March 13, 2011

• Battle: Los Angeles

  [SPOILERS IMMINENT]

  The first movie of the year I was amped to see has now finally been seen.  My verdict?  

  Meh. Decent, but overall a little disappointing.  Maybe 2.5 out of 5 stars at best. Once there comes a point in a movie where I find myself a little bored with what's going on due to repetitive activity, then that's when it begins to fail in my eyes.  Dirtiness, shooting, explosions.  Sometimes that's enough for me, but not from an alien movie.  And because the concept of the movie is a very purposefully implemented and straightforwardly simple plot of soldiers battling on the ground for their own survival as well as the survival of their rescued civilians, development into something more interesting never really happened.  It was as it was and nothing more.  It was a battle alright, but nothing too different from your typical battle on the soil, nothing too fantastically eventful that made you go "Oh WOW, this is definitely an intergalactic battle!" Nah, it was more of just...well guns and ships and explosions, stuff you see in movies everywhere, even the non-alien ones. Much of the goodness is visible in the previews, which I guess I should have expected. Sometimes when trailers show too MUCH awesomeness, that should be the first clue that they will leave nothing else in the actual movie to be visually spectacular. Thus, it was a bit of a let down to me. 

  The aliens weren't even really aliens to me.  Aside from their crafts, which I think were pretty cool, the aliens didn't really strut anything terribly original or threatening. I appreciated the fact that they were given some bit of purpose (harvesting water), but even that concept seemed desperately implemented to satisfy the droves of alien movie fans, such as myself, who always seek out a movie that contains aliens with purpose.  But it didn't hold much water to me, no pun intended.  They come to earth to use water as fuel so, okay.  But what does that have to do with destroying humanity? If they wanted water, they can just take it. To me, there was no point to come onto land when the earth is over 70 percent water anyway.  In the movie, it was implied that they intended to colonize the earthling's, but that's not what was going down.  Sure, they were wiping them out, but seriously, is that even necessary?  They didn't even look alien from afar. It was almost as if the creators didn't want to put much effort into detailing them too much; they came across as lazily put together.  Even up close, they were just...piles of mush with legs.  Something out of "District 9" meets "Transformers," and that's putting it nicely.  They were merely soldiers that got around and shot everything up much like human soldiers, which didn't make them too alien to me.  Heck, even their heads looked like the helmets of the soldiers. Their machinery and weapons also looked pretty human to me, able to be destroyed like human technology just as well.  All in all, it was truly like watching a mere war movie. I know it was supposed to be a battle and all, but it was still too human a battle, a sort of "been there, done that" vibe peppered throughout.  We as the audience had to follow the starring platoon as they embarked on a journey to save a few civilians while fighting off humanoid aliens in just constant shoot-outs, shoot-outs, and just to change things up a bit, even more shoot-outs.  

  Oh it wasn't absolutely horrible.  Unoriginal or not, there's nothing bad about seeing heroism in movies like these.  There was even an emotional scene that of course got to me, but what else can you expect when you have a child on screen expressing sadness?  That's hard not to mirror sometimes.  I appreciated the lack of desire for soldiers to give up on each other, and their appreciation for their brothers in arms.  It's not unheard of, however, and those touching notions aren't what I was after when I went to see this movie.  If I wanted a soldier's war drama, no matter the subject matter, I probably would have been pleased.  But that's not what I wanted this time around, not from this movie.  I wanted some alien action, to put it simply.  I wanted an alien movie.  I wanted some intergalactic mayhem, even if it DID take place on our planet.  Give me something alien and otherworldly.  I didn't want a war movie with lots and lots of clichès and scenes that you've seen before. I didn't want serious drama that tried to squeeze itself into an alien movie.  It was very awkward and did drag out.  Still, compared to "Skyline," it was far more sophisticated and mature a movie.  In other words, far better. Though "Skyline,"I must admit, had the edge of being more original with its plot, albeit stilll a stupid plot.  But compared to "Independence Day," my favorite alien movie to this day, it severely lacked.  Soldiers risking their lives to save humanity, even a small bundle of them, is a fantastic thing to portray.  But it's been portrayed before.  "Saving Private Ryan" and "Black Hawk Down" came to mind frequently while watching the movie. The aliens were just the enemy in this case, instead of other humans. But as I said, the fact that they were just as bipedal as humans without much attentiveness to their structural detail didn't really draw me into their world.  They had cool ships, (the drone ships to be more specific) but um...yeah, that was about it. Aside from their squishy looks, nothing else about them was very alien. Oh well.

  Forgettable, sadly.  Don't think it'll make it to my movie collection, just like Skyline, a very saddening fact.  Bleh.  Moving on to "Cowboys and Aliens" and "Super 8."  Hopefully those will fare better.

  • 3:16 am
  • 1 Comment