| Battlefield Earth | |
|---|---|
| |
| Riffed by | RiffTrax |
| Riffers | Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett |
| Series | None |
| Date Released | January 28, 2007 |
Battlefield Earth is a 2000 American not-quite dystopian science fiction and not-quite action film based upon the first half of L. Ron Hubbard's novel of the same name. Directed by Roger Christian and starring John Travolta, Barry Pepper and Forest Whitaker, the film depicts an Earth that has been under the rule of the alien Psychlos for 1,000 years and tells the story of the rebellion that develops when the Psychlos attempt to use the surviving humans as gold miners. RiffTrax released their riff in January 2007.
Synopsis and Preview
RiffTrax w Mike Nelson Battlefield Earth
[Spoilers Begin]
In the year 3000, Earth has been ruled for 1,000 years by the Psychlos, a brutal race of giant humanoid aliens. The remnants of humanity are either enslaved by the Psychlos and used for manual labor or survive in primitive tribes living in remote areas outside Psychlo control. Jonnie Goodboy Tyler, a member of one such tribe, leaves his home in the Rocky Mountains on a journey of exploration. He joins forces with Carlo, a hunter, but both men are captured by a Psychlo raiding party and transported to a slave camp at the Psychlos' main base on Earth, a giant dome built over the ruins of Denver, Colorado.
Terl, the Psychlo security chief on Earth, has been condemned by his superiors to remain indefinitely at his post on Earth as punishment for an unclear incident involving "the Senator's daughter". Aided by his deputy, Ker, Terl devises a plan to buy his way off the planet by making a fortune using human slaves to mine gold in radioactive areas. Psychlos are unable to visit such areas due to the explosive interaction of the gas that they breathe with radionuclide particles. Terl selects Jonnie as his "foreman" for the project and gives him a Psychlo education using a rapid-learning machine. Terl gives Jonnie a party of slaves and a Psychlo flying shuttle and orders him to go out and find gold.
After learning the Psychlos' language, history, and myriad other educational forms from the rapid learning machine, Jonnie plots a human uprising against the Psychlos. He obtains gold from Fort Knox to satisfy Terl's demands, and uses the free time to plot a revolution. Jonnie and his followers find an abandoned underground U.S. military base with working aircraft, weapons, fuel and nuclear weapons. They use the base's flight simulators to train themselves in aerial combat. When Terl returns, he orders more gold to be extracted, and tells how in the 21st century the Psychlos conquered Earth in a matter of minutes. Jonnie warns Terl that he will be overthrown and the humans will retake Earth, and cites the United States Declaration of Independence as inspiration, to which Terl scoffs.
After a week of training, the rebels launch a mass uprising against the Psychlos using Harrier jump-jets and other weapons. Carlo sacrifices himself to destroy the dome over Denver, and the Psychlos inside suffocate in Earth's atmosphere, which they are unable to breathe. Jonnie captures a Psychlo teleportation device and uses it to teleport an atomic bomb to the Psychlo home world. The ensuing detonation causes the entire Psychlo atmosphere to explode, wiping out the Psychlo world. The film ends with the humans in control of Earth but facing an uncertain future, along with Terl and Ker who survived the base destruction. Terl is now imprisoned inside Fort Knox in a makeshift cell of gold bars, where he is mocked by Ker for his arrogance, saying that while he is not living large on Psychlo, he has "finally got [his] gold". Ker throws in his lot with the victorious humans, and helps in their hard effort to rebuild their civilization.
[Spoilers End]
Cast and Crew
- John Travolta as Terl
- Barry Pepper as Jonnie Goodboy Tyler
- Forest Whitaker as Ker
- Kim Coates as Carlo
- Sabine Karsenti as Chrissy
- Richard Tyson as Robert the Fox
- Kelly Preston as Chirk
- Michael MacRae as District Manager Zete
- Shaun Austin-Olsen as Planetship Numph
- Tim Post as the Assistant Planetship
- Michael Byrne as Parson Staffer
- Christian Tessier as Mickey
- Sylvain Landry as Sammy
- Earl Pastko as the Bartender
- Noël Burton as the Clinko Learning Instructor