Five Film Facts: 'Battleship'

Having scored quantifiable successes bringing "Transformers" and "G.I. Joe" from toy-store shelves to the silver screen, the folks at Hasbro are back for more. But this time, instead of transforming action figures into onscreen action, Hasbro is undertaking an even more difficult adaption when "Battleship," tangentially based on the popular board game, opens domestically this weekend. We all know that Taylor Kitsch, Liam Neeson, Brooklyn Decker, Alexander Skarsgard, and Rihanna will look darn good in uniform, but here are five fun facts about the film you might not know.

Fish out of water
Not only is this international pop star Rihanna's first movie, but it's also the first time she's ever been on a movie set. And not just any movie set, but a floating one in the middle of the shark-infested Pacific Ocean. "I was nervous the entire time, the entire movie. I didn't really know what a [movie] set even looked like. It turned out to be just as scary as I thought: Just as big, tons of people, tons of cameras, cranes -- everything in the middle of the ocean," says Rihanna, who plays Petty Officer Cora "Weps" Raikes. "We're in Hawaii, the water's pitch-dark, there's probably big life under there. But I kinda had to go against all that, I said there were enough people in the water for [the sharks] to get to before me."

You sunk my destroyer
Though it was developed in conjunction with Hasbro, the film doesn't seem to resemble the game, aside from the fact that there are ships involved. First of all, the main story line is about the U.S. Navy taking on an alien threat. Secondly, there are no red and white pegs. There is no "You sank my battleship" line. There aren't even battleships, considering the battleship has been replaced by the destroyer in today's Navy. Yet producer Bennett Schneir insists the film relies heavily on the game: "'Battleship' is a game of wits, intuition, logic, and smarts as you try to figure out who your enemy is and win the day. We thought [the game] had all of the elements for a huge, incredible movie. It's cinematic, exciting, and adventurous. To our filmmakers, the game was an incredible launching-off point."

Sergeant Skarsgard
Alexander Skarsgard, best known as Eric Northman on the HBO series "True Blood" (2008), isn't just another pretty vampire -- or another pretty actor, for that matter. No, Skarsgard is also a real-life sergeant in the Swedish Navy. You would think that the son of acclaimed actor Stellan Skarsgard could stay out of the line of fire, but that's not how Alexander wanted it. "There was this unit that I really wanted to join. My unit was part of the Navy, but we weren't on big ships. It was a small unit protecting the islands in the Baltic [Sea], basically," says Alexander. "I grew up in a very bohemian, hippie family in south Stockholm in a very urban area. I needed a challenge -- I wanted to be out in the woods."

Hanging onto the ball
Taylor Kitsch shed his signature locks and went high and tight to play Lt. Alex Hopper, who's at the center of the film's action. Kitsch enlisted in the project partly because of his relationship with writer/ director Peter Berg, who cast Kitsch in the hit TV series "Friday Night Lights" (2006), which Berg created. "You know Pete's going to bring the action. Any actor will love the way he shoots, in regards to freedom -- no marks, nothing like that," says Kitsch. "But I think what really put me overboard, no pun intended, was that thing with the process of creating Hopper, where [Pete] is, like, 'OK, what do you want to do?' And once you give that trust to an actor, that responsibility, just like FNL or his process, you either run with it or you drop the ball." Kitsch will have another opportunity to run with it when he and Berg team up with Mark Wahlberg and Ben Foster on "Lone Survivor," a Navy SEAL action flick due out in 2013.

Like father like son
Berg’s father was in the Navy. He was also a diehard Navy historian whose influence on Berg ran deep. Because of that influence, the writer/ actor/ director always wanted to do a Navy movie, especially one where he got to show off its modern firepower. With “Battleship,” Berg certainly gets his chance. The film received unprecedented support from the U.S. Navy, including direct access to three Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. The crew also had the honor of setting up shop on the Battleship Missouri Memorial (BB 63), where Japan surrendered to Allied forces in 1945, effectively ending World War II.