An Apology For Paul Verhoeven’s Starship Troopers
Written by: Tony Lazlo, CC2K Staff Writer
More fascist fun in Heinlein’s novel:
“[C]an you tell us why our system works better than any of out ancestors? (…) [Because u]nder our system every voter and officeholder is a man who has demonstrated through voluntary and difficult service that he places the welfare of the group ahead of personal advantage” (page 182).
“One of the older cadets took a crack at it. ‘Sir, revolution is impossible … because revolution – armed uprising – requires not only dissatisfaction but aggressiveness. (…) If you separate the aggressive ones and make them the sheep dogs, the sheep will never give you trouble” (page 184).
“Either we spread and wipe out the Bugs or they spread and wipe us out,” he says, “because both races are tough and smart and want the same real estate” (pages 185-186).
“Man is what he is, a wild animal with the will to survive and (so far) the ability, against all competition,” Rico says. “Unless one accepts that, anything one says about morals, war, politics you name it is nonsense. Correct morals arise from knowing what Man is — not what do-gooders and well-meaning old Aunt Nellies would like him to be.” (Note the use of “do-gooder” and “Aunt Nellie.” Heinlein really knows how to evoke the straw-man-building, idiotic condescension that right-wingers use when justifying militarism.)
“The universe will let us know later whether or not Man has any ‘right’ to expand through it. In the meantime, the M.I. will be in there, on the bounce and swinging, on the side of our own race.” (page 186).
“On the side of our own race,” Heinlein writes. Excellent. Let’s look at how Starship Troopers deals with race. Briefly, Heinlein deals with it brilliantly. Not-so-briefly, Heinlein gives us a “democracy unlimited by race, color, creed, birth, wealth, sex, or conviction,” and he populates it with people from across the world: Rico, Zim, Rasczak, Jenkins, Mahmud, Shujumi. Verhoeven recognizes this, and after the first disastrous battle on Klendathu, the world’s leader, Sky Marshal Dienes, “accepts responsibility” for the debacle and is replaced by Sky Marshal Meru – a black woman replaces a white man. What’s not to like?
But the real racism afoot in Heinlein’s novel of course involves the bugs of Klendathu. First, our nickname for the Klendathu arachnids: “Bugs.” It calls to mind other foul, monosyllabic slurs. Hell, it even calls to mind a bigot’s dismissive, pejorative use of the word “Jew.”
Sure, you could call it “species-ism,” but that is precisely where Heinlein’s brilliance lies. Racism is species-ism, and don’t ever forget it. A real racist actually, literally believes that morphological facial differences and variance in melanin levels in the skin constitute a difference in species. Heinlein takes this abominable thinking one step further to condemn those geocentrists who would place humanity above all others.
And once again, Verhoeven uses this material to great effect. After a speech by the Sky Marshal, Verhoeven cuts to Carl (Neal Patrick Harris), who demonstrates the “best way to kill a bug.” He guns down the extraterrestrial creature, then turns to the camera with a furrowed brow and set jaw. (Insert “Doogie Howser” or “Dirty Harry” joke here.)
Immediately after that Verhoeven cuts to a suburban neighborhood where little kids “do their part” by stomping on roaches and beetles. As the children stomp, one of their mothers cackles like a fucking maniac.
I bet Heinlein never stepped on any bugs. I bet he respected the hive-mind genius of ants and bees. As I write this, I’m coming around to the belief that Heinlein imagined a working, benevolent fascist society, yes, but that he also condemns it in ways too sly to register on most intellectual radars. Maybe.
That said, let me temper my praise of Heinlein’s “subtlety” with the admission that Starship Troopers ain’t a subtle book, and neither is Verhoeven’s movie. A lesser director would have keyed in on the super-oblique and ultra-subtle contempt for fascism and militarism that might be in the text and focused on it, and they would have wound up with a misguided, neutered and unsuccessful movie.
(Side note about Starship Troopers and Shakespeare’s embarrassment: A film version of Starship Troopers that outright condemns fascism would be just as lame as the countless modern productions of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice that try to make Shakespeare out to be anything but an ignorant anti-Semite. If you don’t want to do a play that seethes with anti-Semitism, then don’t do Merchant. If you don’t want to make a movie that glorfies fascism, then don’t do Starship Troopers.
Verhoeven’s movie does no such thing, and more important, it’s funny! Humor is just what Heinlein’s novel lacks, and it’s just what it needs to work on film. As I said before, Verhoeven cast beautiful, vacuous, matinee idols and shot the movie like an ad for a high-tech company. There’s not a rough edge to be found on earth, and if anything, it feels like the only subjugated group are the unattractive. With its sleek technology and perfect weather, this world reminds us of the utopia that earth becomes in Star Trek, except, of course, that the veterans are in charge. Even the alien world Klendathu shimmers with primary color blood and dazzling hyper-violence.
The mad Dutchman also dips into his Robocop arsenal and brings back the pace-setting and utterly batshit news broadcasts, this time in the guise of the Federal Network broadcasts (though by this day and age they look more like podcasts). The FedNet podcasts let Verhoeven hit his audience with rapid-fire cuts between trenchant themes, key exposition and wacko satire. Case in point: In the opening seconds we’re told, “Young people from all over the globe are joining up to fight for the future.” Then we see three soldiers say, “I’m doing my part!” followed by a 10-year-old boy who says the same. The crowd of adult soldiers benevolently chuckles at the kid’s enthusiasm. The voice-over continues, “Join the Mobile Infantry and save the world. Service guarantees citizenship.”
Verhoeven has already disarmed us with this lunatic joke about a kid in the army when he slips in the main tenet of Heinlein’s novel: “Service guarantees citizenship.” Not only is that slick exposition, but also it couches a militaristic idea in something that reminds us of a World War Two newsreel.
The filmmakers make this one-two punch their mainstay throughout the movie: disarm the audience, then hit ‘em with something crazy. A lot of Heinlein faithful squawked at the sight of an obvious SS uniform on one of our heroes (Harris’ character, Carl), but it’s a perfect choice. Heinlein had already lulled his audience to sleep by clothing all of the Terran military in American green, and then he hit them with Carl’s black Nazi uniform. He dares us to look at Carl’s uniform and to continue cheering for the “good guys.”
My one beef with Verhoeven’s movie? His portrayal of the Mobile Infantry – and no, I’m not complaining about his omission of the famed power armor from the novel. Verhoeven and his team made clear in pre-release interviews that they had to choose between the bugs and the armor, and they chose the bugs. Fair enough, because the bugs look great, but Verhoeven made the MI out to look like a bunch of grabasstic dingbats, far from the crew of hardy asskickers who could go down to a planet and “round up every left-handed redhead” that Heinlein describes.
But that’s a small complaint when compared to the rest of the movie, which even after almost 10 years remains potent. I admonish all touchy Heinlein fans to go back to the source material, drop their unwavering love of the master of science fiction, and read the book for what it is: a fascist apologetic that condemns fascism in exquisitely insidious fashion. I also encourage those same fans to revisit Verhoeven’s film after rereading their beloved novel so they can see it for what it is: a masterpiece of subversive satire and novel-to-film adaptation.