Chastised by critics nationwide for being a complete and utter crapfest that can only be compared to the campfest sci-fi flicks of the days of b&w, like those generated by master of cheese, Ed Wood. BATTLEFIELD EARTH (based on the book "Battlefield Earth: a Tale of the Year 3000") was considered to be one of, if not THE worst of the movies spawned from Hollywood in the year-that-shouldn't-have-been, 2000. A laughing stock in any book, even if it had NOT opened against the phenomenal GLADIATOR, BATTLEFIELD EARTH would still have died box office wise, even against other 2000 flops like BLAIR WITCH 2 and LOST SOULS. Trust me, no matter what the pairing, BATTLEFIELD EARTH would have failed. I, however, decided to wait and see if it was really deserving of such hatred and disdain. I have one thing to say: "I WANT MY MONEY BACK!"

Okay kiddies, here's little story 'bout a planet named Earth, a poor little globe barely kept it's occupants fed... Alright, so I'm not the best at "Beverly Hillbillies" parodies, but that's not the idea. The story of BATTLEFIELD EARTH is as follows: in the year 2000, a race of intergallactic conquerers from the planet Psychlo invade our little planet, defeating our total armed forces in a matter of 9 minutes. What a minute, "Psychlo"?! I feel as if I've rented a FLASH GORDON sequel by accident... Psychlo, oh man, that's a good one. Anyway, it's now the year 3000, and the Psychlokians use our planet to mine for precious minerals and vitamins, gold being the most valuable metal of all... don't worry, if you're like me and question whether this last tidbit of info has any bearing to the story, not to worry, it sorta does. As for the human race, we're now an endangered species, living in barbaric encampments, struggling to stay alive. To be more precise, we look like refugees from a bad fantasy movie, clothed in animal skins and mangy as bison. We also think the Psychlokians are demons, and the stars in the sky are Gods who will come down and save us someday. Hmmmm, maybe this means me and my fellow Godz will make a comeback...

As with all tribes of frightened neanderthals, one of them feels they must go out into the world beyond their town walls and look for greener, less irradiated pastures and save their fellow barbarians from obscurity. BATTLEFIELD EARTH's intrepid half wit is Jonnie, our hero none-the-less. Leaving behind the woman he loves, Jonnie sets out to explore the remains of the planet. Here it turns from BATTLEFIELD EARTH into BEASTMASTER II 3000, as the pelt clad young man discovers strange and frightening things from the "old world" (2000), such as a miniature golf course overgrown with weeds and the like where a plaster dragon holds dominion. Frightened by the non-moving and somehow smoking artificial beast, Jonnie lashes out with the only weapon at hand: a 5 iron. Okay, first huge inconsistancy, why is there a 5 iron at a miniature golf course?! Miniature golf courses contain putters, usually rubber ones, not 5 irons! It's a curse being an anal retentive son of a Jackal, but it's my job...

After defeating the "dragon", Jonnie is approached by two more primitives, native to this area who promise to show Jonnie a frozen "God" in exchange for food. The "God" turns out to be a big funny looking statue holding a wrench, like an automotive parts mascot... Funny in a way, but far more stupid in other ways. My prayers are soon answered as some big hulking guy in dreadlocks hunts the trio down in an abandoned mall. Sadly, his ray gun seems to be set to "stun", as it does nothing but irradicate street signs and knock over boxes, though the lerge shadowy figure does manage to take the humans down with it... apparently Nerf guns are far more dangerous than I expected. Here the movie takes a more sci-fi twist, as Jon and some other humans are herded like cattle to a concentration camp of sorts, turning the flick into SCHINDLER'S LIST 3000. Only problem is, the Ralph Fiennes character of Amon Goeth is replaced by the John Travolta character of Psychlo Head of Security Terl, instantly throwing the flick into SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER 3000 mode. No sooner does Jon arrive at the encampment does he start shit, impressing Terl a little too much as he steals a Nerf gun from one of the guards and shoots the guy with it. Wow, Jon can pull a trigger, aint' that something... After this Jon joins his fellow man-animals (who I will refer to as "manimals" to save space) in a much needed hosing down. Oh yeah, and despite being from an entirely different solar system, the Psychlokians have a concept of Hell... actually, they straight up call it "Hell"... *cough*cough*thissucks*cough*cough*

Jon soon works his way to the top rung of the slave ladder, uniting everyone in BRAVEHEART 3000 fashion, only without all the epic struggle, drama, and well choreographed battle scenes. As for Terl, his government screws him over and he seeks financial revenge. From here, I think I can make leaps and bounds and no one should mind, so here goes the rest of the flick: Jon and Terl's wacky misadventures lead them into an odd truce of sorts. Requiring Jon and his armpit sniffing manimals to mine a vein of gold for them in irradiated territory (I'll get to the dangers of mixing Psychlokians with radiation later), Terl beams information, skills, and education into Jon's head ala THE MATRIX 3000, teaching him Psychlokian language and tool use, as well as the history of Earth and quantum physics... not exactly the brightest alien to invade a planet is he? It obviously never occured to him that Jon might make use of this info to overtake the Psychlokian base, but then Jon is just a manimal, and Terl is John Travolta after all.

