Battle: Los Angeles

This is the more expensive aliens-invade-LA film from 2010/2011 (the other being Skyline); a gritty, urban military adventure shot from a grunt's POV. It takes a hackneyed sci-fi concept and heavily leans on Black Hawk Down as source material, and is seemingly also inspired by post-9/11 warfare in Iraq and Afhghanistan to transform familiar American terrain into a wartorn Fallujah City in the space of a few minutes courtesy of some gun-happy aliens. Unlike Skyline, the emphasis here is firmly on realism - a lot of sci-fi aspects (the aliens, their technology, the military's response) are played down and transferred into a modern-warfare framework to keep the film grounded in familiar terms for the viewer. And whilst this idea might make the film more realistic or believable, it unfortunately also makes it rather dull as far as alien invasion films go.

Where do I start? I'll start with what works in Battle: Los Angeles favour. It's very well directed, Jonathan Liebesman puts you right inside the action on the ground level. It's a highly unlikely premise that a war between humans and invading aliens would mostly take place via ground forces engaging in hand-to-hand combat (something acknowledged in films like Independence Day and Skyline) but it at least makes this film a little different from it's contemporaries. The overall experience gives the viewer a good sense of the scale on which this invasion has taken place.

The casting of Aaron Eckhart as the ageing staff sergeant also elevates the material, he demonstrates the difference a decent actor can make to a project like this by avoiding acting cliches and really inhabiting the character's skin.

I also enjoyed the film's subtext regarding a non-traditionalist view of how the military can and should work... in war films the sancrosanct nature of the chain of command is almost an unspoken rules, but here the military characters work more as a team, with two leader figures who work in co-operation. It's an anti-authoritarian model for success, with young inexperienced Lieutenant Martinez (Ramon Rodriguez) representing the official line of command and Staff Sergeant Nantz (Eckhart) offering leadership via his valued experience. The usual cliche is that these two will butt heads throughout the course of the film until they earn the respect of each other or they'll fight it out for a claim to leadership, but the film sidesteps all this to show them working together for the good of everyone.

The army itself is also portrayed as being concerned primarily with the lives of civillians - an interesting point often glossed over in war films due to the fact that American soldiers are trarely shown engaging in combat on their home soil. It's a fairly pro-military idea in that it demonstrates the way the army can be utilised as a force for preserving life, rather than a force that takes it away. Admittedly, it's also an idea that would be hard to get across in films where the enemy is every bit as human as the heroes.

Now, the bad points. The dialogue is cliched and unrealistic at times, with soldiers wisecracking in situations where the pressures of combat should demand less eloquence. Also, the post-9/11 gimmick of putting a battle on this nature on American soil quickly wears thin as the film grows monotonous. I mentioned in my review of Skyline that that film's aliens were often teamed up with bright blue light to 'hide the strings' and build suspense. Well, here the obfuscation of the enigmatic menace is achieved more diegetically with grainy surveillance footage and military night vision. This in itself would be fine, but it becomes anti-climactic when the aliens are revealed to be a bunch of skinny guys in nondescript battle-suits.

There are so many great designers out there who would jump at a chance to create an alien race for a big budget Hollywood film, so it's incredibly depressing and disappointing when the invaders in Battle: Los Angeles look like the goofy robots out of The Phantom Menace ("hit the nose!") They're also uninspiringly accompanied by that bog-standard warbling/clicking sound that seems to come with all post-Predator aliens too. Even their technology is ridiculously straight-forward. I couldn't get over how boring they were... they weren't scary or iconic in the slightest. It's like the designers had a mandate to make the aliens as forgettable as possible.

All that aside, I think my main criticism of this film would be that it feels very much like an X-Box game. You might like it if you're a fan of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare or just enjoy action-orientated war films, but as hard as Eckhart and Liebesman try, it just isn't very interesting.

DIRECTOR: Jonathan Liebesman
WRITER/SOURCE: Christopher Betolini
KEY ACTORS: Aaron Eckhart, Michelle Rodriguez, Ramon Rordriguez, Cory Hardrict, Will Rothhaar, Ne-Yo, Bridget Moynahan, Michael Pena.

RELATED TEXTS:
- Skyline, a film with an almost identical premise but executed completely differently (and on a fraction of the budget).
- Infamous low-budget film company The Asylum released Battle of Los Angeles at the same time as this film in order to capitalise on its release.
- For more alien invasion stuff, see Independence Day, The War of the Worlds (the 1950s version), The War of the Worlds (the 2000s version), Mars Attacks! and Battlefield Earth. Okay, maybe don't see Battlefield Earth.
- From a war film point of view, see Black Hawk Down, Saving Private Ryan, Full Metal Jacket and The Hurt Locker.