Genres

Visitors Review

kelvaris-1 2012-05-24 00:50:38

Battle: LA, a surprisingly good movie.

*Vague spoilers*I don't like Aaron Eckhart. The first time I saw him was in 2003's "TheCore", a fun but horribly made movie. He followed it up with a BenAffleck thriller called "Paycheck". Which was notable only in that itwas John Woo's last American made film. I felt that Mr. Eckhart was anover confident, ego-driven character actor. I was right, he does have alot of confidence. I was also wrong, he was not a character actor.After 2008's turn as a supporting actor in Chris Nolan's master piece"The Dark Knight", Mr. Eckhart has moved to full blown leading manmaterial. With his square jawed good looks and no nonsense attitude reminiscentof Kurt Russel, Mr. Eckhart leads his Marines, and the box office, inthis years first bona fide hit: Battle: Los Angeles. Taking place inmodern times the film could presumably be set just hours from now. Init Marine Staff Sargent Micheal Nantz has evaluated his career as amarine and decided that his expiration date has hit. Predictably, and alittle clumsily, that was when the aliens decide to invade earth. Ssgt.Nantz was then assigned to a new platoon where he was only known by hisreputation in his last tour in Iraq. It was difficult to weave a story of Alien invasion. 1996'sIndependence Day set the genre and the time frame for it. Modernaudiences however, will not wait 20 minutes for the action to start, soJonathan Liebesman does the best he can by falling back on an old TVtruism. Hook them with the action then flashback twenty four hours totell the beginning of your story. It's a technique that has beencropping up more and more in films, as the line between the two mediumsblur. It is not a skillful way of hooking the audience but it does thejob. Once the action starts the ride is quite enjoyable. In what can bedescribed as "Black Hawk Down (Riddley Scott 2001)" meets "IndependenceDay (Roland Emmerich 1996) the film follows the 2nd Battalion 5thMarines, as they wade into a nightmare of alien fire to to rescuecivilians trapped behind the line. The film has some genuinelyenjoyable moments, both subtle and not so. Aaron Eckharts portrayal isalso both subtle and not so. Mr. Eckhart sells a scene where hedestroys an alien ship and returns to his unit victorious. Instead ofthe raging bravado one might see from an actor like Will Smith("Welcome to Earth bitch"), you get a shaky, trembling, bent overexhaustion from Mr. Eckhart. The film is full of believable portrayals of Soldiers, Marines, andAirmen in harms way. If you replaced the word "LA" with "Fallujah" youwould be sold on this documentary style of filming. The use of shakycams is kept to a bare minimum limiting the "I'm there" message. Thedirector also employed another technique for filming that is not oftensee in this computer generated age. You don't see the alien for sometime in the film. Lots of shadows, movement, and fog keep you fromgetting a good look at who's attacking. Though the film stumbled someone to get to the invasion it enjoyablyguides us through these Marines hardships and loss as they movethroughout the battle field. There is a somewhat contrived story lineof trust that felt added on to give the new Ssgt. Nantz (Aaron Eckhart)a chance to prove himself as a Platoon Sergeant who is loyal to hismen. This scene comes late in the film though, after Nantz has alreadyrisked his life many times over, to save his men. It feels tacked on togive the audience a breather between the second and third acts. All of this is not to say the movie doesn't have it's faults. DespiteMr. Eckharts performance the other actors in the film are little betterthan decent. The tendency is to deliver their lines with little or noemotion behind them leaving you feeling like the characters are cookiecutter, and anyone could have been playing the roll. The exception to that rule would be Michelle Rodriguez. Famous for her"tough girl" rolls (Fast and the Furious, S.W.A.T.) Ms. Rodriguezmanages to not play herself and deliver a performance as a Airman whois out of her element. The Director could easily have turned this intoa statement, for or against, women in combat but chose to ignore theissue, which made for a much better film. Any political orenvironmental message this movie could have tried to send would havebeen incredibly obvious and heavy handed. The only message here is, Marines kick ass.

