Paul Verhoeven's "Starship Troopers" surprisingly turned up among the 25 best science fiction films of all time recently, and being a sucker for a convincing space opera, I had to check it out. Reading some responses and commentaries online, there seemed to be some house-room for the idea that this movie is a clever commentary on fascism, militarism, the mediatised advertorial recruitment docudrama.
This is monstrous tosh of course. To create the anger necessary for this attack on an actual political course and working-through, Verhoeven would need actual characters who we care about enough to identify ourselves as the audience in opposition to that militarism. However, he seems to also want to make an homage to the square jawed camaraderie and paraphernalia of the first wave of technically pornographic cliffhanger sci fi on television.
However, this simply depoliticises his entire enterprise and leaves the wafer thin plot being prodded forward on a listless parade of barked orders, white toothed Americans, aliens disintegrating under a hail of bullets, and shiny spaceship interiors.
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