Ron Hubbard, the controversial founder of Scientology. Unable to turn down Danny Zuko, the writer began working on a draft. MGM lost interest, and the movie eventually wound up at Fox. Shapiro got his first glimpse of the flick during the coming attractions before a different movie at the cinema. Not long ago, he was speaking to an accomplished fellow writer at a party in LA.
May 14, pm Updated May 14, pm. As an experiment, Terl gives Jonnie back the gun, which he promptly uses to kill another Psychlo. Obsessed with gold, the aliens plan to occupy Earth long enough to strip mine it of all its shiny minerals.
Then there are the humans, who shout a lot and seldom blink. Battlefield Earth is a film with its acting volume turned way up to eleven. John Travolta clearly enjoys playing the most villainous of the Psychlos, Terl.
Like a drunken Gielgud, Travolta mugs and crows through Battlefield Earth as though his life depends on it. In one scene, he proves his prowess as a marksman by shooting the legs off a field full of cows.
And happy hunting! Like Basil Fawlty, Terl fawns all over his superiors, who he hopes will send him home. Although Barry Pepper plays the nominal hero, Travolta was the more bankable actor at the time, so he pops up in almost every scene, clad in his rejected Klingon make-up. Take, for example, the bit where his character hurls a human off a cliff to satisfy a bet.
Before directing Battlefield Earth , Roger Christian was a rightly-acclaimed production designer. He won an Oscar for his work on Star Wars, and was nominated for another in for Alien. Aside from the hideous design of the Psychlos, which required actors to totter around on four-foot stilts, there are weapons which appear to fire polystyrene bullets, like Nerf Guns.
Much of the film takes place in dreary, blue-lit interiors that look like concrete bunkers from WWII, and there are occasional splashes of CGI that would make even the SyFy channel blush. What happened? What went wrong? Why did a movie with previously talented people on it end up looking so hideous?
A possible answer to those questions can be found in the next entry…. Exactly why he chose to shoot almost every sequence in the film with the camera at a 45 degree angle is a mystery, but it gives the movie a woozy, almost dreamlike look.
In one brief snippet published in MovieMaker magazine back in , however, the cinematographer did mention his work on the film. We guarantee your liver will be screaming by the end of the first act.
Flint Eagle worked as a stunt performer on the film. He claims his delivery so impressed Christian that the director kept giving him more speaking parts.
Unbeknownst to him, Christian was behind him. For most, though, the experience on set was positive. Post remembers Travolta taking everyone out to dinner after the initial script reading. Michel Perron, who played a character called Rock, remembers Travolta introducing himself to everyone, not making the assumption that they knew who he was.
The actor brought his own chefs and catering truck up from LA. Benison told the production team that if the catering truck left with Travolta once he was finishing shooting, there would be a riot. The catering truck stayed. Those who worked on the film were more worried, and during other industry previews critics laughed out loud at the film, not with it. At a black-tie event at the Celebrity Centre , an old Hollywood hotel where celebrity Scientologists hang out, they told him there were 7 million Scientologists and they were all going to see the movie at least three times.
As well as attending the premiere, Christian Tessier saw it in an LA cinema. Even the people involved are critical of it now. The film went on to win seven Razzies, an annual awards show that honours the worst films released each year. Mandell feared he would never work again. But Samaha had been lying for a while. In , Franchise went bankrupt. Intertainment solicited Stevens to settle out of court years before the trial because they did not want him, with his knowledge of their fraudulent acts, to testify against them.
Only the film Jack and Jill has won more of those awards.
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