Parents' Guide to

Battlefield Earth

By Nell Minow, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 13+

Worst example of vanity filmmaking in years.

Movie PG-13 2000 118 minutes
Battlefield Earth Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Community Reviews

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age 16+

Based on 2 parent reviews

nduns
nduns Adult
April 11, 2010
age 14+

There is only one thing preventing this from getting 1 star

And that's the simple fact that it's so bad it's funny. This film irritates me on so many levels. The way they shoot it, for one, is annoying. Everything is shot in an angle. But I could look past that were the story good... it is not. The human characters are just... stupid. In the original Planet of the Apes, they could get away with that because the humans were supposed to be dumb. However, these humans are meant to be smart and they make the dumbest decisions ever. Luckily, the Psychlos are equally dumb and give the humans easy access to their weaponry and firearms. In response to another reviewer, I'd say scifi fans would hate this film the most simply because of how poorly written it is.

This title has:

Too much violence
Too much sex
Too much swearing
Too much drinking/drugs/smoking
Ashnak
Ashnak Adult
April 9, 2008
age 17+

Decent scifi movie

This is an OK scifi movie only worth seeing if you LIKE scifi
See all 2 parent reviews

What's the Story?

In the future, a race of 9-foot-tall, dreadlocked aliens called Psychlos takes over the earth following a nine-minute battle. A thousand year later, the few remaining humans are hunter-gatherers and the evil Psychlos maintain earth as an outpost for mining. Terl (John Travolta), furious at not being allowed to return to the home planet, decides to use humans to mine gold for him to keep. But one of the humans, Jonnie Goodboy Tyler (Barry Pepper), encourages the others to revolt.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (2):
Kids say (8):

Made due to the ceaseless efforts of its star, John Travolta, BATTLEFIELD EARTH could be used as an exam for film school students on what not to do. As the bad guy, Travolta tries to sound imperious and sarcastic but lacks any sense of presence or dignity, and his cackling evil laugh is laughable. Poor Forrest Whitaker does his best with an idiotic role as Terl's sidekick and whipping boy.

The sets are dark, dank, and uninspired, the explosions are boring, it is all much too loud, and the Psychlos' dialogue is sometimes garbled. The plot is not very interesting and completely illogical. To mention just one of many examples -- somehow a group of humans who are illiterate and have not even discovered the wheel manage to master thousands of years of literal rocket science in a couple of days, transport over to the Psychlos' planet and blow it all up with one well-placed bomb?

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about the importance of learning and history (Jonnie is inspired by the Declaration of Independence), and they should contrast the way that the Psychlos use "leverage" (blackmail) to manipulate each other with the teamwork and loyalty shown by the humans. They might also want to compare this movie to some sci-fi classics, like the Star Wars movies.

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