Battleship

Battleship stars Taylor Kitsch as Alex, Alexander Skarsgård as Stone, Rihanna as Cora, Brooklyn Decker as Sam, and Tadanobu Asano as Nagata. It is rated PG-13. 

The beginning of the 2012 sci-fi action movie Battleship shows that NASA has discovered a new planet, named Planet-G, that may be able to support life. NASA sends a communication signal from a base in Hawaii to the planet.

Meanwhile, the reckless Alex Hopper is celebrating his birthday at a bar with his older brother Stone, who is part of the US Navy. Hoping it will make Alex become more disciplined, Stone forces Alex to join the Navy. Alex eventually becomes a lieutenant on the USS John Paul Jones, but he is in danger of being kicked out of the Navy because of his behavior problems.

Planet-G sends ships in response to the communications signal from Earth. Their main communications ship crashes into Hong Kong, devastating the area. The others land in the waters near Hawaii, which happen to be around where Alex and Stone's ships are training. One of the alien ships creates a force field around Hawaii, trapping all of the navy ships inside. The aliens fire at Stone's ship, the USS Sampson, as well as the John Paul Jones and a destroyer called Myōkō. Sampson and Myōkō are destroyed and the John Paul Jones is greatly damaged. Alex finds out that his brother has died, as well as the head officers of the John Paul Jones, which means that he is highest rank to command the ship. Survivors from Myōkō are rescued and brought to the John Paul Jones, including Alex's rival, Captain Nagata.

Alex, with assistance from Nagata; Ord, a crew member; Cora Raikes, Gunner's Mate; Sam, Alex's girlfriend; Mick, a retired veteran and amputee; Cal, an apprehensive scientist; and many others, is able to defeat the alien ships. During a night battle, the alien ships and the John Paul Jones fire at each other in a manner resembling the board game Battleship, hence the name of the movie.

The heroes are able to defeat the aliens because of clever strategies. Also, it is discovered that the aliens are very sensitive to sunlight, and they must wear masks in order to protect them from exposure. The cannons on the aliens' mother ship can only rotate so much until they crash into the ship itself.

I enjoyed Battleship, especially learning about how the aliens are defeated.  The aliens are able to detect hostile and peaceful humans or objects using their masks, which highlight objects in either red or green, which I thought was very interesting. The special effects in the movie created great suspense and action moments. Overall, I rate the movie a 7 out of 10.

By Emily Lau