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Information Exchange => Reader Comments => Topic started by: ken@jabootu.com on December 20, 1999, 11:37:07 AM



Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: ken@jabootu.com on December 20, 1999, 11:37:07 AM
Far be it from me to correct the gallant Sgt. Borntreger (what is it with Marines and Bad Movies?  Ed "Plan 9" Woods and Phil "Robot Monster" Tucker were both Marines).  Still, the Why We Fight documentaries (at least the ones most famous here) were anti-Nazi propaganda films (and what's wrong with that?) made by Frank Capra, of It's a Wonderful Life fame.

In a way, of course, this makes the satire a bit more obnoxious, though.

I agree that this was a much misunderstood film.  The fairly high degree of political commentary remaining from the novel I credit to the fact that it was directed by a European.  However, Verhoevan apparently wimped out, and couldn't decide whether to portray an actual, functional Fascist governmental system, or if to satirize Heilein's vision instead.  So he tries to do both, the least satisfactory of the available options.

On the other hand, minus the sci-fi elements, one imagines that the instant and horrible carnage suffered by the troops here makes this a more realistic portrayal of battle than almost any other film provides.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: stevej@ameritech.net on December 20, 1999, 02:02:49 PM
Hey, Sarge, I see Ken d'Jabootu beat me to the punch on "Why We Fight", but I have to take issue with the "Good movie pretending to be a bad movie" thing.  Actually, this is a bad movie pretending to be a good movie pretending to be a bad movie.  yes, to be honest, I rather enjoyed it a minute at a time, but overall, it had some insumountable problems.  I'm dismayed that a marine could review this movie and not once say "Where the hell is the artillery?" when I can't watch the movie without saying it twenty times.  let alone the armor.  Did we forget how to build tanks by this time?  One lousy Panzer IV could've wiped out that whole planet, let alone an ultramodern hover tank of the expected "Hammer's Slammers" variety.  Why were they even down there?  I do, in fact, understand the watered down political satire intended, but the combat scenes are central to the process of the pic, and they are tactically painful to watch.  If the fascists rule the world in this movie, they must be Italian Fascists, and they got voted into office, cause they never had to fight anybody before but Ethiopians with spears.
But don't get me started on that.  Even if the rest of the film was a gem of satire, its medium--that of a war movie--was intrusively bad.  All the clever deep meaning can't change that.
Steve "and what idiot designed hand nukes?" James


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: fenris@badmovies.org on December 20, 1999, 06:27:51 PM
Ken and Steve, I didn't write this review - it came via Max Gardner.  As to the screwed up "Why We Fight" section - I didn't proofread the review really, just checked it for spelling errors before posting it.  (I was in a hurry last night, so that's my fault.)  Ah well, time  to go and fix that.  I'm quite particular about military equipment when it comes to certain films, though I try to tone it down a bit since most civilians don't really care that such plane is Soviet and such plane is American.  Still, in all fairness, a review fitting of the amazing  problems this film had could only come via Jabootu - Max didn't quite fire the same rounds at it I would have, but he's not me.  I believe the book is a wonderful little piece of work and wish they had stayed true to the ideas, but mourning such things is pretty fruitless.  Lastly, please don't call a Marine Corps Sergeant "Sarge."


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: ken@jabootu.com on December 21, 1999, 09:31:52 AM
Damn me for an ass!

My apologies to both the intrepid Sgt., (no 'sarge' here, by golly), and to Max as well.

Steve raises a good point as to armor, etc.  In fact, the lack of the 'power suits' described in the novel is sort of the basis of that.  Ironically, I imagine that they (Verhoevan, et al) didn't want to look like they were stealing the powers suits from the 'Ripley in the Exoskeleton' thing in Aliens, whereas Cameron probably took that bit from...the novel of Starship Troopers.  Notice the numerous other tips of the hat to the book in Aliens.  Of course, you could also make the argument that Cameron stole the exoskeleton thing from one the of Dean Martin/Matt Helm movies, which contains a comically similar scene.

Really, again though, I apologize for my sloppiness.  I mean, Max's name is there, big as life.  