Using his new found knowledge, the equipment provided to him by Terl for the mining project and his barbarian amigos on the outside, Jon takes a Psychlokian craft to the remains of Texas, where he uncovers a nuke and learns just how to set it off. This is good for Jon and friends, because the air the Psychlokians breath on Psychlo is very reactive to radiation. So, Jon plans to send the nuke to Psychlo via teleporter, detonating it on arrival and destroying the entire cursed globe of angry Rastafarians in platform shoes. This will prevent any cavalry from coming to the rescue when Jon carries out his take over of the Psychlo base on Earth. Everything goes fairly smoothly, as Jon and the other knuckle draggers rebel, which includes another MATRIX 3000 moment as Jon is shot at in slow-mo. This alos involves one scene that baffles me with it's brutal lack of common sense as a group of the technologically illiterate ass scratchers teach themselves to become fighter pilots, battling Psychlokian cruisers in an aerial dogfight straight out of INDEPENDENCE DAY 3000... and they win too.

Before his planet is detinated, Terl calls them up requesting back-up, and before you know it those resourceful Psychlokians have an entire death squad up and running in a mere 5 seconds time! This is obviously funnier than it is impressive... But, in spite of a few minor set backs, everything goes as planned in the rebellion. The planet Psychlo is blown up, the Psychlokian forces on Earth are defeated, Jonnie's friends wind up dead, but he still gets to tap his girlfriend, who was amongst the survivors. As for Terl, he was stupid enough to blow his own arm off, and Jon also decides to keep him as bounty, in case any other Psychlo squads come looking for the guy responsible for the destruction of their planet. Hooray, it's finally over!

As the Psychlokians would say, "this is one crap-lousy movie!". The only remotely impressive aspect were the special FX, and since these sucked hobo rectum most of the time, this is a bad thing. Also, gore wise, almost all of the killings occured off screen , so we only get implied violence... which is bullshit. The costumes were VERY bad. Where as the human outfits of either animal hides or prison jump suits required no thought process at all, the Psychlokians are WAY overdone. Their massive dreadlocks, elongated heads, lizard-like eyes, cheesy "clawed" hands, elevator shoes, and humorous nose extensions/artificial breathing tubes made for some bulky and awkward looking extraterrestrials. Most injured by the outfit was Forest Whitaker, who played Terl's apprentice Ker. How can anyone take Ker serious with all those bulges and pieces of costume sticking out?!

Next to get the axe is the acting, actually, just Travolta. In 2000 Travolta committed Hollywood suicide with not only BATTLEFIELD EARTH, but also the frightening LUCKY NUMBERS with Lisa Ku-blows. I don't know why Travolta played Terl here, but he does horribly as the role of a kinaiving (or however it's spelled) despot type. He was far more villainous and menacing in FACE/OFF... oh who am I kidding, he was more menacing in URBAN COWBOY for fuck's sake! I think ol' John's decided that he no longer wants the second chance he was given by Quentin Tarantino in PULP FICTION and has instead decided he'd much rather continue his lament with more sequels to the LOOK WHO'S TALKING series, probably Direct-to-Video to show that he's not "in it for the money" but in it for the "art". Well, even if Travolta's acting carreer has slipped through his fingers like so much diarehha, at least he shows talent in the field of long-distance cattle butchering. Finally, the directing. Roger Christian (leave it to a guy with a name like that to direct a movie written by the guy who founded Scientology) needs to scrape up a few bucks and get his camera crew a tripod or something, because 98% of the scenes were shot at an angle. I'm hoping this is purely because the cameramen were so bored that they were knodding off and therefore holding the cameras crooked, because is it was an intention by Christian (who also worked on the visual FX for STAR WARS), than he's just as naive and insipidly retarded as his name implies. Death to Cristian(s)! On one last hilarious note to make fun of the movie, I would've liked to have wiped my ass with the VHS film to prove a point, but my anus is allergic to the substance used to make the film, and I'd break out into a horrid rash were I to do such a thing. And there's no way I'm letting this movie get under my flesh anymore than it already has!

DVD X-tras: For such a horrible movie, the DVD sports many x-tras, though none of them really that prominent. Here goes: Commentary track from the director and the production designer; behind-the-scenes featurette "Evolution and Creation", in which Christian actually has the sac to compare his crap-fest with the classics STAR WARS, 2001, and DUNE... yeah, I'm sure that's what the two people in the world who liked it thought too...; there's a visual comparison section on the storyboards and the final film sequences; make-up screen test for Travolta, in which he tries comparing himself to James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart... with all these egos on the set, no wonder the movie bombed! Next, there's a featurette on the visual FX; a teaser, trailer, and 2 TV ads; a 5 page plug for the book; and cast & crew filmos and carreer highlights. Also, if you push "->" on your controller while in the "Languages" or either of the "Special Features" sections, you'll put a targeting sight on one of three illustrated objects. These Easter Eggs lead you to more behind-the-scenes footage of the make-up application, the riot scene, and test footage of a guy getting jerked around violently by a "jerk the guy back really hard" harness. If nothing else, this DVD taught me one important lesson: NEVER LISTEN TO GEORGE LUCAS!

Also Known As: BATTLEFIELD EARTH: A SAGA OF THE YEAR 3000

Sequels: Pray there never is...

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