New Review: Battle: Los Angeles

Alien Nation

It used to be that the genre of alien invasion films could be a little more varied than it is now. It seemed like in the past people were willing to mix he genre from other elements, whether that be polished studio product (Independence Day) or campy cheese-fest (Mars Attacks) or gritty docudrama (District 9). Lately now, they all seem to be produced in one huge gelatinous mass, most of them indistinguishable from the next. Hot off the heels of last years dud from the Brothers Staruss’ Skyline comes this film, which despite an intriguing ad campaign can’t live up to a fraction of what it seemed to promise.

You all know the familiar premise. One day, the people of earth are having an ordinary, nonchalant day that gets interrupted by some pesky extra-terrestrials that have a real anger management problem. Aaron Eckhart headlines a group of mostly void marines to stop the alien menace as best they can. There’s some half-assed attempt to explain why these aliens are invading (something about colonizations and water supplies), but who cares.

I would admit that the movie does make an attempt to establish some credible sort of character moments that feel real enough to maintain some genuine emotion throughout. It doesn’t always work, but I’d be lying if I felt something for these stock characters in the beginning. Director Jonathan Leibsman even does a decent job at crafting the rising tension and hectic action in the beginning of the film. However, soon the film just becomes redundant, and the chaotic action scenes no longer have any gravity to it. It all just becomes a relentless cacophony of loud explosions, hailing bullets and death of characters whose emotional attachments are very fleeting. It’s pretty much a one trick act that is used all the way through, and it runs out of steam way before the end comes.

Eckhart is a talent actor, but there’s nothing at all for him to grab onto in this role. There’s some lackluster attempt to give him some emotional backstory, but it mostly feels flat and without too much effort. The other cluster of of marines fail to have any significant emotional resonance, all of them pretty much as expendable as the next. That’s always the downfall about films that center on soldiers: the uniform is supposed to dissolve personality, and the film is nowhere near clever enough to conquer this problem.

There are some good alien invasion films out there, but this is not one of them. There’s some talent on display, but most of it gets lost in a deafening soundtrack, wooden acting and relentless action that just becomes stiff and monotonous by the conclusion. Sadly, expectations are not appropriate for the film, and in the end it becomes another reason to never trust March outside of Zack Snyder.

C