Horrors of War
Rating (from metacritic.com): N/A (3.4/10 from IMDB
Storyline (from IMDB.com):
FILM SYNOPSIS: 'Feeling the pressure from Allied advance, Hitler unleashes his secret weapons giving rise to a type of warfare the world has never seen. Throughout the European theater of WWII, Lieutenant John Schmidt comes face to face with these "weapons." The Office of Strategic Services (O.S.S., precursor to the C.I.A.) initiates missions behind enemy lines to find the source of the weapons terrorizing U.S. soldiers fighting the Third Reich. Schmidt is joined by Captain Joe Russo and his group of war-hardened GIs who have experienced for themselves the all-too-real horrors of war in battle. Together, they must find and destroy Hitler's horde of nightmare weapons before his horrific vision can be fully realized.' Written by Philip R. Garrett
Source: My personal collection (sadly)
Review:
I own this movie and I’ve never been about to sit through the whole thing. I usually get bored about 20 minutes in, and find something more interesting to watch, like drying paint. But, because I foolishly let people vote, I now have to sit through the whole thing.
I will find where you sleep and poop on your face in the night, you dirty bastards.
Set in late 1944, or mid 1945, this movie is about a unit (or units) of American GIs that first stumble across, then are later set out to destroy, Nazi super-soldiers. Yep, that’s the plot. Unlike ‘SS Doomtrooper’ produced by the Sci-Fi channel, this movie avoided everything that could have made it fun. I can’t really get too much into the plot, because it confused the hell out of me.
The movie starts with an under-strength infantry squad taking out a machinegun emplacement (in a manner that would make a seasoned ground pounder weep in frustration), then running into a zombie. They hit it in the head once, making its helmet pop off, then pop it in the brainpan again. This starts many mistakes that could have been resolved by talking to a real infantry veteran of the era. Helmets aren’t designed to stop bullets, they’re there to stop shrapnel and ricochets. For a great example, watch Band of Brothers.
Then, we jump back six months, and follow a shitty version of the Dirty Dozen get dropped behind enemy lines… In occupied France. Because the writers lost me, I can’t tell if this is suppose to be March 1945, which was when Allied forces were entering Germany. But, if it was September 1944, it would make this work. Who gives a crap? Not the directors, that's for sure.
This group of criminals ends up stumbling across a werewolf (not a zombie) and getting killed. The group is lead by an asshole of a captain, who reminded me of military men portrayed in Vietnam movies, who gets torn to bits. The whole goal of this sequence is to have one of this team end up bitten by the werewolf, so he can be used later. That’s it. It’s about a third of the movie that could have been summed up in a 5 minute flashback.
Back to the present time, we meet another captain, and are then subjected to another overly long flashback, which was suppose to take place right after D-Day, but because the writers were incapable of communicating the most basic of information, we’re guessing again. This group of soldiers - this time numbering near a dozen, encounters a zombie. Woop-di-fucking-doo.
The flashback ends, and another under strength squad is sent to infiltrate behind enemy lines… This is all supposed to be done by the OSS, but it’s so terribly planned, I can’t believe anything about these missions.
Fine, let’s get to the end of this piece of shit. The team finds the evil Nazi lab, another zombie, and the evil scientist that’s been doing all this. Of course, the scientist isn’t all that evil, but he gets infected with this serum, and turns into a zombie thing. During this, the GI who was bitten by a werewolf changes, and gets killed by the zombie in a heavy foreshadowed way. The leader of the mission injects himself with the serum and becomes a zombie too, and punches a hole in the other zombie. He then begs his own men to kill him.
The End.
God damn, this movie sucked. The worst part was that it had so much potential. The script was bad, but it just needed a bit of editing. The directing wasn’t terrible, and neither was the acting, it just wasn’t that good either. I knew what the writers/directors were trying to do, they just couldn’t do it. Either they didn’t have the skill, the time or the budget to really do what they wanted, and just ran with it anyway.
There’s so much about this movie that they could have just dropped, or shortened, and it would have made a much better movie. At one point, a squad of soldiers ends up running through a graveyard. Somehow, they missed several enemy soldiers, a tank and an artillery piece. How does this happen? Then, they run into the forest and the enemy is unable to locate them. I’m sorry, but this is like throwing a rock to distract a Beholder. I just don’t know how the people who are responsible for this movie didn’t even talk to someone who’s been near a battlefield. Or even play a first person shooter video game, for god’s sake!
To add to this, there’s a scene I think is suppose to be taking place during the Normandy Beach landings, but due to the poor production value, I couldn’t be sure. I do know that Ohio looks nothing like Normandy, or does a dry riverbed look like the seashore.
A while ago, a company called Pinnacle Entertainment Group made a role-playing game called Weird War II. It has zombies, werewolves, magic and all that, set during the war. I think I was the only person who bought this game, and it felt like the writers may have read the covers in a game store. I wanted to like this movie, I really, really did.
Because of this movie, I want nothing to do with Ohio. I will never visit the state, and I will start working on a list of jokes about Ohio. Fuck Ohio. If this is the best movie the state can produce, I think we should let Indiana take them over.
Final Thoughts: Horrors of War? More like Horrors of Cinema…
It was a UGLY movie.
Coming Soon: Lost In Translation
(Also, don't forget to vote for the 20th review. And, expect an informative entry soon.)
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