Battle: Los Angeles

Battle: Los Angeles is an example of a film where its creators have clearly lied in interviews, where they said that they had created an original movie in which the traditional alien invasion movie meets gritty realism. These claims seem to be about an entirely different film, as Battle: Los Angeles is devoid of all originality.

Admittedly, in this picture, no big monuments explode, but apart from this break from the past, the production team seem to have attempted – with great success – to include every other applicable cliché, and at times moves into self-parody; cue ridiculously gung-ho soldiers, unimaginative action scenes, and a screenplay freshly regurgitated from other, better, films, even at times spouting dialogue that comes extremely close to stealing direct quotes. In terms of characters, it is not much better; Aaron Eckhart, for example, plays the old grizzled sergeant looking for redemption, leading a squad of assorted cannon fodder, all of whom have some laughably pathetic attempt at characterisation that are to be honest quite amusing and get even more so when they bump into a bunch of rather foolish civilians. The film therefore never achieves any tension, as it is hard care for this bunch of cardboard cut-out heroes, resulting in the audience instead looking forward to the next embarrassing line of dialogue, or explosion, and, of course, the film’s inevitable entry into the genre’s ongoing noblest death competition (which it handles rather well), rather than creating the slightest shred of tension or drama.

The thing is, though, that none of these moments are handled particularly badly meaning that, once you appreciate that this is nothing more or less than a by-the-numbers alien invasion movie to be watched with your brain switched off and a large bucket of popcorn, then essentially you’re fine. In comparison to likes of last year’s 'Clash of the Titans or Michael Bay’s Transformers franchise, it is never anywhere close to being so nauseatingly loud and incompetent. It also does not have the same editing problems, meaning the action moves at the right pace and so what’s going on is actually visible making the numerous shootouts, if uninspired, perfectly watchable and enjoyable. Other technical aspects leave room for improvement such as Jonathan Liebesman’s direction, which marks a vast improvement in mainstream fare after the abysmal Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, which of course says very little, whilst the alien design feels uninspired and, despite the title, the one attempt at creating a sense of place is a song in the soundtrack about joys of California at the beginning that simply does not work.

Even if it does not have an original bone in its body (whatever its makers may say in interviews), Battle: Los Angeles is a passable piece of mindless entertainment, and while it should not be classified as a good film, it is a perfectly enjoyable piece of cheesy alien shooting fun.

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