Battle Force

To be fair, I watched only the first 20 minutes of this movie, so my comments are only based on that. I might have hung around if WWII Sicily's "landscape" wasn't so easily recognizable as that of Southern California. I gave up hope when several shots showed the film's characters walking along railroad tracks on top of modern concrete ties with modern signals in the background.

I get the feeling this movie was a film school project. And if it was, then I guess it's OK for that purpose. If not, at least it was a good opportunity for inexperienced actors to put something in their blank resumes.

The combat special effects were OK... enough has been said by others regarding the realism of the combat itself, but I thought the special effects used for weapons discharge and bullet flight was OK... more realistic than those we used to see 15-20 years ago. That earned this movie its 3rd star.

I watched it through to the end. That's something. Especially since, in the opening scene, American GIs are firing bolt-action rifles as though they were M-1 semi-automatics, never once working the bolt. As the movie shows, they HAD at least one old Garand on set, that they could have used in that scene accurately, but no. The script delivered a sprinkling of facts about the First Special Service Force, and then ladled on a ton of malarkey. I won't address the fact that the set looked the same no matter where anyone was supposed to be, thousands of miles apart, and others have rightly criticized defects in costuming, weaponry, etc. I'll only say that, when the main Nazi bad guy stands TWICE out in the open, once marvelously silhouetted by the skyline, at, for the military, very close range, and highly trained commandos can't hit him, with an aimed Garand, a BAR, even the supernaturally accurate submachine guns, while your random, unaimed snap shots are taking out Germans who are firing from cover, well ... There are other, more egregious crimes against history, good movie making, and the laws of physics in this movie, but we'll leave it at that. The closing scene, I can say without spoiling the movie, was particularly wrong headed. Having read three books about the FSSF, I can say that anyone with a smattering of that information could have crafted a screenplay better than what was served up, with the same guns, costumes, and characters, and made a decent movie out of it, since their ACTUAL exploits still rate as fantastic, without exaggeration, to this day.

Piracy the scourge of the industry? Hmm, and yet with piracy supposedly on the increase, the industry is making more profits than ever. Bigger and bigger profits, whilst agonising that piracy is killing employment. Big profits and yet jobs still have to go? Anyone spot the deliberate mistake?

It's a mistake that supposedly leads the film and music industries to try so hard to smash the internet completely, on the basis that we are all pirates, liars and thieves and would never ever pay for anything - even if it was worth it! But so much produce of Hollywood and the music industry is dross polished up and advertised as gold - which in my books is genuine fraud - so who are actually the pirates?

I never object to paying good money for a good movie. I don't think many people do at all. But a turd polished up to sparkle is still a turd, even if you sell it as gold - "Look at the shine! Don't look behind the sparkle!"

Of course, the real mistake is thinking that people would actually pay for a ticket to buy this dross if only they hadn't been able to download it. I wouldn't have paid 5p to watch this (a friend treated me - and I didn't contribute) as it's basically a Sunday afternoon TV movie, to watch after you eaten too much lunch and consequently can't be arsed to change the channel even though you have the remote in hand.

Thanks for making snooze material Hollywood, I won't demand a refund of my 90 minutes of life, as I actually enjoyed the nap, but never assume that I will buy a ticket to support mediocrity. I get that free from the television. So count me out of your statistics.

As for this film, my opinion is zzzzzzzz

One of the worst war films I've seen. The low budget certainly doesn't justify the film being filled with errors. Many films use a low budget to enhance psychological depth or other aspects that can be explored even without money.

The errors are numerous, right from the beginning, making this a difficult film to watch until the end. Mistakes in setting, errors in uniforms, historical inaccuracies. The dialogues are truly poor and unprofessional, clearly lacking an expert on World War II military themes in the production. The actors are not very credible, if not entirely unbelievable. When I rate a film, I usually start from 10 and then deduct points based on aspects that I find poorly executed. It's difficult for me to give a score below 6 because I always recognize the value and effort behind the production of a film. In this case, I had to start from 6 because from the very first frames, the low cinematic quality of the production is evident. I've seen films made by amateur reenactors that were better done and even with even fewer resources than this.

A special forces group fighting against odds on a suicidal mission. So much to the story, which is a workable plot. Equipment, at least on the Allied side, looks authentic. Individual acting is not bad, sometimes above average, maybe even too slick at points. The Nazi officer is overdrawn. The problem is the lack of combat feel. Some of the worst shootings in movie history. Special forces not able to aim, the Germans not doing any better. Tactics, group movement, avoiding ambushes (if there were any)...forget it. Surprisingly good close and knife combat between the LT and an Italian guy. A few minutes later, surprisingly underwhelming close combat between the LT and some other guy (saving the spoiler). The amusing thing is, the movie is not the typical B class movie that needs 30 seconds to quit, but is entertaining in its own way, with its mix of setting and dialogue, esp. with the Missouri GI. 70% watchable, the rest is running around and shooting...and missing.