I reiterate my position: Starship Troopers was a bad movie. It had bad acting, bad storytelling, a storyline not credible at all, bad special effects. Okay, maybe it had references to today’s politics, but this doesn’t make a really bad movie in a good movie. It doesn’t matter how much subtlety there is in a movie if the basic movie elements are non-existent.
P.S.: Starship Troopers wasn’t a rip-off of StarCraft, it’s acutally the other way around(well, sort of). The Marine’s suit in StarCraft was actually inspired by Heinlein’s designs.
Hapa, you are just barely becoming annoying. You ask us for our opinions on a film, and then deride us as morons when we give them to you. You call the novels we read ‘trashy’ (your word) even as you champion a movie based on one of them. In answer to your title, we understood the show much better than you.
Satire is far from dead, it just wasn’t effectively accomplished in Satrship Troopers. Apparently it was “satire” to make the movie suck, thereby brilliantly lampooning the ideals it supposedly espoused. Bottom line, it still sucked, whether because of ineptitude or plan. Normally, I like subtle satire, and Robocop was my favorite movie of all time.
As for charges of American imperialism, I understand that people believe in it. Just because those people may commit acts of violence against our military doesn’t mean their ideas have any validity, however.
Actually, if you want to be technical, Starcraft was a VERY blatant rip-off of Warhammer 40K. The visual designs and races are taken without any alterations but thier names. Warhammer40K certainly had some Heinlen influence, but had a mix of many other SF writers as well.
Blizzard (The game company) did the exact same thing with Warcraft and Warhammer. Not the most creative company around. Not that that’s relavant.
And no, ST wasn’t a “subtle” satire. It was desperatly, waving in your face, jumping up and down trying to pretend it was a satire. Which, I suppose on some level it was, but hardly a subtle one. The 50’s style jingoistic commercials were fun, but they were done better in Fallout.
And perhaps you should explain exactly HOW it mirrors American middle eastern policy. Do we regularly send vast armies to the middle east to be slaugheterd because they have the same grasp of tactics and strategy as a brain damaged sloth? Does the middle east shoot out nukes in random directions for no reason? Does the government fund WW2 era “Lets get-em, boys!” commercials? (if so, they must show them pretty late at night)
Not a Heinlen fan, (for the record, I think ST is a vastly overrated book) but not a Verhovan fan, either. Though I did like Robocop. Not as good as 8-Man After, but still pretty good. Though come to think of it, that’s the ONLY good movie that Verhoven ever did. (Ok, Total Recal wasn’t bad)
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“In the 70s, you could take an abstract concept like shining your love, and just run wiht it.”
ok, if a person thinks overall a movie sucked - for whatever reasons - that movie will suck for that person. If a person thinks a movie is great - again for whatever reasons - the movie is something worth watching. MY point? I don’t have one. Wait, maybe I do. You can’t say “Verhoven did/wanted to do-show-illuminate” this thing or this policy or whatever. On the other hand, you can’t say the opposite. The only person who knew what Verhoven was thinking over the months ST was made is Verhoven. None of us know. No matter what the special addition with extra footage says (which is probably mainly a lot of p.r. bullshit they made him say to give an excuse/reason for why this is one way and that is another.) So, all we have is our opinions. Let’s keep that in mind when we say “X is this ways because Y.”
Now onto my opinions ::
Starship Troopers - eye candy, nothing special, tit shots
Showgirls - tit shots, unrealistic fight scene, why was this made?
Total Recall - people will watch Arnold no matter who his co-star is (hey, Sharon Stone was in this movie…)
Robocop - Verhoven’s only good movie on more than one level
punk snot dead,
broccoli!
BTW - it’s Doogie HOWser, not Hauser. You must be thinking about Nazi’s too much (kidding)
There’s nothing wrong with satire. My objection is the vehicle used to deliver it. Fans of the novel did not go to see Starship Troopers for satire, they went because they enjoyed the book. (Though admitedly if they saw any preview it should have warned them off.) It’s as if Anne Rice’s book “Interview with a Vampire” had instead been changed into a political commentary on how political action commitees are sucking the life out of democracy in the US. Perhaps the point is valid, perhaps not, but it doesn’t justify disguising the message by twisting the work of another author.
And if someone wants to discuss “American Imperialism,” a catch phrase for anti-American sentiment everywhere, feel free to open a thread in the Great Debates.
Dropzone, I’m sorry that you feel that way about Mr. Heinlein’s work. Which big concepts gave you trouble? Honor? Duty? Devotion? If you bring nothing to the understanding, you get nothing out.
Or was it the strain of imagining doing things Other Ways Than Ours? To have such a violent reaction (“depthfree, jingoistic crap”) means that you flat out missed the whole point.
Read some Spider Robinson (particularly “Rah, Rah R.A.H.”) and chill out.
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