Starship Troopers (1997)

Jingoism meets soap opera meets war film. There's little here to latch any aspirations of “serious cinema” onto in this sci-fi combat flick. The script is barely above that of an after-school special, there's no science in the fiction, and it pretty much lays a log on of the novel upon which it claims to be based. But if all you're after is an amusing two hours with a gaggle of handsome people from a hilariously conservative future society, who ship off to war with giant bugs so they can add “rugged” to their résumé, then this is definitely your movie! All things considered, that's not such a bad thing. Seeing thousands of extras being melted, beheaded and several different kinds of impaled at the talons of their giant insect aggressors has a creative shock value that's hard to deny. The special effects, from the titular starships to the troopers to the arachnid race are extraordinarily impressive, matching up well to work done now more than 10 years since it was made. Also there's nudity, so it has that going for it. Simply put, it's a popcorn muncher violence-fest with an amusingly bent take on the definition of utopia. A perfect guilty pleasure.

7 out of 10.