BATTLEFIELD EARTH  (2000)  1/2

Reviewed 5/17/00

By now Battlefield Earth's reputation as the biggest turkey in recent memory precedes itself. I have little to add except that it is the absolute worst-edited movie I have EVER seen. It looks like the editor put his 3-year old kid in front of the Avid and then the kid started hitting random keys. There is no way to detail how incomprehensibly pathetic the editing is except for you to see the movie, something I strongly advise you against doing. The cuts are so quick and senseless and the music and sound effects so blaring that the movie feels like a wall of sheer chaotic noise. That and the entire movie is in blue-gray, so make that a blue-gray wall of sheer chaotic noise. Of course, editor Robin Russell may not be totally at fault. Director Roger Christian (second unit director on The Phantom Menace) may have simply shot-impossible-to-edit footage. Oh, and the 1/2 star is for all that cool, shattering glass.

Copyright © 2000 George Wu