Okay so this film was supposed to be based on a two-player board game called ‘Battleship’, which some of us may have played as kids. It was basically an L-shaped board with players sitting on either side placing their ships into a grid. Each opponent must try and guess where the ships are and the first person to sink the oppositions entire fleet is the winner. Battleship, the movie, is about a fleet of military warships (though today they’d technically be the Navy) out on manoeuvres. They stumble upon a strange ship beneath the water that quickly turns into an alien menace threatening humanity. The fact that the alien craft looks like something out of a Transformers movie is no coincidence. Hasbro, the makers of the Transformers toys is also the maker of the board game.

Check out the Final trailer of Battleship which releases on April 13, 2012 in India:

Director James Cameron has recently criticised Hollywood and in particular the makers of Battleship for trading on the game’s name and not being very original. Well we could say that Mr Cameron (with all due respect) is hardly one to talk considering he’s re-releasing Titanic in 3D (trailer review here) and his previous film Avatar wasn’t exactly an original story either. I do agree the makers should have probably steered clear from referencing the board game too much and various iterations of the trailer have lead up to a final trailer that shows us what could be an interesting film.

Transformers-like ship attacking

Very distinctive is the way the alien ships ‘transform’ and their steel-looking exterior reminds us of the Decepticons from the Transformers films. But what’s interesting about the trailer is that it then delves deeper, showing us the aliens within the craft, thus ‘humanising’ the story and putting a face on all of the mechanical mayhem.

An extinction level event

No one does destruction better than the people in Hollywood and this film has plenty of high-quality end-of-world scenes. In fact, the camera work, CGI and action sequences all look stunning.

The alien

We’ve seen alien invasion films before but the new trailer introduces an element of mystery with the four-fingered aliens and their motivations for attacking Earth.

Rihanna gets all wet and wild

Singer Rihanna makes her acting debut and she’s looking mighty fine. Liam Neeson is there to give you that ‘big name veteran’ presence and Taylor Kitsch is probably hoping he has a better film in Battleship than he had in the mega-flop John Carter. While the first trailer of Battleship looked very generic alien invasion film, this new one may indeed ensure that the movie doesn’t go down without a fight.

Battleship is releasing on April 13, 2012 in India, almost a month before its US release.

Battleship Contest: Win Tickets & Posters

This is the poster you can Win!

Here’s your chance to win one of 8 awesome Battleship posters AND you could also win 5 Couples Tickets to the film in Mumbai. Just read the review above and answer two questions:

1) What other Hasbro franchise is talked about in the review?

2) Who makes her acting debut in the film?

Email your answers to minorityreviewindia@gmail.com with your name, number, address. Entries must reach before April 10, 2012.

Terms and Conditions apply. Contest is only for Mumbai residents. The poster will need to be picked up from our offices in South Mumbai as they may be damaged in the post. If you’re fine taking that risk, we will post it to you.