Battleship (2012)

'they ain't gonna sink this battleship, no way!'

So without talking too much about the classic boardgame from my childhood this is BATTLESHIP!
Aliens come to earth and land in the sea near some US battleships, they are unfriendly, the ships engage in sea warfare and the humans win (check..the Americans save the world). Is that a spoiler? no no no no no, well yes but I think I can safely say everyone should realise this.

So 'Independence Day' at sea you say? well your pretty darn right mateys, this is indeed a complete rip of that errr classic alien invasion flick. The film is VERY by the numbers in every department, unbelievably cliched to the hilt and really very stupid. Oh and I forgot in this film they don't get the President to muck in oh no, they get all the old age ex-sailor pensioners to get stuck in, ave it!

Is it good? hmmm well sort of, you know what will happen every bloody inch of the way no question, Taylor Kitsch's character is utterly predictable with his rebellious ways at first, then drafted into the Navy (this doesn't feel right), still a bit of a 'Jack the lad' in service, but turns into a leader of men when the shit hits the fan, grrrr leader of MEN!

Casting Rihanna really didn't help this film one bit, right from the get go it gave the film a bad vibe of tacky sci-fi, she is also in damn near every fudging shot! plus she isn't that pretty looking without her usual swathes of makeup. Neeson is the other big name...why? dunno, lets move on.

OK so the effects are average really, the CGI on show isn't much, it doesn't look as nice as previous alien invasion films in my view. Does the job but overall the alien ships are uninspired and look like a cross between Transformer and Zoids toys (yep that's an 80's thing), didn't wanna mention Transformers but I had to .

The aliens themselves look a bit poor to be honest, humanoid with dumb facial expressions and these daft looking goatees on their chins that look like a patch of sea anemones. Their suits are better and made me think of 'Halo' somewhat, some nice futuristic spacesuit designs going on with 'Predator' vision inside their visors.
Again the weaponry the aliens use was uninspired and dull, their ships fire these boring shaped canister things that hit their targets but do nothing, after a few seconds they then explode...like wow! I since found out they are suppose to be shaped like the pegs in the boardgame of which this is based, yeah kinda stupid idea right there. They also fire Sonic the Hedgehog type mechanical metallic fury ball/disc things that seem to have a mind of their own and zip all over the show seemingly blowing things up when they make contact.  In short I'm sure the aliens could of destroyed all the humans very quickly if they really wanted to.

I can see what they have tried to do here and I don't blame them with the aliens/alien invasion obsession doing the rounds but its just come along too late. Completely zilch originality so don't go expecting anything new and cool looking but it is reasonably pretty looking at times. The football (soccer) game at the start is hilariously bad (all football wise UK viewers I'm sure will agree) and stay till after the end credits for an extra scene (sequel much?).

Nice try for a cash in on the current bandwagon but these things don't always work do they, strike two for Kitsch (who is this guy?) and will Hollywood ever learn? stupid question that really. This battleship has well n truly sunk...zing!

4/10