For the past few years, J.J. Abrams has become one of the most prominent filmmakers in the industry. As a director, he played a major role in reviving not one, not two, but three incredibly prominent franchises through his work on 2006’s Mission Impossible III, 2009’s Star Trek, and 2015’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens. And after that, he then proceeded to get further involved with each franchise as a producer, paving the way for incredibly strong outings like Mission Impossible – Fallout, Star Trek Beyond, and Star Wars: The Last Jedi. But, of course, this isn’t all that J.J.’s known for as a producer, as easily the most notable franchise to come from his own production company, Bad Robot, has been the Cloverfield series. What started as the titular 2008 found footage monster film directed by Matt Reeves ended up spawning a new anthology series where the films were connected more by their narratives than their genre. Things got off to a great start with 2016’s 10 Cloverfield Lane, but then the franchise admittedly stumbled a bit this year with the Netflix-released The Cloverfield Paradox. And if you’re wondering, the only reason why I’m bringing up Cloverfield right now is because today’s film, Overlord, was initially reported as being the fourth installment of this steadily growing franchise. However, J.J. Abrams would later state that the film ultimately wasn’t going to be tied to Cloverfield. Instead, Overlord, directed by Australian filmmaker Julius Avery, is its own thing; a stylish, well-made World War II-era horror film featuring zombies… and not just any zombies, Nazi zombies!
It is December 5th, 1944, just a few hours before the Allies are set to land on the beaches of Normandy and begin their liberation of German-occupied France in what would become known as D-Day. In the skies above, a squad of paratroopers is tasked with destroying a radio tower in a nearby village to aid the incoming troops. However, their plane ends up getting shot down and only a few of the troopers end up surviving the crash; seasoned veteran Corporal Ford (Wyatt Russell), Private Ed Boyce (Jovan Adepo), sniper Tibbet (John Magaro), and photographer Chase (Iain De Caestecker). Now stuck behind enemy lines, the quartet find themselves under immense time pressure to destroy the radio tower before their fellow troops land on the beach, a task that quickly becomes even more daunting given that they’re just four men against a sizable Nazi army. However, as they soon find out, that’s not the only issue that they have to deal with. When Boyce ends up getting stuck inside the Nazi base where the tower is located, he is shocked to find a series of experiments utilizing dead bodies. These experiments come to fruition with a special serum that, although managing to revive the dead, ends up turning them into terrifying creatures with inhuman strength. Now facing a threat that’s unlike anything they’ve ever seen before, the paratroopers, with the help of a local woman named Chloe (Mathilde Ollivier), must now ensure that these horrifying trials never see the light of day.
Now to answer your first question… no, this is NOT a Cloverfield film. Obviously, one of the most prominent aspects of films (and TV shows, for that matter) that are produced by J.J. Abrams is that their marketing campaigns make a considerable effort to be light on spoilers. Granted, this hasn’t always worked for them (e.g. the fiasco of the Khan twist in Star Trek Into Darkness), but I’d say that this ‘mystery box’ tactic does do its job at keeping audiences guessing. But in the case of Overlord, J.J.’s claim that the film wouldn’t be tied to the Cloverfield franchise is 100% accurate, thus allowing it to be its own entity. Plus, it also manages to be two films in one given its premise. As it starts, it fully succeeds at sucking you into its war-time setting, partially because the opening sequence where the paratroopers’ plane gets shot down is a figurative and literal explosion of audio and visuals, easily making it one of the most intense openings to any film in recent years. After that, the film works quite well as a small-scaled war film, hitting just the right notes in terms of setting up the main conflict and the primary characters who get involved in it. The same can be said for how it gradually builds up its plot to get to the big reveal of the Nazi experiments that turn its unwilling subjects into zombie-like creatures. However, the zombie element of this story isn’t as prominent as the marketing implies. Sure, it’s there, thus paving the way for plenty of gory moments to satisfy fans of the genre, but on a whole, it plays more of a secondary role in the plot. In other words, this is still primarily a war film at the end of the day, but one with the added element of the undead.
Unlike some war films, Overlord only focuses on a small cast of characters instead of a wider ensemble. But while this does prevent a situation where you end up forgetting who’s who, the film is still quite light on character development. Every main character in this film is a typical archetypal protagonist that one would usually see in a war film. There’s the ‘audience avatar’ who’s set up as being so innocent that he wouldn’t hurt a mouse (literally), the hardened veteran who stresses that things be done by the book, the inexperienced soldier who’s clearly out of his depth, the wise-ass who’s there for comic relief, etc. Despite this, though, this film’s cast of generally rising stars do a solid job with the limited material that they’re given. Most of the film sees us following Pvt. Boyce and Cpl. Ford, and Jovan Adepo and Wyatt Russell do a nice job when it comes to conveying how these two serve as foils for each other given their vastly different ideologies. To back them up, there are also solid performances from John Magaro and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Iain de Caestecker as Tibbet and Chase, respectively, and newcomer Mathilde Ollivier as the film’s main female lead Chloe. As for the villains, they too are simply characterized, but there is one major standout in Pilou Asbæk as Captain Wafner, a truly sinister Nazi commander who frequently crosses paths with the paratroopers. Asbæk very much channels Christoph Waltz’s iconic performance as Colonel Hans Landa (AKA ‘the Jew Hunter’) in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds here, resulting in a highly intimidating antagonist.
Over the past few months, I’ve covered quite a few horror films and have repeatedly mentioned what I feel is one of the most important elements to a great horror film, creating characters that we truly care about as they deal with all sorts of horrific obstacles. That doesn’t really apply to Overlord, though, because while this film does sport a good cast, the character development beats that they’re given are as basic as you can get for a film like this. But to be fair, you don’t always need to have fully sympathetic characters to be a great horror film, and Overlord ultimately manages to succeed despite this shortcoming because of how well-made it is. For what is only his second directorial feature ever, director Julius Avery crafts a highly engaging thriller with a solid visual style that works as both a war film (thanks in large part to its incredible opening sequence) and a zombie film. Granted, the zombie element of this film isn’t as prominent as one might think given the marketing, but there are just enough practical zombie effects in this to satisfy fans who’ve witnessed the likes of George A. Romero’s Dead films. And while I’ll openly admit that part of me would’ve been genuinely interested in seeing what this film would’ve been like had it been tied to the Cloverfield franchise, it’s nice that it ultimately wasn’t. Because of this, Overlord is a very entertaining war film with horror elements that serves as another shining example of the high quality of films produced by Bad Robot Productions.
Rating: 4/5
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