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Bob Sacamento on December 23, 1999, 10:31:45 AM
stevej@ameritech.net spoke my mind! thats what I've said about this movie since I was 13! This movie is god-awful! The plot flaws are extremely terrible, even for a bad movie. I might would give this one slime due to the fact that some of the action is ok(though it dosen't make sense either), and that theres some nudity(of a bunch of flat and ugly chicks of course). Otherwords, this movie needs a really big skull.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: cwestfa1@twcny.rr.com on December 24, 1999, 12:25:20 AM
When I first saw the trailer for this movie, the first thing I said, "Where's the damn power armor!" Of course if everyone was wearing power armor, which might have doubled if not tripled the film's budget, you might lose character recognition, as if that really matters. If they did have the 'armor and deployed as by the procedures in the book, rather then going for these panaramic, psuedo 'Normandy Landing styled shots, atleast the 'tatoo: "Death from Above" would have made some sense.

I think that it would be cool if they did play up the fascist styled government more, and had the humans more overtly appear to be the expansionistic war mongers, for once humans are the bad guys, a nice change.

As for nude scenes, the only woman I wanted to see topless and or nude was Denise Richards, sure she's fake, but it's better then flabby reality. Why else would anyone want to see 'Wild Things', until discovering the plot was nice and intricate, and Bill Murray was good as the lawyer.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Daniel on August 28, 2001, 11:39:15 PM
This movie RULES!!!!!! The best film about giant killing bugs ever made! The same guys who made Robocop and Total Recall made this and whoever those guys are, they = rulz!! Nuff said.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Chris776@pacbell.net on March 27, 2000, 10:20:23 PM
I fully agree with your evaluation of this film.

By the way, I thought you should know that, the voice you have credited as "Angry Guy" who delivers the line "The only good bug is a dead bug!" is actually the film's Executive Producer, Jon Davison, who also incidentally produced ROBOCOP, also with Verhoeven directing!


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: tirdun@yahoo.com on March 28, 2000, 11:44:24 AM
The satire and "deep" message(s) did not escape me, however this movie still sucked. After skillfully transposing some of the message of the book, Verhoevan then went on to wuss out on the military. If you had to get rid of the power suits for budget sake, why not throw in some TANKS? Was ANY military person involved in this flick? Ever heard of air support? The book had the big armor, which was a essentially a tank anyhow, and air power. The movie had a bunch of jocks wandering around a planet firing glorified M-16s... It was fun watching them die, though.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: on May 16, 2000, 03:46:33 AM
I just didn't understand why the combined might of humanity amounted a platoon of light infantry minus the heavy weapons.  I mean even the little green army men we all played with as children had the guy with the radio on his back to call the luftwaffe...er air support, or at least to coordinate activity with the maybe one other platoon the bad bug things were attacked with.

Regarding the references to "Aliens", why, if they wanted to kill the bugs on their home world, did they not just bombard it from orbit?  Even from a long range?  I mean, you can hit a bridge with modern laser guided munitions (the famous gulf war pics...), seems simple enough to just sit at the top of the gravity well and dump nukes out of a cargo bay.

On the other hand, the beat up spaceships coming back to port near the beginning was cool, and seeing SS Hauptman Doogie was priceless.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Max Gardner on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
The film was not intended as a faithful adaptation of Heinlein's book.  It is not realistic from a military standpoint, nor was it meant to be.  It lampooned its source material, twisting Heinlein's work (labeled fascistic at the time of its publication) back on itself to provide a squeaky-clean soap-opera military regime.  In the end, both the novel and the film proved uncannily prescient.  The novel scares the hell out of me.  I prefer the film.  It's essentially the difference between whitehouse.gov and whitehouse.org.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Bats on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
Doogie Himmler - ROFLOL!!

Ahem...

