Overlord

I thought the film would use the cast of unfamiliar acting faces to surprise you with who would be the hero, who would die, and who would survive (if anyone), but alasthe roles were clear after only a few minutes. What followed was nearly three-quarters of an hour of more or less boring or rather ordinary waiting to find out why I was actually watching Overlord in the first place, and then, yes, a fairly entertaining parade of practical gore effects, but one that was more intimate than I would have liked. Never mind that I didn't see Overlord in the cinema, the TV screen is just right. (06/22/2019)

An absolute blast from start to finish. Overlord is essentially a high-octane B-movie with the kind of plot you'd expect from this genre, but it's executed so brilliantly, with top-notch effects and an intense pace that you can't help but get swept up in it. The level of brutality is impressively extreme, definitely not holding back. While the characters aren't deeply developed, they're likable enough for me to care about their fates. As an action horror film, it hits all the right notes and stands out as a top-tier entry in the genre. You won't find anything better anytime soon. (10/11/2018)

Overlord is a kind of silly B film which is dead serious about itself, painfully heavy, and deprived of one-liners, juice and memorable scenes alike. There was just one creative and funny trash scene (the grenade in the mouth) that I was able to enjoy. The rest is just awfully austere and has a superficial pathos that only a lazy screenwriter could produce. In the best parts, the plot doesn’t offer more than dull escapes when faced with a Deadpool-looking creature with no costume. The characters are so deplorably designed. Just to name a few, they could be described as the warm-hearted black man, the badass cowboy, the nasty Italian, the clever kid, the emancipated French lady and a generic SS villain with a horde of brainless Nazis – all being flat, uninteresting and predictable. And the actors’ performances do nothing to help or enhance them. To add insult to injury, the film is unnecessarily noisy, including the characters who shout at each other all the time, even when there’s no reason. All flows in a linear predictable way, without any twist or surprise. As for those couple of scenes with too many effects, they’re definitely not compensating for the dull scenario (and I don’t agree with those who say the initial airdrop is well shot). [Sitges 2018] (10/11/2018)

If Overlord was a typical war film, I would have probably given it a boo rating, but it was a standard slasher film for people who can appreciate Wolfenstein or Resident Evil, so I enjoyed the mayhem and suppressed my criticism of the historical inaccuracies. It would have been pointless in this case anyway. If you don't mind a few hectoliters of spilled blood, the occasional deeper insight into the human anatomy, and a little French baseball fan, just relax, switch off your brain (except for the basic functions, that is) and there's a pretty good chance you'll be entertained. (03/08/2019)

Audiovisually it’s great, but in terms of script and direction, it’s a shabby grindhouse shoot ‘em up with a story that would work better as a video game – two thirds of relatively realistic war action and cheap psychology, followed by a final level tuned to action-horror where you have to kill the enemies with something a bit thicker than a stick. In a film, this approach is twice a shame: on the one hand, it can’t fulfil the expectations of a brisk and gripping carnage, and on the other, it excels in the impression of a serious war drama that takes the plot with the undead very seriously, but finishes it with an avalanche of action clichés and a wisecracking self-sacrificing hero. It’s not bad, because within the set standards, the script unfolds in a logical and well thought-out way, but it’s such a shame that the premise remains unfulfilled because they chose motives that are the total opposite (we follow a war mission into which the zombies get somewhat by mistake, and it doesn’t feel like the cruel, realistic horror they probably intended), and it’s too soft, too (it should have been much stronger visually). The excellent opening twenty minutes and the interesting alternative to the war genre with lots of minor ideas are worth the attention, but don’t expect a great B-movie with an intentionally silly bloodfest. For many people that might be good, but not for me. (02/04/2019)