I’m sorry, it’s what your post says. I respect your posts and am thus doubly startled to be reading what appears to be a very naive interpretation of what makes movies “good.”
ST is not a linear novel, not a juvenile and is not about the battle sequences. That doesn’t mean it could not be made into a first-rate movie, much as written; we’ve already had a version that threw out everything except the mech-tech-porn and it was utter crap.
If the posts here haven’t given you some idea of how a “good” movie could be constructed from the book-as-written, by all means discuss what you think are the insuperable flaws.
Highly doubtful. He stopped participating in Hollyweirding in the early 1960s because his mindset was grossly unsuited to it; OTOH, I don’t know of a major Heinlein property that was not optioned multiple times with no artistic control demanded. He would have grinned at the check and shrugged.
I don’t think it’s flawed at all - I think it’s hard - maybe impossible - to adapt into a movie that many people would want to watch - and that wouldn’t be sharply criticised by groups of people for either omitting something important from the book, or being overly-narrated, or missing the point.
I made the mistake of using the word ‘action’ in my first post - and I would like to reinterate, I did not mean this in the sense of ‘action movie’ with explosions and guns - I meant action in the sense of any kind of activity that would be performed by actors - most of the book isn’t about people doing things at all - it’s about what the protagonist thinks.
puddleglum said what I’m trying to say, only better:
There is a long, long list of successful movies made from “difficult” “interior” “unfilmable” books. ST is nowhere near as difficult as some of those. You have to remember that ten pages of description can be turned into ten seconds of film without losing a thing, and interior monologue can be turned into a mix of action, VO and dialogue.
Of course it won’t please everyone, especially the end of the audience that liked the first movie. But I maintain - from the position of someone who spent the better part of a year writing a full working treatment as an exercise - than a truly superior movie can be made from the book as written.
ETA: It’s just that no one will ever bother, not in this movie climate.
The novel is a hymn of praise to hierarchy. Heinlein does a masterful job of selling the notion, dear to those at the top of real-world hierarchies, that those at the bottom worship and revere those at the top. (Think of Rico’s awed and unquestioning idolization of The Lieutenant.) The concomitant myth, that those at the top are wise and caring guardians of those beneath them, is well-presented, too.
Heinlein holds out the hope essential to the existence of hierarchy: that if you have the right demographic characteristics, and commit yourself to full support of the status quo, then you may, perhaps, rise to the top yourself.
(And sweet indeed is the reward of ending up as your own father’s commanding officer. This is a powerful fantasy, and Heinlein served it up with style and finesse.)
In very small part, perhaps, but you have to keep in mind it was written by an Annapolis graduate who was cheated of any chance to rise to command levels. Just as with his near-worship of children, you have to note the influence on his viewpoint and move on.
The novel is in general about some very noble and worthy things, and letting either the bughunt sequences or the training-film view of ranks get in the way is a mistake.
You could go either of two ways with a film adaptation of ST, and end up with a good movie either way: You could make a cerebral, theme-based science fiction movie that follows the same themes Heinlein was exploring in the book, or you could tone the philosophy way down and make a blockbuster explosion-fest. Back when I first heard that they were making a ST movie, I was excited, because I assumed that they would do the latter, and there’s surely no way that Hollywood could screw that up, right?
Didnt read all the intervening posts, but here’s my experience: the first time i watched it, i thought it was so so because i focused on the bugs. Then, i found out the universe is based on the idea of what if the nazis had won ww2? The second time, i focused on the dialogue and he movie became immeasurably better.
In that case, I am going to concede the argument. My position is now merely that this would be a very difficult thing to do right; there are not many people in the film industry who could achieve it, and even if they did, the end result might not be a commercial success.
Same movie I was thinking of. There are quite a few other “soldier stories” which start or take place mainly in training; Starship Troopers gets to have parts about training, parts about daily life and parts about Big Explosions (with mechsuits! Yeah!).
A minority, and objectively wrong. Everything Verhoeven presents as being wrong with Starship Troopers is his own fabrication. He’s a coward who cannot present his argument without creating an army of strawmen to rail against.
No they didn’t. I’m sorry, that’s not an opinion. You may like the movie that happens to be called* Starship Troopers *but it is not from the book. The movie was already being made before the work was optioned. Verhoeven never finished the novel. The writers were unaware of the book while writing the script. There were minor changes to line it up with the book after production started. If it remained under the name Bug Hunt at Outpost Nine I still wouldn’t like it much but at least I wouldn’t despair that a decent ST will never be made.
ETA: Just to clarify, I’m not saying that it is factually wrong and not a valid opinion to like the movie. I don’t agree with the opinion but I would never say anyone can’t have their own tastes. But what can’t be argued is that the movie is only superficially like the book. That comes directly from the director and others involved.