aballyTKD 2012-05-23 12:45:00

Reasonably entertaining film with aliens, shooting and shouting

This film was never intended to answer any deep or fundamentalquestions about the nature of life, the universe and everything. ForPete's sake all you philosophy majors out there critiquing this move asif it was the "Seventh Seal" - lighten up! I like my Marine (US andRoyal) staff sergeants gritty, grizzled and preferably chewing oncigars while lobbing grenades. Two out of three ain't bad, and despitethe lead actor's lack of tobacco, he romps his way through a fairlyaction packed couple of hours of heroics, which are maybe somewhathammed up, with adequate shouts of "oorah" from his men and ladies. Itkept my kids and me entertained for the duration of the afternoon. Do Ifeel let down that it didn't enlighten me about Cartesian dualism, andthe ghost in the machine? Not at all - I saw shooting, shouting andaliens - which is what I paid for.

Gorgon117 2012-05-21 21:52:47

What did everyone expect?

I saw this film yesterday in the theaters and I really enjoyed it.Afterwards, I came back here to look at the reviews and most of themmade me cringe. I can honestly say that I think people have forgottenwhy we go see movies, and everyone is a critic nowadays. This was anACTION film! It's not Hamlet or Gone with the Wind! Seriously! What dideveryone expect as they bought their ticket for this film? Were you allexpecting to have your life changed forever or see the greatest movieever made? Right from the get-go, everyone knew what this movie wasabout: Aliens attacking the Earth. Period. People need to grow up and remember why we go to movies; to beentertained. This was not going to be nominated for best picture, sowhy couldn't everyone just go watch the film and just enjoy the filmfor what it was; a blockbuster!Personally, I thought the film was a great thrill ride.The CGI wasincredible, the action scenes were intense, the characters were OK anddid their job, overall it was all OK and that's all that it was destineto be. Yet, here there are people claiming this as the worst film theyhave ever seen! "0h the aktors 5uk3d!" "Teh pl07 wa5 57up1d!"Seriously, ask yourselves; What were you expecting?!? This wasn'tShakespeare!! It's a solid b-movie about Aliens!! What more do youwant?! The $100 million budget this film had was spent very well. Toall those saying who didn't, you are idiots. If you want to see a moviewith a budget that was wasted for ridiculous reasons, go see Beiber'sNever Say Never. People need to go to movies and suspend their beliefs for an hour ortwo at a time and just accept what they see on screen especially whenthey know well in advanced what they are walking into. Sure the moviewas full of cliché's, predictable, uninspiring, and dry, but again.Just ask yourselves, What were you all expecting?

ioannougiorgos 2012-05-21 02:54:09

Best alien invasion movie to date!

Battle for LA is a movie heavily influenced from previous movies andvideo games. Movies like Independence Day and video games like Crysisand Gears of War are seen through out the movie. Plot: Your basic alieninvasion scenario but with a twist and a dose of realism, for an alienmovie that is. Don't expect anything special but it is nice to see anending that doesn't disappoint. The aliens also use projectile weaponsand missiles, not those stupid rays from other movies. Acting: It is anaction movie. Don't expect much. I didn't connect with any of thecharacters but I did feel that mankind was fighting and I was on theirside. Dialogue: Nothing fancy, a lot of army jargo but not too heavy.Effects+Action sequences: The best I have seen in a movie with aliensinvading earth. Top notch action scenes. It was nice to see some actualfighting between aliens and humans(and not follow Tom Cruse with hisdaughter around doing nothing). Recommendation: Watch at the movies!

Herbiegreatone 2012-05-21 03:35:20

Why so negative?

Maybe I'm biased because I'm an 0311 myself but I actually enjoyed thismovie. Yes the plot was simple, and the one liners were pretty bad, thecharacter development was lacking, etc. But I think that peopleoverlook the good qualities of the movie. I think that it's simplicityis the beauty of it. It's a movie showing Marines doing what they'resupposed to do, protect the American people. It's not trying to make astatement about anything other than the fact that the United StatesMilitary is willing to protect America against any threat. Thecharacters are pretty bland, not awful just boring, with the only trulybad performance being turned in by Michelle Rodriguez. The dialogue isa little cheesy, but the way the Marines interact is somewhat accurate.Also the CGI is above average, it's not mind blowing but it's betterthan most. Now I don't think that it should be in the talk for bestpicture or anything like that but I don't see why there is so muchanimosity towards this film. All in all I'll give it a 6.5/10.

