Battlefield Earth - Recruitment Film?
by Adam Matthews

Why has it taken so long for the A$135million Battlefield Earth to come to the big screen?   The movie, based on the novel "Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000" by famed science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, has all the ingredients for box office success; big stars, big budget, big special effects, an "us against the aliens" storyline. 

It certainly hasn't been through lack of trying by the films' star John Travolta, who has been trying to get the film made for 15 years.  Travolta has pointed to his lack of power in Hollywood over many of those fifteen years as to the reason that the project has remained grounded until now.  But in fact the reason for the delay may have more to do with the novel's controversial author, than Travoltas' movie making clout.

You see, L. Ron Hubbard is also the founder of the Church of Scientology movement, of which Travolta and his wife Kelly Preston (who also stars in the film) are members.   The church aims, in Hubbards' words, " for a civilization without insanity, without criminals, and without war", and claims that human-beings are nothing but the tools of aliens. 

It teaches its' members, who have to pay an extraordinary amounts of money for the right to be taught the sacred texts (written mostly by Hubbard), that the psychiatric establishment is to blame for all crime, violence and sin perpetrated by humans. To say that the movement is controversial would indeed be an understatement.

Members of the movement have been arrested all over the world and charged with   fraud.  A German has recently ruled that the church used "inhuman and totalitarian practices" on it's members.

So why would members of Hollywood's elite (Tom Cruise is also a follower) choose to associate themselves with such a controversial movement?  Quite simply it is because they believe the views which the church promotes.  Fair enough.  They are certainly entitled to their beliefs. 

Another angle is that they have been targeted by the churches' heirachy to boost the image of the church.  Having movie stars on board would certainly do no harm for their recruitment push.  Which brings us back to Battlefield Earth.

Travolta, a devotee of Scientology since 1975, has dismissed claims that Battlefield Earth is nothing but a Scientology recruitment film as nonsense.  One must take his word, at this stage, as the film has not yet been shown to a wide audience.  Looking at the various previews of the film, there is nothing to show that the movie is anything but a typical Hollywood blockbuster.

The book, however is a different story.Some former members have pointed to the fact that ,whilst the book may not directly deal with the teachings of Scientology, it does provide a vehicle through which the church can boost its profile and membership. Others have stated that there are definitely similarities between Hubbard and the characters in the book.  In particular, books hero, Jonnie "Goodboy" Tyler (played in the film by Barry Pepper). 

Now that the film is made it will be interesting to see what the cinema-going public thinks of it.  As far as the book goes, most reviews dismiss the link between the book and the church. One obvious link, however, is the name of the aliens, "Psyclos".  Surely, it doesn't take a genius to work out that the aliens represent modern psychologists, the people on whom Hubbard blames the world's problems.  

Is this a one off connection?  Probably not, but, like anything, is you go in looking to spot links than you probably will find some. However, if you go to see the movie with no preconceived ideas, you would probably walk out of the cinema with just as much idea of what Scientology was as when you entered.

Battlefield Earth was certainly a great book, and the film has the potential to be a big money spinner, but you feel that it was not L. Ron Hubbarb's best work of fiction.

   Battlefield Earth opens in Australia September 28, 2000