Actually, I hate Starship Bloopers with a passion.  Homer Simpson accurately described the soldiers in this film when he said 'they were the suckiest bunch of sucks that ever sucked.'  What the hell was going on inside those Sky Marshals' heads when they said, 'yeah we'll just drop 100,000 grunts on an unknown planet without any tanks or artillery or air support or even a MASH.'  Like, duh?  And presumably by the time this story is set the US has conquered Argentina, I suppose?  That's the only reason I can come up with for all those California accents in Buenos Aires.  As for the performances, well...  Did these people just wander in off the set of Baywatch or something?   I mean, Denise Richards = babe.  Casper van Diem = ex-lifeguard (true!)  Neither of them convinced as rough, tough space hombres (hombrettes?).   Of the two, Denise Richards is easily the worst, and by far the most irritating character in the film.  I was really disappointed when the brain bug passed her up in favour of Zander.

Oh, and those escape capsule things in the Rodger Young... they bore a none-too-subtle resemblance to the Hammerhead cockpits from Space: Above And Beyond, or is that just me being picky about this dreadful mishmash of a movie?


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Chadzilla on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
I would watch this a second time simply to see the battle sequences and Michael Ironside again,  other than those to reasons, well there just aren't any.  Robocop was far superior to this.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Ukemist on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
This movie makes little sense if you've read the novel, and less if you haven't.  I enjoyed the sheer senseless gore, but that's all.  It could have been a great movie, and I doubt it was budget constraints that led to its idiocies (power armor is no harder to animate than bugs).

It strikes me that this movie was made by people who /hated/ the book.  Heinlein must be rolling in his grave.  They cut out everything that made sense, such as the capabilities and uses of the infantry (dropped like bombs from space in flying power armor armed with nukes), and flatly reversed key statements ("these bugs have spaceships, they are obviously smart" to "these are bugs, and can't be smart"; the brain bug was supposed to be a strategic mastermind, a genius among intelligent bugs, not the only intelligent bug).  Our Hero was whipped (but not booted out) for f**king up so royally that someone /died/ (in an insanely and needlessly dangerous live-fire training situation), rather than for not treating a harmless sim-nuke like a real nuke; similarly, the trainers were callous and abusive WRT physical damage, rather than sympathetic, though rough (in the movie scene the trainer cruelly spikes the guy's hand with a knife after he asks why they bother with these weapons; in the same scene in the book, it leads into the question of why they don't just use orbital bombardment for everything, and the trainer has a discussion with him about the role of the infantry and suggests that if he has such doubts, perhaps he should drop out).

Incidentally, simple labels like "fascism" don't do the political system in the book justice.  Veterans vote, soldiers don't, there's no draft and soldiers can quit any time except during combat (or when facing court martial); by all appearances they have at least the free speech and other personal freedoms of modern-day USA.  Most people don't consider it worth the bother to earn a vote, and some openly speak out against the political system (to the annoyance, but not retribution, of the government); there is no evidence of propaganda (outside of public schools, where the "propaganda" presented is not primarily facts, but philosophical arguments).  Minor crimes (such as drunk driving) are punished by public lashing, and major crimes (such as murder) by execution (nothing inherently fascist about this, whether you consider it brutal or not; it depends on what laws are being enforced).  People complain about "it works because it works" logic explaining the success of their society, but it's actually "we know it works because we've seen it work", which I think was a hint from Heinlein not to accept his vision thoughtlessly: "in the real world we /haven't/ seen it work, so /we/ don't know, it's just an idea".

The movie was built like an effigy of Heinlein soaked in kerosene with boxes of matched piled around it.  Burn, straw-man, burn!

Of course, most people don't know Heinlein, either to love him or hate him, so they just got a stupid movie that didn't make any sense.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Joe on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
This movie is cool, but it isn't as gory as everyone says that it is-- lots of movies are gorier than this! But anyway, the special computerized effects are really cool.  I liked the brain bug.  It's cute... in its own way.  But I liked the part where the beetles shoot meteorites out of their butts and the part(s) that were censored.  The brain bug one was good, but the cow one where it got ripped to pieces was by far better.  I love this film!!!!!!!!!!!