Tony Medley 2012-05-20 16:48:30

The pace is fast enough and the goal of victory so seemingly elusive that this is a pretty entertaining ride, despite the total lack of story and character development.

Arend 2012-05-20 06:29:35

Boring, dumb and glazed with typical patriotic US army BS.

If you watch the trailers, at least as a sci-fi fan, you hope you havesomething to look forward to. But deep in your soul you already know...this can't be good. But you still give it a shot. As you always do. Iwas not surprised that BLA is bad. I was surprised it's that utterlybrainless and uncreative. Why the studios spend millions and millionson movies based on crappy scripts like this is beyond me. Well I justsaw the movie still made decent money worldwide... but why don't theyhave the ambition to make an invasion movie that excites and appeals toall the fans for years and years to come. Instead BLA is yet anotherempty entry in a long row of forgettable and lazy genre features thatwill only be appreciated for no more than 2 hrs bylow-flick-standard-buffs and kids.What is really annoying about this movie are the constantin-your-face-marine-US-army-stars-and-stripes-donkey-crap scenes thatare so stuffed of painful clichés that you feel ashamed for gettinggoose bumps by the manipulative (and of course uninspired) soundtrack. Needless to say this movie offers just cardboard characters, go-go-gomarine dialogs and an incredibly flat story including a ridiculoustwist in the end.This is basically 'war of the worlds' minus character-development pluscombat scene copies from 'black hawk down'.

The_Film_Cricket 2012-05-19 21:00:33

Assault by aliens? Who will protect us from a movie like this?

Watching Battle: Los Angeles is like eating a really boring dessert.Once you've finished it, you immediately forget about it and never askfor seconds. Afterwards you're sorry that you even bothered. Here is awar movie filtered through an alien invasion movie and rings theclichés out of both genres, often at the same time. The movie is aneedless, brainless insult to both genres. Somebody ought to sue.The story takes place on August 12th of this year and involves aninvasion of the earth by something from above. Meteors are falling toearth and landing on every coast. When they land, they contain shocktroops who immediately overtake an area and begin shooting lasers. Intothat chaos comes Marine Staff Sgt. Michael Nantz (Aaron Eckhart) who isjust about to retire after 20 years of service and has something bad onhis record that is never explained. The movie kind of, sort of, dancesaround that incident but never really gets into it.Nantz is given orders to move his troops into Santa Monica to take backL.A. from the invasion force. From news reports, we hear that all ofL.A. is under attack, so why exactly Nantz's team specifically needs tomove into Santa Monica never really comes up.The troops on the mission come right out of the action movie clichéfactory: The Guy Who is Getting Married, The Guy Who is About to be aFather, The Gung-Ho Fighter, The Big Mouth. None of these men areexactly distinguished and it hardly matters. They are defined by veryminor personal issues that sort of telegraphs their fate. When a guyhas a pregnant wife, you know he'd be better off just staying home.They are all different minorities and ethnicities, but individuality isnull and void. This movie plays like the cut scenes from a video game,it is just that dull.The reason that the aliens are here is kind of inane. They are here -if I heard right - because they need our water to survive and to fueltheir ships. That begs this question: What have they been using to fueltheir ships up till now? The aliens, which are are an incomprehensiblemorass of legs and what appears to be bladders for torsos are hard tomake out. The movie never gives us a clear look, they are mostly seenat a distance or in close-ups briefly because they are blown into ittybitty Martian meatballs. There is never one tiny sense of wonder orcuriosity about these creatures, where they come from, or what theyknow of us. What passes for wonderment comes from a scene in whichNantz and a Vet Tech rip apart one of the creatures to find out how tokill it. There's an answer to that question but it informs the troopswhere to shoot them. However, based on the battle scenes that follow,it seems that half of the troops weren't listening.The ships that they aliens arrive in are particularly lame. They lookas they through are made up of pieces and parts filched from ajunkyard. One of the ships even has the capability of burrowing intothe ground. Why? So it can look impressive rising out of the ground asthe hero look up in shock and awe.Battle: Los Angeles is one of the most frustrating action movies thatI've seen in many moons. Nothing makes any sense. The front-and-centerof the movie is a series of incomprehensible scenes in which the castis required to shoot across a city block at something that looks likean alien. Occasionally someone on the human side dies, but even thesuspense of that nullified by the fact that the characters are so thinthat you lose track of which character has just perished. Here is amovie so inept that it can't even give an answer to its own logicalmistakes and then comes up with an ending that isn't really an ending.What we get from the end of this movie is the suggestion that a sequelis eminent that will continue the mess that this one has started.

