But I can tell you that the movie is, in fact, in our opinion, stating that war makes fascists of us all.
EN: That’s true; that was the theme. And this, this opening was modeled on the “why we fight” films of World War II; in fact the movie was modeled on propaganda films made during World War II.
PV: Yeah they’re propaganda films from the American propaganda films, and of course there is also, a clearly undisguised statement about propaganda films of the Third Reich. In fact, it’s saying, of course, that this fascist propaganda, that is kind of apparent in the movie, should really be read, at least that’s how we meant it, should be read as something that is “not good”. So, whenever you see something that you think is fascist, you should know that the makers coincide with your opinion, thinking that it is not good, that it is not a good statement, and this is not good politics and if you see a black uniform you should also know BAD, BAD, BAD, you know, it’s very simple, you should not read it differently than that. We all agree with that, it’s bad, if you see Carl later in his black uniform, and when he makes certain statements – and we’ll come back to that later – then you know that it’s about “bad”.
EN: Yeah, when I was growing up it was always these films, these kind [sic] of action/adventure films, were always called “fascist”. I remember a lot of my really liberal friends always used to tell me that Robocop [another movie by PV&EN] was a “fascist” film. So I, I thought we just like should king of go out and out {? All out?}, and sort of make a film that was essentially a fascist action/adventure film. So that’s what we have done.
PV: Yeah well, I would see it a little bit more nuanced [chuckles], because I feel that we are, we are certainly stating in the movie that we disagree with some of the premises that are said here - …
[Classroom scene starts]
PV: Anyhow, we are back in, now we’re back in the movie here, I think, and we’ll leave the politics for some time, we can leave them alone…
EN: Well, this is the biggest political statement of the film! [Laughs]
PV: Although in f- Right, OK well forget about it, you go ahead here. [Laughs]
EN: Well, this is just where-, this is just showing how this society is completely oriented toward its political stuff, and they teach it in the schools, and it’s actually kind of a society that works pretty well - there’s no sexism, there’s no racism, later we’ll see that there’s very little crime, in fact they seem to have achieved the ideal sort of politically correct society – EXCEPT THAT we sort of question how they have achieved it, that they have achieved it.
PV: Yeah, because the political- most important political statement that is in this scene is Rasczak saying, in more-or-less at the point where we are now , where he says that violence is the supreme authority that solves everything, which is of course questioned by Dizzy but then of course not accepted by him. You could of course say that this kind of statements [sic] not so much going back to the Third Reich; I would say they are much more statements about American politics. I mean, the whole movie is about the United States, all statements are about the United States, it‘s not- or any superpower for that sake [sic], you know, you could say, as well for Russia ten years ago, or perhaps for China in the future, or for Germany in the past. But it’s certainly also talking about American politics NOW, and so it is really saying of course, as we have perceived in the last twenty, thirty years, that there is a tendency in American politics that if people disagree, that we would use power, and violence. I mean, very apparent now in the conflict with Iraq, but also clear in any conflict in the Middle East, especially of course the overthrown from [of] the Iran government before the Shah, or - I mean there is multiple examples [sic] of course, if it’s Panama or if it’s Vietnam - is just the idea that power and violence is [sic] always used at a certain moment when things take too much time to solve in a more democratic way. And I think that is what the movie – the statements, the political statements of the movie are about. I mean, that’s my opinion, but that’s – I mean that’s how I read the script. [Laughs]. I mean, he’s the writer, he can tell me that it’s not true, that it’s not about American politics, American politics are [sarcastically] “always benevolent”.
That pretty much sums the movie up. Really intelligent, subversive content.
What surprises me is that nobody got this when it was released.
It isn’t hidden. The film beats you over the head with it in some places; like Carl’s Nazi uniform, the early classroom scene, etc. It surprises me that this, and most of the subversive themes of Verhoeven’s “oeuvre” are missed. I’ve seen Totla Recall and Robocop, so I am at least marginally familiar with him now.
I’ll report on Showgirls shortly.
The book was loads better than the movie btw.