Netflix movie of the day: will Battleship be a direct hit or leave you board stupid?
“Some people will tell you that Battleship is a bad film. And they will be right”
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WhenBattleshipwas announced, it was met with derision: if Hollywood was making a movie based on the board game where you try to guess where the other player’s ships are, it was surely a sign that filmmakers had run out of ideas. What next? A movie based on emoji? Pfft.
As the quote fromStuff.co.nzsays above, some people will tell you thatBattleshipis a bad movie. And it is, but it’s also surprisingly good given the source material, which it doesn’t pay the slightest bit of attention to. And a movie with Alexander Skarsgård and Liam Neeson in it can’t bethatbad if you’re looking for a mindless watch onNetflix.
Can it?
Battleship: not likely to be remembered alongside Battleship Potemkin
The 1925 movieBattleship Potemkinis widely regarded as a masterpiece. It’s fair to say that the 2012 movieBattleshipwon’t be. And about the only thing it has in common with the board game it’s ostensibly based on is the name. It’s a military sci-fi action movie where space aliens come to earth and hide behind an impenetrable force field. Cue CGI.
Keith Garlington ofKeith & The Movieswas one of many non-fans, writing that “Underneath the bombastic veneer of grinding metal, explosions, and destruction lies a corny and often times ridiculous story that can’t be saved by the fancy coat of CGI paint.“Time Out Sydneysaid it was “logic-free Michael Bay-style fodder where nothing’s at stake and even the jingoism is hard to take seriously”.
But the film does have its defenders – defenders such asFilm 4’s Catherine Bray, who says that it’s “An assault on reason, logic and complex characterisation, but in an enjoyable way, like a slightly less camp dramatisation of the Village People’s finest ship-based sing-song.” And Jason Gorber of ScreenAnarchy argues that “we should celebrate the explicit nature, the unabashed and unapologetic chutzpah of a film that dares to be stupid, yet does so with so much intelligence.”
There’s a thin line between stupid and clever, and Battleship straddles it; it’s very, very silly but it’s silly in an action-packed and expensive way. The dialogue is terrible, the story never met a cliché it didn’t like and there’s one very key omission that might be a deal-breaker for fans of the game: asCinemaBlendreports: “Believe it or not, no one ever says the game’s signature line. So, let’s say it here, all together and with enthusiasm, ‘You sunk my Battleship!'”
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Writer, broadcaster, musician and kitchen gadget obsessive Carrie Marshall has been writing about tech since 1998, contributing sage advice and odd opinions to all kinds of magazines and websites as well as writing more than a dozen books. Her memoir,Carrie Kills A Man, is on sale now and her next book, about pop music, is out in 2025. She is the singer in Glaswegian rock bandUnquiet Mind.
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