Battleship (2012)

Movie Info

The battleship is coming!!!

A signal is sent into space to Planet-G from a research facility in Hawaii.  As the navy practices a military exercise around the island, a response comes in the form of huge battle spaceships that set up a barrier over the state.  With a majority of the naval fleet trapped outside the dome, Alex Hopper (Taylor Kitsch) finds himself in charge of battleship and forced to lead the combined forces against the alien invaders.  The aliens, who have lost their communications ship, have set out to use the research facility to signal the rest of their fleet.  Alex’s girlfriend Sam (Brooklyn Decker) and a double amputee named Lieutenant Colonel Mick Canales (Gregory D. Gadson) battle the land invasion as Alex leads the fight at sea to prevent a full scale invasion.

B17…You sunk my Battleship!!!

Directed by Peter Berg, Battleship is the big screen “adaptation” of 1967 Milton Bradley board game.  The film was met by largely negative reviews and topped many “worst of lists” for the year.  The movie was nominated for Razzies for Worst Picture, Worst Director, Worst Supporting Actor (Liam Neeson), Worst Supporting Actress (Brooklyn Decker), Worst Screenplay, and Worst Screen Ensemble.  Rihanna took home the Razzie for Worst Supporting Actress.  The film was considered a financial failure despite making back its budget.

I was a bit surprised by Battleship.  I, like many, thought it was a joke when the film was announced.  A board game (which actually started as a pencil and paper game long before Milton Bradley got ahold of it), just didn’t seem like something to make a movie about…then to make it about an alien invasion really pushed it.  What surprised me was that of all the big, loud, and bad movies that seemed forced, this film wasn’t my least favorite.

I’m an alien with a fashionable goatee!

The script does what it can to incorporate a game about the hunt for rival ships.  The only real reference to the game is a point at which the battleship is trying to predict where the alien ship is going to be to launch missiles…other than that, the similarities stop.  The script is a bit pompous and overblown, but it was decently paced with action and lulls in the appropriate places…though it should have been an hour and a half script.

The movie really falls apart with the acting and the forced relationships throughout the movie.  Kitsch is a rebel…loses his brother (Alexander Skarsgård)…and fears asking his girlfriend’s father (and his commanding officer) if he can marry her (this is played by Neeson who doesn’t appear to know what he’s doing in the role).  I like Jesse Plemons from his time on Friday Night Lights and he almost balances out the awful Rihanna who seems like she’s just reading lines.  I admire Gregory D. Gadson, but his storyline with Brooklyn Decker is really awful and the movie hits the brakes whenever they show up.  I also found the ending when the World War II veterans pilot the battleship so saccharine that it almost rots my teeth (I guess only the “Greatest Generation” can save us now!)

Alien ship or WWII battleship? I don’t think the movie is called Alien Ship!

The effects on the movie are quite good.  I like them better than many of the Transformers’ films confusing effects and the giant ships seem to be well designed for functionality.  The big booming fight near the end is fun and looks good, though I don’t know a battleship could be controlled with as much finesse as it seems to be.

Battleship is in no means a good movie, but it isn’t as bad as a movie as I thought it would be.  Perhaps because I was dreading the film, it got a bit of a slide.  Fortunately with the failure of the film, I don’t think we’ll be seeing Battleship 2 so the cliffhanger of a second invasion seems unlikely…looks like the battleship saved the world!