2012-05-19 05:12:34

you'll love it of you love the military

If you have been in the military or love the military then I believe this movie will be up your alley. The lingo, camaraderie a la armed forces is believable. If you loved District 9 for it's sci-fi action and it's portrayal of the complex nuances of human nature, you will likely find this okay to deplorable. I personally found it's dialogue tedious and the trite cliched characters unlikeable. I laughed at some of the one-liners that weren't meant to be funny and found the action sequences interchangeable and honestly they dragged on and on. The special effects weren't bad, I liked the alien mechanizations of war. The main focus of this flikk is the troupe and it's brotherhood. I just didn't care about any of them. The writers may have been ham sandwiches.

2012-05-18 12:01:21

Well...

I bought this movie because I did not get to see it at the theater, or on pay per view. While mildly entertaining, and of course as stated, predictable. I guess I expected more. The premise was good, and the aliens were tough as you might actually expect them to be. To me it shows that actors can make or break a movie. The new Lt. is a dork (as seen in Transformers 2), and the guy playing the lead cannot carry a lead role in a movie. Gee, why didnt we give the control sticks of the helicopter to the lady from Avatar? I give it 3 stars, not bad to watch...but dont buy it, it will collect dust in your collection.

2012-05-16 20:22:11

Independence Day 2

Not a great movie, but it wasn't all that bad either. I wouldn't buy it but it would be a decent rental I suppose. If you replaced the main character with Will Smith, I'm sure this would have just ended up being Independence Day 2. Fortunately the casting helped and they didn't quite go down that road, however the similarities are still present. For these reasons an others I would give this movie 1 or 2 stars but for some reason I think it deserves a little more. Filled with lots of military propaganda and over the top super heroes but I guess just because of a few intense scenes I bumped up the rating a little. It doesn't really deserve 3 stars but if you just watch it once and your an action movie fan you'll probably end up shrugging and saying, "At least some of the action was cool". However looking at the plot deeper there are many dumb things about this movie. Slight Spoilers....Aliens travel across the void of space and begin their invasion on foot(I guess they're not to experienced with tactics). The Aliens have a weakness that can easily be exploited to completely decimate their forces (very similar to the jet flying into the center of the UFO in independence day). All that said, rent it before you buy.

Ricky Haas 2012-05-16 05:43:05

Saving Pvt. Ryan in L.A.

