Hacker Cinema
Battle: Los Angeles
2011 · Film · 116 min
Directed by Jonathan Liebesman
When once distant UFOs become a terrifying threat and an alien invasion force begins attacking Earths major costal and riverside cities, a U.S Marine staff sergeant and his team are sent into battle only to find they must take it upon themselves to defeat an unknown enemy and protect what remains of Los Angeles.
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5 comments on Hacker News
> stores that sell photographic film, or stores that sell movies
You'll be happy to hear that Yep selects neither for top positions: https://yep.com/web?q=Film+store+in+los+angeles. Google, Bing, and Yahoo all get this perfectly right.
Other searches are much worse.
"los angeles, where to purchase roll of film" top 3 results: https://i.imgur.com/UxEXD0N.png
1. The movie Battle: Los Angeles on Vudu
2. A fake viagra spam with "la" in the domain
3. The LA muncipality definition of an "Unincorporated Area"
> Plus, they protect you in the eventuality of an alien attack.
Except when the aliens are ransacking Earth for its water. See the documentaries V [0] and Battle: Los Angeles [1] for more on this.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_(1983_miniseries)
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle:_Los_Angeles
It's a weird premise indeed, and I've seen it only in two places - as an in-movie speculation I mentioned, and as something the director alluded to[0]. Personally, I've discarded it in my headcanon - as it makes little sense, and one can imagine alternative explanations.
--
[0] - https://screenrant.com/battle-los-angeles-comiccon-2010/, C-f water.
> The most absurd thing about "Battle: Los Angeles" is not that aliens would come to Los Angeles (as opposed to Detroit) to steal water,
Hey, they landed near all major coastal cities; the movie was just following one group of soldiers fighting off one part of the invasion force.
> but that they would come to a planet which has a thin layer on the surface as opposed to being just a run-of-the-mill dwarf planet or asteroid or comet or whatever you call it that is closer to 50% water.
Fair enough.
Disclaimer: I really liked the movie and wish there was a sequel made.
EDIT: My guess would be that the alien military tech was running off water (probably hydrogen/oxygen), so they started the invasion on the coasts to have essentially unlimited supply of water, but the actual purpose for the invasion was something else entirely. The "aliens need our water" hypothesis was AFAIR proposed by some talking head in the movie, not stated as in-universe fact.
There are a lot of US movies that go the other way - praising the US military/portraying conflicts in good vs evil way.
Example is Battle Los Angeles (2011) and American Sniper (2015). So such things are in effect "soft propaganda".
In China, to protect themselves against such soft influence, they enact regulations. Letting people watch all US movies without a filter is effectively letting US set the cultural standards and values.
I am not advocating for such a strategy, but since some other countries don't have the technological capability to make engaging soft cultural influence movies, I get where they're coming from.