Overlord

Watch Movies TV -***DISCLAIMER*** The following review is entirely my opinion. If you comment (which I encourage you to do) be respectful. If you don't agree with my opinion (or other commenters), that's fine. To each their own. These reviews are not meant to be statements of facts or endorsements, I am just sharing my opinions and my perspective when watching the film and is not meant to reflect how these films should be viewed. Finally, the reviews are given on a scale of 0-5. 0, of course, being unwatchable. 1, being terrible. 2, being not great. 3, being okay. 4, being great and 5, being epic! And if you enjoy these reviews feel free to share them and follow the blog or follow me on Twitter (@RevRonster) for links to my reviews and the occasional live-Tweet session of the movie I'm watching!  This film had me at Nazi killing.

Overlord – 3 out of 5

With the fact that Nazis are literally rising back in the public eye thanks to a President who deems that there are “good people” on that side, it’s hard to want to get invested in any property or story that involves these monsters.  However, I’m kinda all about the cathartic release of seeing a Nazi in pain so when I heard that there was going to be a zombie Nazi film in the form of Overlord, I was pretty excited.  Making the Nazis zombies basically made the promise that we’d see an even higher Nazi body count and that the kills would probably be super gory.  And with today’s political times being what they are we need to see Nazis getting killed.

In this current era, I'd pay to watch a movie that is just one man and a magical
machine gun that had an infinite clip just mowing down wave after wave
of Nazis for an hour and a half.

In WWII, some paratroopers are sent to take out a German radio tower but their plane is shot down.  Only four soldiers; Corporal Ford (Wyatt Russell), Private Boyce (Jovan Adepo), Private Tibbet (John Magaro) and Private Chase (Iain De Caestecker) survive.  With the help of a local named Chloe (Mathilde Ollivier), the soldiers find the church but discover that secret experiments are being conducted in there and a mysterious serum is being developed.  The team soon learns the serum turns people into inhuman monsters and the Nazis plan on using it in order to take over the world.  Now what was once a mission to destroy a radio tower has become a frightening mission of survival.

Yes, the typical open-mouthed stare at something that will turn out to be
a monster out to kill you.

Sure, it's a zombie but looks how shiny and smooth
they're skin looks!

Overlord starts out very exciting.  The entire sequence with the paratroopers in their aircraft getting ready to jump over enemy territory and get their mission done is killer.  This whole part is exceptionally crafted as it creates a very tense atmosphere as the chaos of getting to the jump point as explosions are ripping through the skies around our main cast.  Sadly, after this point, the film slows down too quickly and the build to get to the part where we get to see zombie monsters made by Nazis takes too long to arrive.  The build-up isn’t terrible but it results in monster action arriving too late in the story and the fun element feels fleeting.  As it stands, the pacing basically made the film an average, middle-of-the-road experience that wasn’t terrible but wasn’t something that stood out either.

I don't want to say it all goes downhill from here but this sequence set the bar
very high.

The performances in the film are undeniable great.  Pilou Asbaek is fantastic as the antagonist and he brings that same “love to hate him” charm that he brings in Game of Thrones.  I really enjoyed Jovan Adepo as Boyce because he really nailed the character’s development and it was incredibly easy to sympathize with and cheer for him.  The only weak link I saw in the cast was Wyatt Russell as Ford.  Russell feels very vanilla in his role and he doesn’t have a very commanding screen presence.  His performance isn’t bad in any real sense.  He looks and feels like a real soldier and his confidence feels legit but he doesn’t bring anything memorable to the role.  To boil it down, I found Russell to be serviceable.

It could have been worse, I guess.  It could have been that episode of Black
Mirror that Russell was in.  That was pretty unbearable.

Finally, while the monster action takes a bit to arrive, when it does it is very cool.  The makeup and practical effects look terrific.  Sure, this compounds the disappointment I had that the film doesn’t feature this aspect enough but when it is around it is very cool to see.  One scene of note is when the troopers foolishly test out the Nazis’ serum and the results are pretty horrifying but very wickedly cool to watch.

This is how I imagine a trip to the chiropractor would look for me.

Overlord is not without its entertainment value or without its charm.  The film is definitely entertaining and the cast is great but it didn’t quite deliver the punch I was hoping from it and it feels like it takes too long to establish its premise and too quickly resolves its conflict.  It’s a decent and entertaining film but one I feel probably didn’t live up to its potential.