Starring: Jovan Adepo, Wyatt Russell, Mathilde Ollivier, John Magaro, Gianny Taufer, Pilou Asbæk, Bokeem Woodbine

Directed by Julius Avery

Paramount, out now

When a WWII company is brought down by enemy fire over Nazi-occupied France, the mission remains unaltered: destroy the comms tower so that the Allied forces can advance. But there’s something evil going on beneath the surface that could turn the tide of the war in the Nazis’ favour.

There’s something deliciously trashy and B-movie about Julius Avery’s gory war/horror movie hybrid that’s presented by J J Abrams’ Bad Robot company. I really didn’t think they made films like this any more, let alone give them major cinema releases, and yet here we are. For the first 40 minutes or so it’s all Saving Private Ryan as the survivors take refuge in the bombed village, plotting how to defeat the oppressors, but then the screaming starts.

Jovan Adepo (The Leftovers) is our everyman, Boyce, with Wyatt Russell (Black Mirror) as his superior, Ford. As with From Dusk ’Til Dawn, which suddenly switches genre mid-movie, Overlord becomes a sub-hybrid of mad scientist/ Frankenstein/ Nazi experiment flicks, and that’s where Billy Ray and Mark L Smith’s screenplay really takes off. Pilou Asbæk (the pirate Greyjoy in Game of Thrones) has great fun as big bad Wafner, and if you think he’s a badass while he’s still alive…

The knowing quips and resurrection of well-trodden genre conventions are an affectionate throwback to the time when this was standard video shop fodder, enriched with buckets of the scarlet stuff and cracking limbs. It’s another of those rarer 18 certificate horror movies, no doubt earned by a brutal head crushing, multiple stabs and other close combat. Of special note is Mathilde Olivier as final girl (well, she’s the only girl) Chloe, fighting to save her young brother. She’s no damsel waiting to be saved – she’s wielding a flame thrower!

The extras are okay but not much beyond the sort of Electronic Press Kit that would have been assembled a couple of decades ago (although to be fair, that’s appropriate). The transfer of the movie itself though is what you’re after – and it still looks good on the small screen. Hopefully the temptation to produce a sequel will be resisted.

Verdict: Slaying Private Ryan – this is an unashamed old school horror movie that wears its zombified heart on its sleeve. Total nonsense for sure, with a foot in the video nasty camp, but with a glee and budget to carry off its crazed ambitions. A guilty pleasure and a reminder that horror movies don’t all have to be franchise sequels with telegraphed jump scares. 8/10

Nick Joy

 

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