Film Review – BATTLESHIP ★★½☆☆☆

Going into 2012, I had two big budget targets on my radar that I expected to go ‘all film school’ on: John Carter and Battleship. Unfortunately for Taylor Kitsch, he happened to star in both of them. John Carter was out of theaters before I was able to see it (my bad), and as for Battleship (yes, based on the classic Hasbro naval combat board game), well I’ll be damned if I didn’t have a great time throughout the ridiculous bombastic spectacle that it was.

To be fair, I am a firm believer that you can’t appreciate good movies without sitting through bad movies. And by no means is Battleship a terribly bad movie, but to say it doesn’t ride the B-Movie wave big time would be misleading (albeit a B-Movie with a budget of possibly $200 million or so). Every single production penny spent is up there on the big screen, Battleship easily excels as a film that looks and sounds expensive (and you will not experience a louder film this year, of that I can assure you).

Director Peter Berg (Hancock, The Rundown) really steps up several notches by borrowing heavily from the Michael Bay playbook of how to assault the senses of your paying audience. The film certainly has the hi-tech look and feel of a Transformers off-shoot, but Berg thankfully left out much of the roll your eyes humor that somehow always makes it to the final cut of a Bay film.

So let’s get to the plot, which is safe to say is fairly straightforward. Throwing caution to the wind, some optimistic astronomers in Hawaii beam a blind ‘hello’ beacon to a distant Earth-like planet in hopes of high fiving any existing extraterrestrial neighbors. Lets just say when the eventual response years later is not a reciprocal greeting, but a preliminary alien invasion force, its up to the guys and gals of the U.S. Navy to let them know exactly where the buck stops.

Alex and Stone Hopper (Taylor Kitsch and Alexander Skarsgård) are our lead hero Naval officer brothers, with Alex being the unpredictable Maverick to Stone’s straight and narrow Goose. Academy Award Winner Liam Neeson plays Admiral Shane, Commander of the Pacific Fleet, and adds the necessary weight to the role of the big man in charge. Sports Illustrated supermodel Brooklyn Decker plays Admiral Shane’s supermodel physical therapist daughter, and to complicate matters, fiancée to Kitsch’s screw-up sailor. And then we have Rhianna as Petty Officer Second Class Cora Raikes, who also serves as a weapons specialist (and also for my taste has far too much screen time as the tough-as-nails-who-always-has-a-one-liner military chick).

While the plot is thin, (do we get or even deserve a reason for the alien’s invasion?), a big summer actioner like this should not (and does not) require its audience to think too hard. Are there scenes where combat takes place that are literally inspired by the board game based on nautical coordinates? Of course. They have you mid-scene before you realize it. And does anyone get to deliver THE big Battleship tag line? Wait for it…

When the aliens do arrive after we spend a little too long with character developing introductions, Battleship kicks in on full throttle. The intense battle scenes are well staged and the accompanying special effects are convincing. The powerful alien submersible ships are both impressive and oppressive, as are the razor laced roller balls of destruction. Another piece of eye candy are the humanoid aliens who travel about in nifty Mass Effect inspired exo-suits.

Battleship definitely settles into its A-game comfort zone with some quick cutting Top Gun-esque excitement on the high seas. Since ship to ship combat on the big screen has been monopolized by the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, it’s great to see the bad ass arsenals of sea faring vessels that are not waving a jolly roger flag atop their masts.

By the time the plan in store for third act big finish reveals itself, you will either be cheering or throwing your concessions at the screen. But again, that is part of the inherent fun of the popcorn formula it adheres to. There are some cringe worthy lines of dialogue that read better off the script page than in front of a camera, but frankly moments like that only make you appreciate more how Bill Pullman managed to pull off the pep rally Presidential speech in Independence Day.

Battleship doesn’t pretend to be anything but what it is. Its all there right in your face and you know already if this is your idea of a good time at the movies. If so, add an additional half star rating. So go with it, enjoy the intended high octane fun, watch big things go bang and boom, and most of all, don’t over think it. That’s what I did.

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