Battlefield Earth Dubbed Worst Movie of the Decade

J. D. Shapiro recently received a "Razzie" for writing the screenplay to "Battlefield Earth." Razzie is short for "Golden Raspberry Award," and it's annually awarded to the absolute worst in film. Shapiro recently wrote an article for The New York Post in which he apologized for writing the movie.

Battlefield Earth is based on a novel written by L. Ron Hubbard, who is now more commonly known as the creator of Scientology.

"I had read an article in Premiere magazine saying that the Celebrity Center, the Scientology Epicenter in Los Angeles, was a great place to meet women," admits Shapiro. "I didn't find any eligible women at first, but I did meet Karen Hollander, president of the center... Karen called me a few days later asking if I'd be interested in turning any of L. Ron Hubbard's books into movies."

The rest, as they say, was history. One of the worst movies of the decade was apparently the result of one screenwriter trying to pick up chicks at the Scientology Epicenter. What's even more ridiculous is that when John Travolta first read the script, he called it "The 'Schindler's List' of Sci-Fi."

Though, in Shapiro's defense, he stated that his script was "very, VERY different than what ended up on the screen."



Everything started to go downhill when Shapiro received a batch of notes asking him to essentially change the entire movie. According to some gossip, L. Ron Hubbard apparently wanted Battlefield Earth to be made into a movie more than any of his other books. He "wrote extensive notes" on how he envisioned the film.

The movie was ruined. Shapiro only watched it once, and states that even that was "one too many times."