On Screen

Of all the things to look at in 3-D—which is a stupid
technology and a waste of plastic and somehow, I feel, an insult to
those of us who wear real glasses, but I will tolerate it
because I must—outer space is one of the prettiest and least
pointless. The opening scenes of Battle for Terra 3-D, in which
the camera floats serenely in the starry vacuum, through weird astral
tunnels and past immense clouds of hot pink space gas, are gorgeous on
the big screen. But then, unfortch, the movie starts.

There are these aliens, see, that look kind of like Snorks and kind
of like E.T. but with gross flesh ponytails and lemur eyes. They live
in rustic hippie peace on a planet of amphibious hummingbirds and giant
flying whales (favorite character), where technology is taboo:
“Inventions not approved by the elders are against our teachings.”
Feisty teenage Mala (Evan Rachel Wood) fancies herself an inventress,
and whips up clandestine little telescopes and things in her home
laboratory (surely that’s illegal, right, elders? Hellooo?). The
creatures of Terra have never known war. This is supposed to make you
feel emotional a little bit.

Then, one day, a big, creepy metal thing blocks out the sun. And
gueeeeeess who’s coming to fuck you up, space hippies? Duh! It’s
humans! Humans, you see, exhausted the earth—a novel
premise!—and then also blew up Mars and Venus in a big war
between space colonies. They’ve been traveling through the stars for
generations looking for a new place to kick it. And Terra is it.

The humans are led by an evil general (who looks exactly like a
caricature of George W. Bush and says things like, “We are human, they
are alien… Us or them”) and a wise and pragmatic black president (“We
need time to explore, to think”). When a lone soldier (and his
robot-crab-dog, voiced by a slumming-it David Cross) crashes on Terra
and is rescued by Mala—OH, I JUST MADE AN OXYGEN-GENERATING
MACHINE OUT OF THESE TERRA-COTTA JARS AND THIS FERN AND THIS SPACE
BURLAP—the two learn a few lessons about cross-cultural
understanding and space feelings and martyrdom. Blah blah blah.

The Battle for Terra 3-D is basically a movie intended to
teach children what destructive pieces of shit they are. Which would be
fine—humans do suck, it’s true—but it’s also no fun
at all. And you kind of just wish they’d all blow up already. Because
in space—empty space—nobody ever says, “Lock and load,
people. It’s crunch time.”