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: lostmissy on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
RAH wrote this book in response to what he viewed as a wave of "pacificism" that swept over the US during the late 50's and early 60's . It was a thought provoking novel about the role and purpose of the military in a modern society and the responsibility of the citizentry to that society. How that book became this movie reflects more on the society that we have become (dumbing down is the phrase that comes to mind)then the "fascist" ideals that RAH was roasted for then (really a military coming of age book). gut the book of any intelligence, then whip up a mishmash of alien/species/star wars/private ryan/titanic ( i dunno ) ripoffs that is cobbled together with as much violence as time and dollars will allow. Then add the sorriest group of actors (except Michael Ironside)that ever embarrassed themselves before an audience..god I was pulling for the bugs!!!


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Gaz on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
Starship Troopers is the most fun i've had watching a film. It's basically an updated WW2 flick with enough twists and emotion to reach any hard hearted SOB.

Check out the animated series as well. it kicks ass!


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Alan Smithee on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
One of the most inexplicably "bad" good movies of our time. I remember once hearing Paul Verhoeven explain this movie as trying to revive the classic B-level "kill all the giant monsters movie". Well he failed miserably, but I think this film is not without merit. The action scenes are exciting,though perplexing(man can send itself millions of miles across galaxies to fight an unknown enemy, yet doesn't understand the concept of artillery or even sending a goddamn tank to save thousands of worthless grunts). For my money, a better movie would involve the facists sending super-smart cyborgs to fight the bugs, Paul Verhoeven could then draw on deeper themes like he did in the much better Robocop. No, actually that would suck too. Also, why the hell isn't Denise Richards naked like in Wild Things. Her tits would make me forget every single flaw.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Jesus Thorn on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
I enjoyed the action in this one, I loved seeing people get ripped to pieces. Sure, everything was computer animated, but over the years, I've learned to cope with every movie being little more than a cartoon. The only thing that made me queasy about the movie, was the acting, save Michael Ironside. Basically, everytime I watch this, I hope, by some miracle, that the ending will magically change, and every bad actor in this movie gets ripped to bloody pieces.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Flea on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
Enlist 2-1-98

Well, it's probably a bit late to volunteer, but it's never too late to get drafted.

Starship Troopers rocks


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Max Harker on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
 When my friends and I first watched this movie,
we alternated between making fun of it and begging
to turn it off. We made it through to the end, our
brains scarred for life.
 The first problem I noted was, why are we invading
their planet? The humans (as in real life) are
agressive war mongers who decide it is their divine
right to own the universe. From that point on, I
was rooting for the aliens, who were really just
defending their home.
 The psuedo-jock heroes didnt score points with me
either, acting like testosterone laden zombies who
the director screamed "over-act!" at on random
occasions. Michael Ironside was the only character
who made sense and added an enjoyment factor
to this turkey.
 The tatoos have been mentioned, make no sense,
and only add to the eye rolling about these
moronic characters.
 Another thing thats been mentioned but cannot have
enough said on it is the lack of support the soldiers
had. When watching the movie, I continued to ponder
what had happened to air support since the napalm
dropping in Vietnam. No fighters, no bombers, just
a small group of guys kicked out of the transport
with puny rifles and a tatoo for armour.
 The bugs were made with astounding computer
animation. However there were some very noticeable
model/parts that were not animated which stuck
out. Maybe because of my experience with computer graphics and animation, it was more obvious to me, dont know...
 Finaly the brain bug gets captured, surrounded by
hundreds of armed bloodthirsty warriors as its
race lay dead or dying, and it takes a psychic to know "its scared"...and everyone cheers like that
was a big secret. If they had animated it p**sing
itself it couldnt have been more obvious. When it was over, I honestly couldnt believe movies
that bad could be made in this day and age. I have
since been proven wrong, but this one will ramain
etched in my memory as one of the worst movies of
the decade. I may buy it just for the amazing
potential for mocking it.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Brian Cole on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
Starship Troopers
   By Brian Cole
   
   Starship Troopers is one great movie -- unless you make the mistake of taking is seriously.
   
The most memorable sequence, I believe, is when the photogenic Denise Richards is impaled through her left shoulder by a 14-foot arachnid. (Throughout most of the movie all she is allowed to do is advertise her orthodontist's work.) This can't be much different than being crucified — you die from shock, blood loss and sheer agony. You are at least expected to pass out.
   
