OFF: Starship Troopers (was Classic Rock)

[Hardman DK]

On Tue, 6 Jan 1998, Andy Gilham wrote:

> > > ObMovie - _Starship Troopers_!!!
> >
> > you jest(?)   For about 10 mins I thought there was going to be an
> > intelligent film interwoven among the dross but I gave up that hope
> > soon enough and my sympathy is entirely with the stick insects!
>
> No, I thought it was superb.
[....]
 Verhoeven himself isn't, I think, necessarily militaristic himself
> - but the film does pose the question, can you be a pacifist when your life
> is on the line?  And the Californisation of world culture is one of the
> film's many little jokes.

One can't help but admire the battle scenes and it's worth seeing just for
this. But at the same time it's this aspect of the film that overshadows
anything that Verhoeven is actually trying to say, if anything. As it is,
I felt that both the politics and the love-triangle storyline were
unconvincing and got in the way of the action.  Worse, I was never sure
where Verhoeven stood in relation to the facism and militarism being
portrayed. At times he appeared to be poking fun at it, but at other times
playing it straight. He should IMHO have either placed less emphasis on
the fighting and made the politics more coherent, or he should have gone
all-out for a total bubblegum movie. Unfortunately, he seems to have
fallen somewhere in between.

It's also possibly the most violent movie I've ever seen!

Dave

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David Hardman                           "When your back's against the
HCI Design Centre                        wall, you've got to turn round
School of Informatics                    and march forward!"
City University
Northampton Square                       John Major, ex-Prime Minister
London EC1V 0HB

Phone: +44 0171 477 8152
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E-mail: D.K.Hardman at city.ac.uk
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