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**/**** Image A- Sound B+ Extras D starring Richard Hatch, Dirk Benedict, Lorne Greene screenplay by Glen A. Larson directed by Richard A. Colla
by Travis Mackenzie Hoover I find it supremely ironic that George Lucas had the nerve to sue the Battlestar Galactica team for the crime of plagiarism–this, after plundering Kurosawa and Ford and Leni Riefenstahl (and God knows who else) to create the po-mo patchwork quilt known as Star Wars. It doesn't really reflect well on your case when the thieves in question have actually ripped off fewer movies (and cultures, and archetypes) than the alleged textual victim; accordingly, Lucas lost the argument and the case. And yet, on some spiritual level, the bigger theft has more integrity than the smaller one. At the very least, Star Wars gives the impression that somebody wanted to make it: it's in awe of its sources, and that respect surges through every purloined frame. The Galactica crew only respected money and career opportunities, making the irritant of this would-be cash cow's maiden voyage seem like a mosquito the size of a Cessna.
The leaden and convoluted plot involves a race of spacefaring humans who've been colonizing planets here and there and spreading the love across the galaxy. They're about to sign a treaty with the warlike Cylons–quasi-robotic creatures who look like Roman centurions wired for Pong–when the Cylon no-goodniks launch a sneak attack and wipe out the majority of the human race. It's never explained exactly why the Cylons never tried this before, or why, with their obvious military superiority, they still regard the survivors (or anyone) as a threat, but never mind that: the one remaining human Battlestar, the Galactica (hence the title), is the last hope for the surviving human beans. It's up to fatherly Commander Adama (Lorne Greene, clinging to dignity) to lead the survivors to an ancient colony called "Earth," preferably while eluding the vindictive Cylons in hot pursuit.
This, of course, means space battles and lots of 'em. The movie does not skimp on the models and matte lines, theorizing that this is what pulls in the customers/viewers above all; everything else, from script to performers to production design to good sense, is an afterthought. And so the film is useless when not producing the money shots that were the impetus for the project in the first place. If you thought Star Wars' characters were ciphers, wait 'til you meet the boys from Galactica: the central figures of dogged Capt. Apollo (Richard Hatch) and lightly-debased scoundrel Lt. Starbuck (Dirk Benedict) are so poorly drawn, they lack even the archetypal resonance of Lucas's Folly, their insipid dialogue inspiring groans instead of the desired awe or identification.
Part of the problem lies in the fact that this is clearly not a real movie at all, but a television movie blown up to theatre size. Everything is cheap, and nothing has style–director Richard A. Colla shows the style-deficient hallmarks of '70s TV cheese, capturing the action without much cinematographic comment or personality. His job seems mainly to manage the traffic of the extras with perfect hair. And Colla's not the only one asleep at the switch: Galactica isn't so much designed as decorated, with cliché shorthand (and the occasional hanging sheet of bubble wrap) doing the work of evoking the culture for which we are intended to root. The results are a kitsch paradise, culminating in an interstellar Atlantic City sequence so ludicrous that one would expect Maria Montez herself to stride in and take up residence–were it not for the fact that it lacks the enthusiasm that marks good camp. This general artistic lethargy results in a limp and bloodless film drained of vitality.
In all fairness, there is some meagre entertainment value here for those of us old enough to remember what models and matte lines look like–one marks distance between awesome effects then and now and smiles at the quaintness of what was once state-of-the-art. Indeed, I was frequently reminded of the five-year-old boy who used to eat up this tripe and beg for seconds, thrilled with the walking shiny things and non-stop laser light shows. But that nostalgia was tinged with regret. Having one of your childhood pleasures–even one as minor as Galactica–revealed to be a cynical ratings-and-marketing device without a shred of integrity (or even base creativity) is a dull and crumpling disappointment, and it poisons the memory of the innocent, credulous child you once were. So craven are the instincts at work here that one half-expects to see, written somewhere in the stars: Be sure to drink your Ovaltine!
THE DVD Universal's Battlestar Galactica disc should cause no end of pleasure for whatever overgrown fanboys still carry the series' torch. (The television show that spun off from this feature film is being concurrently released in its entirety on DVD.) The 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen image is generally first-rate, with colours as rich and saturated as they can be with the movie's wan palette; the red lights of Galactica's bridge are especially impressive. There's a slight softness to the definition, but it's largely negligible. Sound, meanwhile, is rendered in something called "Dolby Digital 1.1"–this means centre-channel mono plus subwoofer activity. I'd like to say that it's a triumph of limited means, but it's only marginally impressive, with the woofer adding a little bit of rumble to the spacecrafts and some low bass to the theme music. Nevertheless, it's clear as can be hoped for and does not detract from the presentation.
The "extras," meanwhile, are either self-aggrandizing blather or blatant huckstering. Side 1 of the flipper features "Production Notes," which give a rosy–and often contradictory–depiction of Glen A. Larson's vision for the Galactica experience; they're of interest only to the least discerning trivia buffs, though fans will surely thrill to it. In a similar vein come bios of Greene, Hatch, Benedict and Colla, with Colla's spotty career coming in for hilariously upbeat spin. A Universal weblink rounds out this side. Side 2 features two extended commercials: one for the new Galactica miniseries (which, I must admit, looks as though it might have solved the problems of the original), and a behind-the-scenes look at the Galactica interactive game–standard EPK material with nothing in-depth to offer. Trailers for Hulk, Millennium Actress, and TimeCop: The Berlin Decision round out the disc.
125 minutes; PG; 1.85:1 (16×9-enhanced); English DD 1.1, French DD 1.1; English SDH subtitles; DVD-14; Region One; Universal
