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Over the weekend, the New York Post published an “apology” from screenwriter J.D. Shapiro for his work on Battlefield Earth. Videogum, of course, has a personal relationship with this movie, as it was the first entrant in The Hunt for the Worst Movie of All Time. It is terrible, no duh, and an official apology is long overdue. But does it have to be THIS official apology? Of course, Mr. Shapiro offers some consolation, like:
The only time I saw the movie was at the premiere, which was one too many times.
And:
Now, looking back at the movie with fresh eyes, I can’t help but be strangely proud of it. Because out of all the sucky movies, mine is the suckiest.
BING BONG. We all hate this thing LOL. But this letter is two pages long, and most of it is about Mr. Shapiro’s attempts to bang Scientologists? Gross, J.D. Shapiro. For example:
During my Scientology research, I met an employee who I instantly had a crush on. She was kind of a priestess, and had dedicated her life to working for the church by becoming a Sea Org member. She said that she signed a billion-year contract. I said, “What! Really?” She said she got paid a small stipend of $50 a week, to which I said, “Can you get an advance on the billion years, like say, a mere $500,000?” And then she said as a Sea Org member, you can’t have sex unless you’re married. I asked her if she was married. She said yes. So I said, “Great! That means we can have sex!”
Yikes. You should have rested your case earlier, Mr. Shapiro! Of course, it’s not JUST about his “Willy Wonker” (actual terrifying reference made to his own penis in Mr. Shapiro’s apology for Battlefield Earth), sometimes it is also hilarious anecdotes. Like this one:
I researched Scientology before signing on to the movie, to make sure I wasn’t making anything that would indoctrinate people. I took a few courses, including the Purification Rundown, or Purif. You go to CC every day, take vitamins and go in and out of a sauna so toxins are released from your body. You’re supposed to reach an “End Point.” I never did, but I was bored so I told them I had a vision of L. Ron. They said, “What did he say?” “Pull my finger,” was my response. They said I was done.
WOOOOOOF. (He also wrote Robin Hood: Men in Tights.)
The thing is, I know that everyone needs to put food on their families. I know that, you know I know that. But perhaps the best (not best) part of the entire letter of “apology” is how it doesn’t even really apologize. All Mr. Shapiro needs to say is that earning a living as a screenwriter is incredibly difficult and exceedingly rare, and sometimes you take jobs simply for the paycheck. To which we all would have said, “fair enough.” Instead, he says:
My script was very, VERY different than what ended up on the screen. My screenplay was darker, grittier and had a very compelling story with rich characters. What my screenplay didn’t have was slow motion at every turn, Dutch tilts, campy dialogue, aliens in KISS boots, and everyone wearing Bob Marley wigs.
HAHAHHA. I mean, either way, we are still talking about a hokey science fiction movie based on a novel written by the founder of a make-believe religion very real cult starring John Travolta, right? DUTCH TILTS ASIDE? I’m pretty sure the screenplay was always beside the point. But Mr. Shapiro is an artist, and he wants us all to know that. In a perfect world, Battlefield Earth would have been Preciousfield Hurt Lockearth: Based on a Screenplay by Mr. Shapiro. Well, now we know, sir. Thank you for telling us. And good luck with your latest project! Looks great! You’re going to get so much pussy! (NOW I AM THE ONE WHO NEEDS TO APOLOGIZE.)
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So I should remind myself once and a while that it’s not necessary to click on EVERYTHING you embed in your articles. Point being, 524 AD looks awesome.
actual tagline: From the knuckleheads that brought you ‘Robin Hood: Men in Tights’ and ‘The Blair Witch Project’
Also note, you can download and read the entire script off their website. A stage direction quote
Dane grabs David’s knapsack and tosses it down the street. It slides and falls into the sewer.
Always with the open sewers!
The script is frightening. There is actually a character named Helen Keller Knight, and this scene actually happens.
“Arthur tries to hand Helen Keller Knight the scroll. But
Helen Keller Knight keeps reaching for it and missing.
Arthur grabs his hand and places it in it.
Helen Keller Knight gets up and runs to the door! But he
misses the door and SLAMS into the wall.
Helen Keller Knight steadies himself, backs up to make
another mad dash at the door, but backs up too far and
falls out the window.”
Classic HKK moment.
Shapiro’s original draft of Battlefield Earth would have been like Reservoir Dogs in Space. The part where Terl douses Ker with space gasoline and lights him on fire was going to be especially disturbing.
Yikes. Would it be fair to call Travolta’s codpiece “aspirational”?
DUTCH TILTS ASIDE, I’d say that would be more than fair.
(I don’t even know what that means, I just love the phrase DUTCH TILTS ASIDE, so I’m stealing it from Gabe and using it to make whatever given point comes to mind.)
I know. I was hoping it was something sexy…
but it is *spoiler alert* a jankety camera angle.
Urban Dictionary says
“A sexual maneuver that consists of holding a woman at a 45 degree angle and then having frontal sex with her.”
It also says it’s a jankety camera angle. So, even Urban Dictionary knows what’s up. I am learning so much today.
Sadly, it’s more aspirational than operational.
“Why, in the future, do people have bigger packages? Or maybe it’s just because it’s John Travolta and a black dude in the photo!! High five me please. . . . I’m so lonely and unfulfilled. ” – Something J.D Shapiro would say.