But not Denise.
   
She is impaled, then lifted off the ground by the arachnid and dropped in front of the "brain bug" which wants to suck her brains out. (What a waste.) But Denise manages to slice off the brain bug's sucking appendage (call it whatever you want). Then she jumps to her feet, Johnny Rico has arrived, and is able to handle an automatic weapon.

She then shoots the arachnids and makes a run for it because a fallen soldier is about to detonate a portable nuke. At the last moment, she jumps into a ravine, escaping the blast.
   
She then emerges with Johnny out of the cave into the sunlight with the rest of the victorious troopers. They caught the brain bug!
   
She rejoices with the rest of the gang, then walks away arm-in-arm with Johnny and Neil Patrick Harris optimistic about the War Against The Bug.
   
I wish I could be like Denise. She never calls for a medic; never passes out; doesn't bleed to death; and is able to put the glow of victory above her mangled shoulder and chest.
   
What else is there to say about Starship Troopers? Only that there are at least a dozen other funny sequences leading up to Denise's valiant performance of her duty.

Show up lobotomized, and you'll love Starship Troopers.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Jesus Thorn on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
The biggest problem I have with this movie is that Denise Richards DIDN'T BLEED TO DEATH!


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: David Wooldridge on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
I think the person who did the review who said this was a good movie disguised as a really bad movie has a point (but I don't necessarily agree with). The idea of the movie Starship Troopers, as I read it, was about militarism like the novel, but it took the polar opposite view of it. The movies point seemed to be about how silly militarism was, about how patriotic fervor and rushing off to "fight the good fight" simply results in alot of young people dying horrible, pointless deaths on some distant rock. In that way, it comes across brilliantly, though I don't agree with it. Now, I'm a big fan of Heinleins work (despite some of his later stuff with tends to be rant heavy) and I kind of found the fact that they went in the complete opposite direction of book (one of the points of the book is tha militarism is necessary for the survival of the state) a bit offensive. Starship Troopers is a very thought provoking novel. I don't agree with all of Heinleins politics and I found the society in the book a bit disturbing, but to take the name and some of the names of the characters and then trash the whole point of the very well written novel to me is wrong. They shouldn't step all over his work like that.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: m_dude on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
this is, in my opinion, the best film on this site. If you have see the DVD commentary, you learn at the end that the film wasn't supposed to be about attacking bugs at all. It was trying to say that the government isn't always right. But I think Rob Heinlein, who wrote the novel, could've created a better scenario for who the troope had to fight rather than fictional planets with oversized bugs. I haven't seen the film for a while, but i I think there was this bug who was this gigantic blue glob who sat in the middle of outer space and destroyed ships. No meterors. No sattelites. Just ships. You'd think it'd destroy everything around it wouldn't you?

>>i have an e-mail address. i don't wanna leave it and get stupid offers from businesses


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Ernst Bitterman on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
The only comment that I have about this show which hasn't already been quite excellently covered is this:

I'm not sure the MI in this show deserve artillery support, if they're so unprofessional that when the CO sticks his head in with an alert for two of his troopers (Rico and Wusserface who dies minutes later), finds them in flagrante, and rather than yell their asses off for wasting energy like that, SMILES INDULGENTLY and tells them they've got EXTRA TIME TO GET READY!  Errrr....

I think Paul Verhoeven must have taken a serious blow to the head just prior to filming (but, always remember, there's some screenwriters to heap blame on as well).  I thought the exterior scenes in space were pretty good.  If you haven't seen this yet, go rent the animated series; it's superior in many ways (better armour, slightly more professionalism, no giant lips on the actors, &ct).


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Lt. Col. Lance Shujumi: R.A. Heilein Fan on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
The Starship Troopers Film adaptation (Henceforth refered to as "Nazis in Space", it sure as hell ain't Starship Troopers) is the worst interpritation of Heinleins novel. The only thing "Nazis In Space" as in common with the Starship Troopers novel is the title and names of the characters, ships, and planets. Oh yeah, they keep the Bugs, however the bugs in the Novel are more intellegent.