Since "Independence Day" there has not been another great alieninvasion flick… until now. It was truly spectacular. The film was a bitformulaic, yet it wasn't that predictable (aside from a death here andexploding aircraft there). I will admit, the story was very basic,however, non-stop action prevented the unrecoverable damage a basicstoryline could do to a modern audience. In other words, this is a verytheatrical movie, and you must see it in the cinema or on your HD TVwhen it comes out. You need to watch it with other people so they canenjoy it as well. A group setting enhances this film experience.Of course, with any film, there are unintentional comedic moments. Forinstance, there is a part where they keep digging through alien armorto see how to kill them. They plow through dozens of layers in a screentime of what felt like five or more minutes. Another example was when afather said something along the lines of, "You can use my son foranything," regarding his youthful child. A second passed while watchingthis in the cinema and I started to laugh. Soon after, the wholetheater erupted in laughter. Obviously, this was not the intention ofunderrated horror director Jonathan Liebesman ("Darkness Falls," "TheTexas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning," and the B-Movie "The KillingRoom") or writer Christopher Bertoli (whose only writing creditsinclude "The General's Daughter" with John Travolta and the TV movie"Madso's War").Ignoring such things as that, you must look past those hiccups and lookat the brilliant writer/director team. Liebesman's horror filmbackground compared with Bertoli's war film background makes for anawesome sci-fi epic. The only way I can describe it is if the bastardchild of "Saving Private Ryan" and "Black Hawk Down" met the bastardchild of "District 9" and "War of the Worlds" (2005), thereby havingtheir own bastard child. By far brilliant and deserving of at least aBest Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing Academy Award nomination.The acting, on the other hand, wasn't as deserving as the men and womenbehind the camera. Aaron Eckhart must have been tired of doing creepyroles (i.e. "The Dark Knight" and "Towelhead") and wanted to be theseemingly fallen hero with the motivational speech; Bridget Moynahanwas lost after wandering from the "Blood Bloods" set; MichelleRodriquez fell back into her tough-girl niche; Ne-Yo no longer wants to"Stomp the Yard" (and it's all "Because of You"); and Michael Peñaneeded a breather from acting his butt off. So besides from fallingvictim to cheap sarcasm, the cast was actually not that bad. It is asci-fi epic, not "The Thin Red Line." The characters just need to bebelievable as a real human being in a situation such as an attack by anunknown alien species bent on the colonization of Earth. And since thisidea has only been explored in the movies, I doubt anyone could spit ontheir acting abilities when compared to "what someone would do in'real' life." Sit back, and enjoy the show. With the amount of alienfilms that have been coming out this year ("I Am Number Four," "Paul,""Cowboys & Aliens," just to name a few) this may very well be the bestof the year.NOTE: After viewing the film you will certainly wonder if a sequel isin the works (Perhaps, "Battle: Harford" or "Battle: Paris"?), and allI can say is that I hope not. It might ruin the first film and create afranchise devoted to steal the money away from the unwitting (remember"Transformers"). However, being a Connecticut citizen, I am bias to asequel in Hartford— as long as the same team behind the camera bringsit to life.

2012-05-15 20:18:06

One blockbuster please...shaken, stirred...and blurred

Did they even watch the final copy before releasing it to thedistributors? Where do I start? The bobbing camera is OK for a fewscenes, but why use it for everything?...Everything! - Aaron Eckhart isdelivering clichéd, teary lines and the camera is jerking like it's ona motocross dirt-bike. It get's worse as the movie progresses, withaction scenes blurred out to the point of incomprehension because ofall the shaking. You get only glimpses of all the panoramic shots ofLA. The rest is all blurred out in a mayhem of out of focus cameraaction and more shaking. Of course, you never get a clear view of thealiens, all you'll remember is that their infantry look and act likethose Cylons in BG. Storyline? There isn't one worth talking about.*sigh* What has happened to good movie-making skills these days?My wife got sick by the end of the movie and I managed not to bylooking away when it got really bad. Do yourself a favor and give thisa miss.

arthera09 2012-05-15 10:03:58

Really disappointed

I had a lot of hope for this movie, but was sorely disappointed. Itstarted out trying to do to much character development for too manycharacters that were quickly killed off. So I will use this as atransition to why I hate hand held work. It can be done well, but itwas not done well here. I was not sure who was dying and never got myorientation with respect to the where the characters were withrelationship to each other or who was getting shot or dying. So whenpeople did die I felt nothing because I did not know who was dying.Also doing a bunch of character development before the action on a darkgolf course does not help us identify the characters. So the biggestproblems with that movie is that we do not feel any of the intensitybecause we do not care about the characters because we rarely know whowe are looking at or who is doing what. So here is one of my biggest complaints about the movie: the soundediting. There was also noise going on in the background. It wasannoying to me. Maybe I am just getting too critical at this point inmy life, but it did not match the music and did not allow for a senseof downtown for the characters which as a result detracted from anypotential intensity for any possible situations. It also feel into the problem that every sci-fi movie falls into andeven use a terrible line at the end about how they need to telleveryone about how to destroy the aliens. So the fact that this ragtaggroup of individuals figure out how to destroy this alien race wasreally cliché and the whole execution. I hated how there was almost nosecurity around the command center and that the enemies showed up inone direction in small packets of troops. I would like to say the special effects were cool, but there only someof the shots of the city getting destroyed at the beginning. The alienswere terrible looking and I feel like we never got a good look at them.The idea of having them have their weapons part of their bodies wasreally cool, but I never really ever saw it and would have never knownit, if they had never said it. The under ground section was so cliché and at that point I was justannoyed.I could keep going on about how this movie hit every sci-fi cliché andhow each step was predictable. I won't. Not a good movie, but might befun if you are looking for things to explode.

