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Topic: Favorite Space Battles (Read 16551 times)
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Edward
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the scene in the italian movie "Battaglia" where the combined inner and outer system fleets put aside their dispute and team up against the incoming aliens has to be the best.
there's been good stuff in like Babylon 5 and Star Wars, and some B5 stuff and later SW stuff has better fx, but Battaglia wins hands down for pure grandeur, tension, realism, and emotion
i mean, how can you top fourteen fighters stafing an alien cruiser with operatic quality music, almost perfect miniatures. . . the first battle scene, the aliens coming in at a single file, silhouetted against the sun, and then they slowly take formation, like something unfurling its wings or even like oil spreading across water, until the sun is completely blotted out, captain tornelli whispering mass with just the hum of the engines. . .
i don't think we'll ever get anything like that, frankly, because the notion of scifi as art, mixed with the whole spaghetti western mode, was such a unique atmosphere. now you just have scifi porn, basically, explosions and the biggest possible capships and whatnot
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Zeus
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Holy shit! I thought I was the only person on this forum who'd ever seen Battaglia! Right on!
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Zeus
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BTW -- for those of you who haven't had a chance to see Battaglia -- I assume almost everyone -- here's the description from Philip Strick's fantastic book, Science Fiction Movies (that's where I first heard of Battaglia):
"Battaglia (1984) **** 1/2
BATTAGLIA, a space opera extraordinaire, was shot over two years for a cost of over four billion lire (which is to say, a few million dollars). Undeniably inspired by both the Spaghetti Western and Italy's recent history, BATTAGLIA does seem a little dated: 1980's Italian haircuts were already goofy in the United States, and these days look downright absurd; the notion of a Marxist-Capitalist conflict over the planets is a bit of a stretch today; and the use of miniatures rather than computer effects is a relic of a bygone era. BATTAGLIA also has its share of absurd science, such using antigravity bombs to turn Jupiter into a nebula-like gas field from which to fight a guerilla space battle. But all this can be forgiven.
BATTAGLIA, simply put, has the greatest space battles outside of STAR WARS, some of the most memorable characters since A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, and a speech worthy of the Bard (Capt. Pirello's "A River of Embers" call to battle). Although its politics are dated -- as best I can tell, it's almost a World War II plot of capitalists and Marxists teaming up against implacable evil -- they are much deeper than anything you'd find in American science fiction movies (though the story seems loosely inspired by some Philip K. Dick stories).
Unfortunately, BATTAGLIA is almost impossible to find due to a string of marketing disasters, starting with a horrendous British dubbing and translation (including dubbing the fantastic choral music during the huge battle) and going through a deal with Sony to distribute solely through Betamax. The result is that this movie lacks even the cult following it deserves. But if you can find it subtitled, it's a must see."
FWIW, I caught it at some show Aint It Cool News was putting on at the Alamo Draft House.
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Baltar
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 109
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I'd really like to see this...know of any way to get a copy?
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Zeus
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I have no idea. I saw the dubbed version in a theater in Texas three years ago as part of an event Aint It Cool News was putting on. You might be able to find it on Ebay, but it sounds like all there'll be are betamax tapes. Maybe it's possible to find a VHS bootleg, but I don't know. A quick Google search turned up nothing. Sorry.
You could try getting in touch with the people at AICN?
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Chaotic Evil
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B5 Call to Arms
the final fight in earth's orbit.
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wyrmul
Zebranky food
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Posts: 3
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Hmmm, Endor was where my facination with spacecraft furballs began. It is classic.
Babylon 5 Season 5, A view from the gallery. Not so much for the battle itself but from Bo and Mac's commentary on the battle. And a good explination for fireballs in space.
SG1 Season 7, Lost City pt2. The battle over Antarctica. F-302s and the Promethius vs. Al Kesh and Deathgliders with orbital bombarment by a dozen or so Ha'Taks.
While B5's Into the fire is cool, with the 55 megaton wake-up calls, Some of the Best B5 combat in my opinion is Lines of Communication, where Delen kicks some drack ass, and you see the whitestars "Skindancing". And Shadow Dancing, where the Alliance make their pre-emptive strike against the Shadows, and kick some major ass. Though I'll agree that Endgame, where Clark is deposed and The Long, Twilight Struggle, where the Narns fight the Shadows are pretty badass as well.