Also the Government system portrayed in the book is more akin to the Athenian government, with Veterans the only ones alowed to vote. In "Nazis in Space", the govenment system is a Socialist Dictatorship.

Now we get to the Powered Suits, the vehicles that give the Mobile Infantry it's name. These magnificant Machines are left out of "Nazis in Space". Think "Top Gun" without the Fighter Jets, that's the same scenario you have with "Nazis in Space".

In conclusion: If you want to check out Heinlein's work, go read the book or watch a "Fansub" of the Japanese Animated version (Yes there is one out, but only in Japan). If you want utter crap that is a deviation from the book it's allegedly based upon, "Nazis in Space" is for you.

Lt. Col. Lance Shujumi
Robert A. Heinlein Fan
Terran M.I. TSS Macross


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: octo on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
well when i first saw the trailer the immediate thought was.. 'wow an aliens like story with more bugs and more guns (not they're any good)'

i quite enjoyed it at the time which was a long time ago! and i forgot about it, then they showed it on TV and then i thought..'wait a minute this ain't the same...', i then thought this movie was utter crap... the acting was pants and i agree with the above... the military should have kicked ass. there is also a cheesy factor involved that i don't like.
The only problem with the review is that there was a line saying theres some nudity but no one we want to c nude.. hmm i dunno, i quite liked dizzy NOT rico though lol... too bad dizzy had to die she had a certain sexy but mean b***h about her.
So to conclude... its an ok movie with some laughs, robocop like news clips inserted... er... actually its quite pants :P except for dizy hmmm lol


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Juan Alberto Badia on November 25, 2006, 04:09:03 PM
Aguante Buenos Aires. Creo que los alienigenas la atacaron porque era la capital del mundo para esa altura.
Pierde mucho con la traduccion al ingles, mejor seria verla en su espaniol original.
(Buenos Aires rules. I think aliens attacked it because it was the capitol of the world by that time.
The movie looses a lot when translated to English, it would be much better to hear it in its original Spanish)


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Jon Ferraro on November 25, 2006, 04:10:12 PM
As I saw the film before reading the novel, I heartily agree that the film makers ignored the points Heinlein was making when he wrote Starship Troopers.  The Afrika Korps-style caps everyone wore gave me a chuckle ("Oh, they dress like Nazis, this must be a fascist society").  Several previous posts here already explain the socio-political points that I would have expressed had I seen this review sooner.
I have to chime in on the technical points of the film though.  As stated earlier, what happened to the ideas of, say, preliminary bombardment, air support (one incendiary raid by six bombers, and it's not even in support of ground troops?), armor, artillery, mobility (these guys drop in and then move about ON FOOT?), and tactics?  I should also mention the glaring discrepancy regarding technology in the film.  If I understand correctly, soldiers of the future carry hand-held nuclear weapons, travel between solar systems, etc... but they still use magazine-fed automatic rifles?  Nobody's developed more advanced small arms by then?  I'd love to know who controlled the allocation of military funding in the future portrayed in this bomb (pardon the pun).
One last note: the ship "Rodger Young" was named after a hero of the struggle on Guadalcanal (which took place in World War 2 for you history-class snoozers out there).


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: TheGreatWasabi on November 30, 2003, 01:10:34 AM
Good movie, but unfaithful to the novel, which was very good.  I agree that the movie should have had considerably more military units.  Some heavy assualt tanks, more nukes, mabye some king-sized starships with planetary bombardment capabilities...the computer game of Starship Troopers seem to have it all...


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Viseus on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
Are you people crazy? Of course the tactics are non-existent! It's satire! I can't understand how anybody can take this movie seriously. Why don't you criticize the tactical stupidity and unrealiztic depiction of Wile E. Coyote's road-runner hunting while you're at it? Come ON. This is a very funny movie which not only ridicules patriotic-militaristic-fascistic jerks, it also pokes fun of YOU audience who take it seriously.


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Drew on November 25, 2006, 04:09:03 PM
The controversy over the book is if Heinlein really believed the society in it was a good one, or if he was making a point about how on the surface the society looks functional but in reality it is near facist and the populace just accepts it as a blessing.  Or is it a combination of the two?

