Posted on 11/09/2013 1:46:38 PM PST by EveningStar
When Paul Verhoeven’s Starship Troopers hit theaters 16 years ago today, most American critics slammed it. In the New York Times, Janet Maslin panned the “crazed, lurid spectacle,” as featuring “raunchiness tailor-made for teen-age boys.” Jeff Vice, in the Deseret News, called it “a nonstop splatterfest so devoid of taste and logic that it makes even the most brainless summer blockbuster look intelligent.” Roger Ebert, who had praised the “pointed social satire” of Verhoeven’s Robocop, found the film “one-dimensional,” a trivial nothing “pitched at 11-year-old science-fiction fans.”
But those critics had missed the point. Starship Troopers is satire, a ruthlessly funny and keenly self-aware sendup of right-wing militarism. The fact that it was and continues to be taken at face value speaks to the very vapidity the movie skewers.
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
By the end of the book, the humuns have the Nova Bomb, described as "being able to split a planet in half."
We win.
These Leftists must have never read the actual book. The backstory of why the society in the book is based on a prerequisite of military service to vote is Heinlein’s correct assumption that a society that can vote itself benefits without personal cost will collapse.
We’re seeing that now in our own country as we’ve now reached the tipping point where a majority of “citizens” are takers. Where can that lead except to an ever quickening downward spiral.
The travesty in that movie was that Denise wasn’t nekkid but flat-chested Dina was.
With regard to this half witted critic who wrote the article, does he really think the citizenship gig was not going on in leftist military ? I say more so. Perhaps you have a point there. The leftist military are much worse with regards to what the critic thought the movie was criticizing.
I’ve read Foward’s better known fiction (Dragon’s Egg, Starquake, Rocheworld) and enjoyed it very much.
That’s the version I have although its wearing out.
If we're going to discuss physiology, I much prefer OEM to "bolt ons," Big fan of Dina Meyer here!
Mark
Not to mention that The Natural’s ending was changed and changed the movie’s message.
The book Starship Troopers was superb. The movie was a show piece for Denise Richards and Casper Van Dien and special effects. and Doogie Howser as a SS type was unintenionally hilarious.
I’ve always wanted to read this book. But, I never have the time.
Any suggestions for a good audiobook format for it? The one (The ONLY one) on iTunes has some VERY bad ratings.
Oh, and thanks for the ping, Perdogg.
Hope your weekend is going well.
Saturn Rukh begins with the sentences of “I’ve got a job for you. It pays a billion.” It was about a mission to Saturn to test the viability of mining the Saturnian atmosphere.
He gets pretty technical in the book.
They make have been fake, but they were spectacular !
Then the military tactics.... shudder. He took the Mobile Infantry which typically covered a front line with one man per kilometer and bunched them up so much that a sergeant at Verdun would have told them to spread out a bit. And the space combat was even worse. You have tens of thousands of miles in three dimensions around a planet, but the spaceships were packed in like it was a valet parking lot in New York. When I saw it I said "In space, no one can hear you parallel park."
I’ve worn out three copies, not including one I dropped in the tub when I fell asleep.
I bet Doogie kept the SS uniform for when he plays hide the bratwurst with his boyfriends.
For some reason, that's way funny.
Been a LONG time since I read the book, but IIRC the enemy wielded weapons — and wasn’t just charging monsters.
LOL!
They did Nazi that movie up, didn't they? Field grey everywhere, M43- resembling caps, black leather trench coats...
I guess the left had to attack the book. If the concept of 'no skin in the game, no calling the shots' ever took hold in a real way, the Democrat ideal of parental-statism would collapse like, tomorrow.
Only one exception that I can think of - Forrest Gump.
The critics do have a bit of a point regarding Heinlein’s adolescent bent.
I can remember as a teenager, being absolutely enthralled by Heinlein’s “women.” Only later did I learn his “women” bear as much resemblance to real women as do porn actresses.
I have all three movies. I never picked that up in the third. I’ll have to re-watch (if I can bear the CGI, haha)
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