Overlord

Nazis. Bastards the lot of them. Seeing them getting butchered onscreen never gets old. Steven Spielberg once said he made them the villains in Raiders Of The Lost Ark because no one would complain when they got skewered, melted and blown up at the end. In the last few years fascism has been on the rise again in the Western world and it's a scary time. The rise of shitbags like Trump and UKIP has enpowered scumbags to start being openly racist again and these same scumbags have reclaimed swastika's and straight arm salutes and have no shame in openly using them. Last year a video of Richard Spencer being punched in the face started doing the rounds and it made for immensely gratifying viewing. So it seems like the perfect time to start making nazi's villains in films again. Shooting them in real life would get you in a spot of bother so why not live vicariously through a war/horror movie like Overlord which is out today. Now you'll finally know what happens when a nazi gets a grenade stuck in his gob. Hint - it's a crowdpleaser.

It's the 5th of June 1944. A regiment of paratroopers is flying over Normandy on a mission to knock out a radio tower that would cause chaos for the allied troops arriving by boat the next day. Things go sideways when their plane is hit by flack and soon enough there's only a handful of survivors left including Private Boyce (Jovan Adepo) and Corporal Ford (Wyatt Russell, son of Kurt). Determined to continue their mission they get help from a French woman called Chloe (Mathilde Olliver) and during reconnaisance Boyce discovers the nazi's are up to some very disturbing things in a lab below the village.

This film probably has the best opening scene of the year. A brutal and terrifying assault on the senses that gives us a slight taste of how horrifying battle must be for the uninitiated. It's war depicted as a literal hell. Screaming soldiers being sucked into an inferno. Chaos. Blood. Terror. One scene of dead troopers hanging from trees in front of a blaze looks like something from a Hieronymous Bosch painting. It's a stunning way to start a film but it's so good that the film spends the rest of it's time trying and failing to top it. It's far from a bad film, in fact some of it is deadly but it just never reaches the heights of the opening again. It has a lot of fun trying though.

The war and horror elements of the movie are blended together nicely and the cast sells it all. Jovan Adepo injects a surprising amount of soul into proceedings and Wyatt Russell as the man in charge does a fine job. At times, especially near the end, he looks uncannily like his Da and this could be the film that knocks him into the big time, the same way as Kurt's genre work with John Carpenter made him a big star back in the 80's. Mathilde Olliver as Chloe gets a surprising amount of screentime too and seeing her getting some much deserved payback will plaster a grin across your face. When you've a solid cast in place its easy to sit back and let the madness flow over you.

The war stuff is grand but the meat (literally) of the movie is in the latter half of the film when the nazi's plans become clear. They make very believable monsters and it's a joy seeming them getting taken apart at the joints. It's here the film turns into an absolute gorefest but it's so silly and ott that it's hard to be disgusted by any of it. In these days of anemic family friendly action movies it's refreshing to see a film embracing an adult certificate. Pilou Asbæk of Game Of Thrones fame plays the big bad and relishes the opportunity to play a really villainous piece of work. The most disturbing scene in the film involves him but it's thankfully very brief.

A pretty unique thing this film does is having an African American soldier in the lead. Black actors have appeared in World War 2 films before like Miracle At St Anna and The Tuskegee Airmen but it's hard to overlook the casting in this political climate. Seeing Boyce and a Jewish private called Rosenfeld letting loose on a right wing enemy feels like a pointedly "fuck you" moment which directs the movie into the arena of revenge fantasy. Which isn't a bad thing at all. People need to be reminded that fascism is vile and if they can be entertained at the same time then why not? I really enjoyed this. If you have a strong stomach I think ye will too.