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jack_cloudy
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 100
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I'm especially fond of the battle in the nebula of Star Trek 2. It really managed to build up the tension, seeing those two ships flying around, practically blind and without their shields while trying to blast each other into pieces. Though there were some less good moments, such as the whole 2D thinking bit with take us down 1000 metres and they won't know what hit them. And the fact that they tried to protrait Chekov as some sort of superhuman gunner who could hit the Reliant when nobody else could while all he did (that I could see) was pushing a big button.
The battle in the Star Trek movie with the bird of prey that could fire while cloaked was nice also, but only because I think the Excelsior looks brilliant. The weird thing here was that they could make a torpedo locate the bird of prey with some simple and quick modifications while the big E's sensors were unable to do that. (you would think that the ship based sensors were superior to those found on a torpedo)
As for Star Wars, the Endor battle was really great, though it seemed a bit slow at times thanks to the scenes with Luke and the Emperor put in between, but those enhanced the whole plot, so no big loss.
That's it. I haven't seen that many space battles.
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,,That was the worst and most boring movie I’ve ever seen. Lousy special effects.” Sergeant ironhead. The real reason why the alien brain on Cydonia was destroyed while in the middle of displaying a message telling the X-com operatives not to fire.
Hoe meer zielen, hoe meer vreugd! (yes I'm dutch)
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Baltar
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 109
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Granted its been a few years since my last viewing, but I'm pretty sure you are wrong. I think it was Uhura that brought up the fact that they were carrying 'all that equipment to catalog gaseous anomalies' because 'the thing has got to have a tailpipe.' Spock and McCoy then went down to the torpedo bay and stuck this equipment into a torpedo so that it could home in on whatever the Bird of Prey was emitting. I think also there was some reference earlier in the movie about some anomalous readings coming from below the ship at the time of the attack on the Klingon diplomatic envoy that might be connected to this, but again its been some time since I last saw it.
....and yeah, some good FX shots in that fight. I'd say 6 was among my favs along with Wrath of Khan and The Motion Picture.
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Kaiser II
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I get the impression that in Star Trek VI,
where they rig the torpedo to hunt the
hidden Klingon, they don't actually enchance
the sensors. I think what they (Spock and
McCoy, if I remember) did was to change
its flight pattern. The idea would be to
prevent it from using its sensors, instead
flying blindly in a circular motion until it
hit something.
They knew a ship was there, in front of them,
just not exactly where. Having a torp fly around
until it hit something would seem....logical.
Some of those battle shots were excellent too. The
torp blowing through the Enterprise's hull, the
Klingon Captain's declaration of "I'll blow you
out of the stars!"
Or Sulu's "Let her fall apart!"...still gives me
tingles.
It's been ages since I watched any of the old
Star Trek movies (and 6 wasn't my fav) but they
had some good moments.
Actually, they put probe sensors into the torp so it tracked the cloaked BoP's exhaust.
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Deus Siddis
Enlightened
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Gender: 
Posts: 1387
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Yeah, but like jack said, the ship's sensors should have been able to track the trail and then they could have phasered where it starts.
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jack_cloudy
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 100
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Ok, here's a theory. It's been years since I saw it, so I could be wrong. What if the sensors of the Enterprise were damaged? I only remember seeing lots of torps blasting holes in the saucer (that makes me think that they could have finished the Enterprise off a lot quicker by just bombing the bridge. oh well, Klingon targeting systems have never been that good anyway,  ) but what if the sensors had been damaged?
I always thought that they were placed in the blue glowing dish on the engineering hull, but some wires linking the sensors (or at least those that could have been used to track the bird of prey, visual and stuff seemed to be fine) to the computer might have been fried. Though it is odd that they never commented on it in my memory.
That leaves us with the Excelsior. The only theory I can come up with her (it is a stretch, but I can't think of anything better) is that that torp that hit her caused a malfunction in the shield system which in turn caused a power surge to knock out the sensors that just happened to be the one that could track teh bird of prey.
Or (I can get a better theory, yay. ) the Excelsior just didn't had the right gear for it in the first place and was more suited to blowing up stuff it could plainly see.
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,,That was the worst and most boring movie I’ve ever seen. Lousy special effects.” Sergeant ironhead. The real reason why the alien brain on Cydonia was destroyed while in the middle of displaying a message telling the X-com operatives not to fire.
Hoe meer zielen, hoe meer vreugd! (yes I'm dutch)
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