Battle: Los Angeles
The movie starts out a scant 24 hours before the bad guys drop in on us, and we are quickly introduced to the main Marine Corps characters. Two or three are really all you need to know about here: Staff Sergeant Nantz, played winningly and grimly by Aaron Eckhart, is a twenty-year vet who's about to retire, because his last tour in Iraq didn't go so well. He's gonna finish up training his latest batch of raw recruits, then he's gonna hit the high road. You've got Cory Hardrict playing Corporal Jason Lockett, whose brother was killed in that Iraq action mentioned above, so he has no love lost for SSgt. Nantz; and “Doc,” the platoon corpsman played by Adetokumboh M'Cormack. He's an African import who joined the Marines to help him get his Medical degree. The rest of the platoon is filled in with the usual assortment of New Yorkers, blacks, hispanics, etc., that make up the “filler class” of a typical Hollywoodland military unit. There are a couple of other interesting characters, mainly Michelle Rodriguez playing Air Force Tech Sergeant Elena Santos and Bridget Moynahan as Michele, and they round out the characters with the obligatory female roles.
The story is pretty simple and straightforward. Big meteors have splashed down off the coastlines of the Earth, and it turns out these aren't meteors, but alien invasion ships. We know this because they slow down before they splash down. Out of the ships come the aliens, who at first don't seem to have any air cover, and this leads to a few mistakes by the humans fighting them. As it turns out, the aliens do have this covered, and it becomes a serious problem.
Sergeant Nantz's group is tasked with getting to a West LA police station and rescuing some civilians. The first part of the battle is their trip to the cop shop, and the bulk of the flick is their trip back and the serious trials and tribulations that they must endure in order to get the civilians (and themselves) back in one piece. Along the way, the platoon nearly mutinies on Nantz, who ends up proving himself to his men by being one mean S.O.B. who will do nearly anything to make sure the mission succeeds. Time and time again, Nantz puts himself in harm's way, and eventually, he wins over his men, and maybe, just maybe, he will manage to succeed at his mission and coincidentally, save Los Angeles in the process. Do you think he can do it?
As I said, “Battle: Los Angeles” is a tried and true action flick that goes to the max. If this is your style of flick, you're going to enjoy it a lot. If you don't like war flicks, then I doubt it will win you over, but overall, this is a very good way to spend a couple of hours on a rainy summer night.
Mikey Likes It!
116 mins
Rated PG-13 for sustained and intense sequences of war violence and destruction, and for language
Article by: Mr. Mikey
posted:31 Jan 2012
Related Link: http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/battlela/
“Battle: Los Angeles” is listed as a sci-fi movie, but don't let that tag fool you. This is a traditional hell bent for leather action flick that leaves nothing behind and truly puts the foot down. It's a rip-roaring tale, a typical war movie; it just so happens that the bad guys this time around aren't Japanese or Nazis or Iraqis, they're aliens coming on down to grab our water, since, as a TV personality in the flick intones, “Earth is the only known planet where water lies on the surface in liquid form.”
The movie starts out a scant 24 hours before the bad guys drop in on us, and we are quickly introduced to the main Marine Corps characters. Two or three are really all you need to know about here: Staff Sergeant Nantz, played winningly and grimly by Aaron Eckhart, is a twenty-year vet who's about to retire, because his last tour in Iraq didn't go so well. He's gonna finish up training his latest batch of raw recruits, then he's gonna hit the high road. You've got Cory Hardrict playing Corporal Jason Lockett, whose brother was killed in that Iraq action mentioned above, so he has no love lost for SSgt. Nantz; and “Doc,” the platoon corpsman played by Adetokumboh M'Cormack. He's an African import who joined the Marines to help him get his Medical degree. The rest of the platoon is filled in with the usual assortment of New Yorkers, blacks, hispanics, etc., that make up the “filler class” of a typical Hollywoodland military unit. There are a couple of other interesting characters, mainly Michelle Rodriguez playing Air Force Tech Sergeant Elena Santos and Bridget Moynahan as Michele, and they round out the characters with the obligatory female roles.
The story is pretty simple and straightforward. Big meteors have splashed down off the coastlines of the Earth, and it turns out these aren't meteors, but alien invasion ships. We know this because they slow down before they splash down. Out of the ships come the aliens, who at first don't seem to have any air cover, and this leads to a few mistakes by the humans fighting them. As it turns out, the aliens do have this covered, and it becomes a serious problem.
Sergeant Nantz's group is tasked with getting to a West LA police station and rescuing some civilians. The first part of the battle is their trip to the cop shop, and the bulk of the flick is their trip back and the serious trials and tribulations that they must endure in order to get the civilians (and themselves) back in one piece. Along the way, the platoon nearly mutinies on Nantz, who ends up proving himself to his men by being one mean S.O.B. who will do nearly anything to make sure the mission succeeds. Time and time again, Nantz puts himself in harm's way, and eventually, he wins over his men, and maybe, just maybe, he will manage to succeed at his mission and coincidentally, save Los Angeles in the process. Do you think he can do it?
As I said, “Battle: Los Angeles” is a tried and true action flick that goes to the max. If this is your style of flick, you're going to enjoy it a lot. If you don't like war flicks, then I doubt it will win you over, but overall, this is a very good way to spend a couple of hours on a rainy summer night.
Mikey Likes It!
116 mins
Rated PG-13 for sustained and intense sequences of war violence and destruction, and for language
Article by: Mr. Mikey
posted:31 Jan 2012
Related Link: http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/battlela/
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