Joost van Gaalen 2012-05-15 07:59:43

A lot of action, but no storyline

When I went to see this movie, I had high expectations. I was expectingthe best, but left the cinema a little disappointed.I agree though if you like explosions and lots of bullets, this isgoing to be a blast of you. The special effects are good as well, andcarry the movie actually, in my honest opinion. Next to that is thedecent performance Aaron Eckhart. I don't say he did it great, but Ihad the feeling he was the only one who was trying to make somethingout of this movie. The other actors had not much holding on too. Themovie doesn't bring you actually near the characters, so you reallydon't get to know them, except maybe Michelle Rodriguez. I think thedirector of this movie needed something that caught the eye, but evenshe gets boring during the end of the movie.Truth is that it's nicely designed, but like the soldiers, you don'tknow what you are up against. It all happens really quick, making themovie feel more like a video game like Call of Duty. But even that getsboring after a while. The constant background sounds of guns andyelling soldiers don't make it any better.If you want to see a movie with a decent plot line, I suggest you picka different movie. But if you like a no sense shooter movie, with tonsof action, well take a seat in that comfortable chair.

Emina Zeleski 2012-05-15 01:51:49

Not That Impressed

If you expect this movie to be some amazing story telling you what islikely to happen if hostile out-of-this-world forces came down on us,you may find the film tasteless, as did not live to expectations, didnot deliver, and what many have refer to as "Black Hawk Down meetsIndependence Day but no originality".Without question, if aliens did find our planet in this infiniteuniverse and did become hostile, they would put up one hell of a fightas we always see on screen because while we may always end up defeatingthem by the power of screenplay writers, their advanced weaponry andvicious minds tend to level our cities to rubble before we can figureout their weaknesses, however, we can't help to ask "what chance dosoldiers with standard-issue assault rifles have against hyper techweaponry from across the galaxy?", probably none, the same theory isalways argue: intelligent life form capable of light speed travelcannot be beaten with national pride alone. In other words, we stand nochance and therefore the display of brave soldiers firing hundreds ofrounds while shouting one-liners is redundant.

georgestark-1 2012-05-13 20:44:56

Pure real man's entertainment

If you are bloke, and like guns and aliens you will love this, in factif you are a real bloke, full stop you will love this. It's notScorsese does Shakespeare, it is not a deep in-depth narration of thehuman condition in the 21st century, it is a pure real man's actionfilm. I will go as far to say any man who slates this or gives it lessthan 9 is a big girl, and should stick to his Rom-Com's and perioddramas. All those who have slated this are absolutely clueless, whatdid you expect … it does exactly what it says on the tin. I cannot waitfor the sequel in fact we could have a massive franchise; Battle: NewYork, Battle: Paris. Battle: London and even Battle: Bognor Regis, itcould go on forever... and I hope it does. "whoa"

Michelle Orange 2012-05-13 16:41:23

On the whole Battle: Los Angeles is the emptiest form of sci-fi action: Just one bloody (or alien gooey) thing after another.

2012-05-10 19:22:59

Don't bother! The WORST film I've seen in a long-long time

This review is from: Battle: Los Angeles (DVD) The movie is completely disjointed; the "story" line is iffy (at best), the dialogue childish, trite, boring... the acting is simply horrible... should I go on? After about 40 minutes we all wanted to just turn the "stupid thing off... PLEASE!". But then we took a different tack and approached the whole thing as a MAJOR SPOOF. We then started enjoying the supremely bad acting, moronic dialog, barely tolerable special effects for what we assumed it was meant to be: a FARSE a COMEDY! We had a few belly splitting laugh sessions at the expense of the poor (as in pitiful) actors, but MUCH to EVERYONE'S RELIEF it finally ended. Do as you wish (in terms of purchase) but if you call me you can have my copy FOR FREE!!!

Giles Hardie 2012-05-10 04:15:26

It is a well executed one-violent-trick pony, designed for the 12 year old boy the movie studios hope is still playing with toy soldier figurines inside us all.