Verhoven, in the movie, basically took the basic plot idea, but made it into an anti-facist satire.  Because of the realities of translating a book to film, and the fact that he set out to satire the society, he had to change the concept of the infantry from the powered armor that replaced tanks/artillary in the book to a more WWII infantry (Nazi parallel.)  Also, he showed that the individual soldiers acted  because of common, personal feelings that anyone in any society would have.  Meanwhile, the government misused or misdirected the outputs of these soldiers.  That is why a lot of the strategy sucks.  Earth was pompous and stupid at first.



Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Martin Back on June 20, 2004, 03:58:44 PM
I totally agree with Viseus - the soldiers, the millitary tactics are supposed to be dumb- This is a classic piece of cheese and it is great!! lots of gore - HILLARIOUS lines, bad acting - what more can you possibly want????


Title: Starship Troopers
Post by: Colin on November 25, 2006, 04:09:49 PM
As a huge REH fan i went to see this knowing allready that it was going to be a satire of the novel, and on that level it probably failed as the the book isnt that well known amongst the target audience of the movie. However it succeed by hitting so many other targets it had me laughing for ages. The entire idea of the a bunch of kids straight from the set of 90210 being horribly mutilated by large space monsters is very appealing.
Add Doogie Howser in full nazi regalia ( now I understand why that show allways disturbed me ), shameless msnbc ( would you like to know more? ) references, the almost word for word remakes of 40's propoganda films and the ever present bodycount-o-meter and the whole experience was worth every cent.
My only problem was that they had a perfectly good opportunity to kill of the extremely and deliberately annoying Jonny Rico halfway through the movie but let him come back to life... could have been the first movie without a main protagonist for the second half and therefore quite original.


Title: Re: Starship Troopers
Post by: Michael Fallon Alberson on February 21, 2008, 11:53:49 PM
I loved the movie, even before I realized it was satire. However, I would really like
to see a serious movie made of Robert Heinlein's masterpiece.


Title: my favorite bad movie
Post by: S. Schafer on June 27, 2009, 02:40:04 AM
Yeah, this is a ridiculous piece of work from start to finish. It can't even rightfully be called a satire. A satire assumes you're smarter than the material being satirizes, this assumes that you either REALLY like bad movies or you think professional wrestling is real.

My favorite moment was around 1:30, where the grunts have formed a circle with the bugs in the center, and are firing into the center of the circle. I'll repeat that: they are in a circle and are firing into the center.

Oof, but pretty much every minute of this movie is stupider than any other. That shouldn't even be possible, yet somehow is.

Fun, though.


Title: Re: Starship Troopers
Post by: Flangepart on June 29, 2009, 06:18:43 PM
Are you people crazy? Of course the tactics are non-existent! It's satire! I can't understand how anybody can take this movie seriously. Why don't you criticize the tactical stupidity and unrealiztic depiction of Wile E. Coyote's road-runner hunting while you're at it? Come ON. This is a very funny movie which not only ridicules patriotic-militaristic-fascistic jerks, it also pokes fun of YOU audience who take it seriously.
Sure, if you take the MOVIE seriously...the book, which I recently re-read...yeah, its a thinking persons concept. Different things indeed. Heinlin's comments about how the north American (That means U.S., folks)  continent fell into chaos are more true today then I want to admit.
The movie is a riff fest though... :tongueout:


Title: Re: Starship Troopers
Post by: Jurrasic on December 23, 2015, 09:50:36 PM
Needs a 'Clancy Brown!' beside Sgt. Zim's name in the cast list. Guy is a kickass character actor, among many roles he also played The Kurgan in Highlander, (which is balls-awesome enough to get a star on the walk of fame, I say!) and is better recognized then Casper Van Dien by a long shot.


Title: Re: Starship Troopers
Post by: Parralax view on May 20, 2016, 08:20:34 PM
I read the book long ago, I saw the film as the usual watered down misconceived mess that it was.  90210 with no exterminators...  And why on god's green do you send a million troops to some god forsaken planet to get chewed up, when a massive nuclear bombardment would have done Orkin's work for them??