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she blinded me with scientology: battlefield earth by Alex Burns (alex@disinfo.com) - January 22, 2001 |
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| This is a contender for the worst film of the century, the 'Washington Post' declared. "A million monkeys with a million crayons would be hard pressed in a million years to create anything as cretinous as this!" The normally sober 'New York Times' scathingly claimed, "it's like watching the most expensive school play of all time." The film is 'Battlefield Earth' (2000), a universally damned adaptation of the 1982 best-selling science fiction novel by L. Ron Hubbard. Scientologist John Travolta spent five difficult years spearheading the US$150 million production. A 1991 paperback listed two films in simultaneous production. The novel signalled a dubiously triumphant return by Hubbard to epic 'Golden Age' science fiction that established his reputation. 'Battlefield Earth' rocketed to best-seller status amidst allegations that Scientologists were block-buying the book for mass media exposure. The novel's dystopian future locale - a post-apocalyptic Denver ruled by alien Psychlos who battled with militia resistance for Earth's freedom - framed perceived subliminal messages advocating Scientology. Was the 'training simulator' (an E-meter reference?) used by resistance leader Jonnie Goodboy Tyler, really a 'conscious evolution' device? Didn't the post-Colonialist sub-text of Tyler's liberation warfare echo Hubbard's militant individualism and tribalistic 'SeaOrg'? Was the discovery of Earth's past history (losing a nine-minute war) in a sealed bunker referencing a similar discovery in George Pal's film 'The Time Machine' (1960), or to 'Cold War' psycho-political anxieties? Whatever. A movie of Hubbard's 'Mission Earth' Decalogue is now unlikely. Will 'Intergalactic Mining Company' security chief Terl be remembered as Travolta's worst role ever? Did Travolta undertake the project as payback to Hubbard? Detailed anonymous Internet documents delineate Travolta's purported lurid 'Clear' initiation, alleging psychosis, drug-use and homosexuality. The infamous Steve Fishman papers, which exposed senior hierarchy secrets have made Hubbard's pseudo-militaristic 'Church' the Internet's most feared enemy. Memeticist Richard Brodie estimates that "there are 50 000 Scientologists on the Internet, and 3 million disgruntled ex-members." Travolta should have recalled Hubbard's 'Battlefield Earth' soundtrack (BPI Records, 1984), featuring lukewarm synth-pop recorded by jazz legends Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke, and 'Rolling Stones' sideman Nicky Hopkins. 'Mankind Unite', 'The Drone', and 'Funeral For A Planet' weren't exactly chart blockbusters! Oliver Stone's mini-series 'Wild Palms' (1991) more authentically captures Hubbard's paranoid mind-set, depicting a 'Founding Fathers' cult and psychological warfare over Virtual Reality technology. In 'Techgnosis' (Harmony Books, 1998), a perceptive 'digital mysticism' study, Erik Davis argues that Hubbard pioneered technocratic human potential therapies. Dianetics and evolutionary successor Scientology gained early American respectability during post-World War II dislocation when Cybernetics and Behaviourist methodologies were in vogue. 'Astounding Science Fiction' magazine editor John W. Campbell found Dianetics supported his readers' Promethean visions of mutants, alien messiahs, and Precogs (humans with ESP abilities). A.E. Van Vogt's novel 'The World Of Null-A' (1948) exalted a parallel 'strive for Order' to its neo-fascist limits, depicting a future Utopia presided over by a truth-sensing Machine, and rigid social castes created by annual Olympic Games-style semantic intelligence tests. Hubbard 'stole' his 'Tech' primarily from Alfred Korzybski's 'General Semantics' (non-Aristotelian cognitive-process mapping), Sigmund Freud's 'Standard Edition' (abreactive psyche, 'uncovering' defences/fixations), and Aleister Crowley's 'Magick In Theory & Practice' (confronting and altering the subjective 'Deep Self' via Higher Will). Why waste a movie ticket on 'Battlefield Earth' when you can now get 'Clear' on the cheap? |
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10 Reasons Not To Watch The Movie! Battlefield Earth@IMDB Battlefield Earth: Washington Post: Desson Howe Video Review Paper Magazine: Battlefield Earth Review Copyright - Or Wrong? Salon Review: Battlefield Earth Fictive Arcanum Scientollywood: Control On Movie Contents Disinformation Dossier On Jack Parsons: AntiChrist Superstar Disinformation Dossier On Memetic Engineering Disinformation Dossier On Scientology Disinformation Dossier On Subliminal Advertising: Return Of The Hidden Persuaders Disinformation Dossier On William S. Burroughs John Travolta: Battlefield Earth Battlefield Earth A Dread-ful Performance Battlefield Earth: The Soundtrack Techgnosis Scientology Home Page The Exit Tour A Piece Of Blue Sky Lerma's Official Trash Battlefield Earth Page Xenu 2000: Battlefield Earth Information Travolta, Cruise And Other Celebrities Con Fans And Media Operation Clambake: The Inner Secrets Of Scientology Bare-Faced Messiah |
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