Ugh. Thanks – I actually scrolled back up to look at John Travolta’s package, and am now officially the worst.
I did too, and wow. My mom told me that she and I were watching “Staying Alive” when I was younger, and that I looked really disturbed. She asked me what was wrong, and I asked her what the huge bulge in John Travolta’s pants was. So I guess the point of this story is that John Travolta must have a bulge clause in his movie contracts, and that my eyes are always on his package (yikes).
sadly the video clip of John Travolta air humping Jamie Lee Curtis did not show up for me. Becaues that is just too……. much.
“Why is Forrest Whitaker’s package the same size as his head?” – Me
And here I thought that was Keenan Thompson all along.
To be fair to Mr. Shapiro, I have seen the original screenplay and it DOES include a lot more fart jokes.
I would defend J.D. Shapiro, as he is clearly my boyfriend, but sometimes love means letting people deal with the consequences of their terrible, terrible scripts.
It would have been cool if the screenplay had in fact specified Bob Marley wigs and Kiss boots.
Forest Whitaker doesn’t see what the big deal is. You know, on account of the eye.
i really do wish they would have stayed true to his darker, grittier portrayal of the Psychlo race. the inaccuracies of the final product was a definite challenge to any scientologists faith. the film is an injustice, heretical of a really serious thing, guys. really, guys.
J. D. Shapiro talks like a used car salesman who loses a lot of sales. “BattleFIELD Earth? I barely KNOWearth!”
I was going to say he sounds like Rodney Dangerfield, but potato potahto
It should only take Shapiro one attempt to bang a Scientologist, or any woman for that matter.
Shapiro: “Hey girl, I wrote an episode of Charles In Charge.”
Girl: *Swoon*
You guys realize this is probably J.D. Salinger. (Before he died)
This isn’t just a screenplay, it is the synopsis of Shapiro’s new movie “Weird Scientology”, a hilarious comedy about a writer who uses bad puns to nail women who believe in spacelords and emotions stemming from the alien ghosts. It would be a perfect vessel for Dane Cook!
After four minutes, the price on Jordans came down a dollar. And your monsters complain about these spam posts!
Damn it Mr Shapiro, you know what they say: if it’s broken beyond repair there’s no fixing it and we all deserve a rest from your Dutch-tilted prose, thank you very much.
It’s really brave of this screenwriter, whom most of us had no idea existed, is now apologizing for a movie most people forgot about. I hope this only benefits his future screenwriting endeavors.
“out of all the sucky movies, mine is the suckiest.”
this sentence reminded me of that old dicho “in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king [or whatever.]” out of the thousands of aspiring screen writers attempting to get their screenplays turned into charlie’s angels three, extreme maximum action!!! mr. shapiro is the sad sad king. i think we should just give this fool a pulitzer.
You know nothing of my work. Where are the domes? And the muscular men with leather shawls?
Look at that casual guy, just shootin’ his lasers wherever.
To be fair to L. Ron, it seems that big packages were not based on his concept art.
Ba3.14lefield Earth?
In Shapiro’s original script, we begin with a long shot of Terl’s (John Travolta) house, where we find him in his death bed. He drops a snow globe, and whispers “Thetans.” The rest of the movies follows a group of journalist-Scientologists trying to find out what “Thetans” referred to. We see the young Terl become a newspaperman and run for SuperPresident of Battlefield Earth, only to lose when people learn he’s having an affair with a young songbird named Kelly Preston.
At the end of the film, as they box up and burn Terl’s accumulation of Earth Valuables, we see them throw a giant bus-stop advertisement into the fire. The camera zooms in, and we read “Thetans” in tiny print on the poster. The End (?)
yes, it takes a lot of “courage” (desire for attention) to “apologize” (make excuses) for a movie everyone agrees was terrible, ten years after the fact. Thanks, Shapiro, you’re truly an American hero.
Also, you look like this:
good job.
I renew my call for a “Right On Time” tag.
You’re being glib.
I’ve got a real big problem with this right here:
“Because out of all the sucky movies, mine is the suckiest.”
Here Shapiro lays claim not only to Battlefield Earth as a film solely his own, but more egregious is his claim that his movie is the suckiest of all sucky movies. I have a personal obligation to defend the name of the rightful owner of that title. Shapiro is not half the man that Tommy Wiseau is, or should I say a third of the man – Shapiro: writer vs. Wiseau: writer, director, thespian. Volumes could (and might one day) be filled describing the elusive yet everlasting allure of The Room, its ability to generate wells upon wells of post-ironic love-bliss, and the ties which bind all viewers with a secret and sacred knowledge of which they are aware but cannot wholly describe.
But I will not attempt to begin these volumes here for I possess not the ability. Instead I will present a fact which can demonstrate the superiortiy of The Room to Battlefield Earth. That being when one sees The Room they wish to see it once more. This is not so with Battlefield Earth.
Shaprio does not own the right to claim Battlefield Earth as his own, just as he has not the right to claim that his is the best of all sucky movies. Wiseau however can claim that The Room is his and more. there is not a single aspect of the film that was not wrought out of his mind alone. The name Wiseau possesses “wise” within it for great reason, and that wisdom will endure as long as man walks upon the earth and Shapiro and his fitful outburst with which he doth offend us once more will be forgotten, seemingly instantly, and he will not be missed.
This is a test because I’m not sure how to post a link.
I claim this thread for my personal testing needs: