Subject: Retrospective: Starship Troopers (1997)

From: Modemac <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 07 Dec 2001 03:31:09 -0000

It's been a few years now since Paul Verhoeven's adaptation of Robert
Heinlein's STARSHIP TROOPERS faded from the public spotlight.  That's
a good thing, because this is not one of the high points of science
fiction movies.  But in spite of the critical drubbing this movie
received (especially from the legions of dedicated fans of Robert
Heinlein, most of whom consider the novel "Starship Troopers" one of
his best books), it's far from the worst science fiction movie around
either.  It may not be worth paying full price for, but I found the
movie on sale for six bucks, and it's worth it at that price.  For
sheer, exciting, gory, brain-dead (if not mindless) entertainment,
STARSHIP TROOPERS certainly gives you two hours of everything you
expect in a Paul Verhoeven movie: action, excitement, blood, gore,
action, nude scenes, and more action.  If only the plot was brave
enough to put some real brains in; if it had, we might have had a true
science fiction classic here.

Verhoeven shows his familiarity with Heinlein's story by taking the
plot and exaggerating it by several factors.  He includes most of the
famous scenes of the book, especially the boot camp sequences and a
corporal punishment scene, where the hero is sentenced to ten lashes
with a whip.  Verhoeven removes the "powered armor" made famous in
Heinlein's book, and that's a mistake; evidently, his intent was to
make the action scenes look like moments from James Cameron's ALIENS.
The uniforms, weapons, and monsters are closely copied from Cameron's
film; which is ironic in its own way, because Cameron obviously
borrowed from Heinlein's own "Starship Troopers" when he made ALIENS.

But there's a fake, cartoony, comic-book quality to the entire movie
that keeps us from taking it at all seriously.  This is good, because
if Verhoeven tried to give us a grim and gritty, ultra-realistic look
at "war" like PLATOON did, then this exceptionally gory, massively
violent movie would probably have sent audiences rushing out of their
seats.  (It had trouble bringing them in, as it was; the movie was a
box-office flop.)  The boot camp scenes are entertaining, and we
accept them even though they're blatantly fake.  Watch the scene where
Sargeant Zim greets the troops for the first time, and compare it to
the opening of FULL METAL JACKET; the tension and the horror of
Stanley Kubrick's film is completely absent here.  But it's
entertaining, nonetheless.  If there's one thing that can certainly be
said about STARSHIP TROOPERS, it's this: the movie is not boring.

Quite a few movies have taken on a new level of irony or "meaning"
since the September 11 attacks, and this movie is one of them.  It's
interesting to compare the similarity of the plot device -- sudden
surprise attack leaves thousands dead; the world mourns; we go to war;
the hero stays with the army because he lost his family in the
destroyed city of Buenos Aires.  The loss we all suffered in real life
does give make this seem somewhat more believable, though not much so;
it's still cartoony, but not quite as far-fetched now as it was when
the movie was released.  This movie has gained some small benefit in
the "new" American culture.

But even so, it would still benefit more of the screenwriter had dared
to include a brain in the story -- and I don't mean a brain bug,
either.  I certainly can't deny that Verhoeven is a talented director,
and nearly every scene in the movie is full of movement and energy,
and the special effects are very good...but the sheer idiocy of a
number of the plot devices makes the movie hard to swallow, and it
kills whatever emotions we've built up.

I've heard the arguments that the point of the entire story is to take
a satirical look at military propaganda, and Verhoeven's success with
ROBOCOP certainly shows that he knows satire.  And when we compare the
actions of the "Federation" as it goes to war to the real-life
American campaign against Afghanistan and "terrorism," we can
certainly be glad that our military commanders were smarter than the
ones in this movie.  Strictly in terms of plot, STARSHIP TROOPERS
deserves some kind of an award for sending an army to invade enemy
territory using some of the dumbest, most idiotic tactics I've ever
seen in a "war movie," be it serious or satirical.  You could make a
list of the stupid mistakes made by the "military commanders" here --
keeping their starships huddled together so that it's easy to crash
into each other; sending their troops into unknown enemy territory at
night, armed only with machine guns, not having any air support or
heavy armored vehicles, and not even using their portable nukes when
they need them; and so on, and so on.  I can only assume that this
stupidity was deliberately put in by the screenwriter.  I've read
Heinlein's novel, and the movie does follow the book (mostly); so it
seems likely that the stupidity of the military was exaggerated even
more, as a deliberate move on Verhoeven's part.

Of course, the brain-dead military commanders only match the stupidity
of the movie's ostensible hero, Johnny Rico.  He's caught in a love
triangle, though we know how it's all going to end.  It's just enough
to make him a two-dimensional Movie Hero, complete with a perfect
hairdo that never gets mussed.  He pines for his lady-love Carmen
Ibanez; but she only has eyes on becoming a starship pilot.  And he
completely misses the unrequited love of his teammate, high school
companion, and total babe "Dizzy" Flores.  The idiocy of this running
"romantic" theme matches the idiocy of the military tactics of the
film, suggesting that the whole thing is meant to be one big cartoon.

Verhoeven's misogynistic streak also reveals itself here, but it's
kept under control more than in his other movies; the most offensive
bit here is probably Dizzy Flores, whose entire life is dedicated to
landing Johnny Rico in bed.  Of course, Rico is too stupid to realize
this until it's nearly too late; but at least we get to see some
gratuitous nudity.  Verhoeven is one of those rare directors who
doesn't flinch when it comes to either violence *or* sex.  When we see
a Verhoeven action scene, we know there's going to be over-the-top
violence (and quite often too much of it, as in TOTAL RECALL); and we
can certainly expect over-the-top sex as well from the man who gave us
SHOWGIRLS.

And yet, the movie is still bursting with energy.  There's not one
moment in the entire movie when the pace flags.  The action scenes are
well-done (and there are many); the camera moves constantly, but never
in a way that calls attention to itself (I hate those MTV video-style
directors who swoop the camera all over the place with no rhyme or
reason, as in THE CROW); and the film's reported $100 million budget
is certainly well-displayed on the screen.  The bug attacks in
particular are outstanding, and they are far and away the best parts
of the entire movie.  Add on the cartoonish propaganda segments that
occur every so often ("Would you like to know more?"), and the result
is a big, splashy, dumb way to waste two hours.

I's impossible to take this movie seriously, and that's why I enjoyed
it when I watched it with friends.  We whooped and hollered and
exclaimed our astonishment as we watched the characters make one dumb
move after another -- "You've got NUKES, you idiots!  Use 'em!"
"Dizzy wants you so bad, you moron!  [CENSORED] her already!"  As far
as bad movies go, I'd rather experience one like STARSHIP TROOPERS,
with its exciting action scenes and its sheer lack of seriousness,
than a slow-moving slug of a film reeking with self-importance like
BATTLEFIELD EARTH or even GODZILLA (the 1998 version).  This movie is
made for adults -- and it could have been a true classic if it dared
to treat its audience like adults.

--
		      First Online Church of "Bob"
			http://www.modemac.com/

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