Whenever Battle: Los Angeles gets close to embracing what it should be –– that is, a gloriously cheesy B-movie –– it puffs out its bloated chest with self-importance, snuffing out the idea of slight self-deprecation like it’s a giant, contemporary-slick shoe, and the notion of having even a wee bit of fun is a discarded cigarette butt.
Geez, even when this movie tries to be tongue-in-cheek, it chokes on arrogance.
Case in point: during one particularly hairy moment, when headliner Aaron Eckhart risks life and limb to play hero against the evil extraterrestrials, another marine remarks, “That was some serious John Wayne sh@%, man!”
Aaaah, yes. John Wayne.
Battle: Los Angeles has a glimmer of the hoo-rah spirit of classic Second World War features (in fact, according to press notes, the story is based on an infamous “false alarm” over L.A. during the Second World War), so a line like that could act as a solid wink to the audience, a sure sign that this is a traditional us-versus-them hunk of fromage that is sacrificing brains for guts. And by guts, I mean bravery, not splatter.
Then comes the follow-up statement from a fellow soldier:
“Who’s John Wayne?”
And thus, the problem. You can’t tip your hat to a legend like the Duke if you’re too busy looking around for Michael Bay.
What’s worse, Battle: Los Angeles is a special effects extravaganza in which, unfortunately, the effects aren’t all that special. They’re good, just not as amazing as advertised. At least, I don’t think they are, ‘cause with the choppy editing and shaky camera work, we rarely get a solid look as to what’s happening anyway, which is a bummer, for it appears to be one darn fine fight.
The tale has a team of marines, led by Staff Sgt. Michael Nantz (Eckhart), taking on alien invaders bent on destroying the earth via populated ports like the City of Angels.
Nantz, haunted by a mission gone wrong in Iraq, blazes a trail into creature-infested landscape to rescue a group of civilians, which all but guarantees a heap of melodrama.
Director Jonathan Liebesman (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning) isn’t simply borrowing elements from other films, he’s making a freakin’ quilt with Battle: Los Angeles.
Scraps of Black Hawk Down, Independence Day, Cloverfield and almost every George Romero picture ever made are patched together here, and the result is almost as chaotic as the cinematography.
Thankfully, Eckhart is good. Awfully good. He’s able to lift this material to a higher level than it should be. I mean, the poor guy gulps his way through a cornball speech to his battered mates, does the monologue justice, and is then forced to tag it with, “but none of that matters now.”
Bad enough these guys have aliens blasting lasers at them, but they keep shooting themselves in the foot.
Out of five stars, I give Battle: Los Angeles two. The feature is currently playing at Vernon’s Galaxy Cinemas.
–– Jason Armstrong is The Morning Star’s film reviewer.
