QUEUE CLEANSING: Flight World War II (2015)

                “Flight World War II” is another direct to DVD feature from the folks at The Asylum studio.  The Asylum is noted for churning out low budget movies that feed the market for bad entertainment.  Netflix Instant has been a logical landing spot for many of its products.  Especially since we don’t have very many drive-in movie theaters any more. The Asylum movies need to be watched with a copious amount of alcohol and/or a suspension of normal brain functions.  If you do that, they can be enjoyable.

                “Flight World War II” has a sci-fi tinge to it.  A passenger plane passes through an electromagnetic storm and is transported back to 1940.  They arrive in the middle of a German bombing raid on St. Nazaire.  How do they figure this out?  There are two nerdy historians on board.  A movie that has heroic historians, spoiler alert: my grade will be prejudiced.  The two determine it is the famous raid on St. Nazaire which was in June, 1940.  (The Germans actually were bombing St. Nazaire at that time as it was part of the Dunkirk evacuation effort.)   This is despite the fact that those are clearly Me 262 jet fighters that are buzzing them. If you have even a rudimentary knowledge of WWII aerial warfare, you know that 1940 is too soon for jets, so what is going on here?  Is it the typical insulting the intelligence of the audience that you get with these types of flicks?  Actually my theory is the screenwriters are weaving a more tangled web.  They have to be jets in order to keep up with a passenger jet.  (Plus they look way cooler than propeller planes.)  But in order to justify jets in 1940 they have to transform the plot into an alternative history tale.  This is confirmed when the plane makes contact with Nigel the radio operator who informs them that Dunkirk was a disaster.  It looks like the Allies are going to lose the war.  Unless the plane can change history!

another movie where a historian is the hero -
how cliche!

                A passenger suggests they kill Hitler.  This would have made a better movie, but two soldiers on board point out that they could end up screwing up history.  Party poopers!  Meanwhile the plane undergoes a series of attacks by jets.  Luckily, the German pilots are unable to bring down the sitting duck.  They do manage to damage the landing gear so we can watch Hector the handyman fix it with a hammer.  The historians put their heads together and realize that the key to turning the war around is giving radar to the radarless British.  Nigel suggests they drop their radar set to a British patrol behind enemy lines in Germany.  Having no parachute, they use a poncho.  Nigel has it up and running in five minutes.  (If you are not on your fifth beer by now, I warned you.)  He is able to steer them to another vortex.

there's a sexy stewardess, of course

                Even heavy drinking does not make “Flight World War II” tolerable.  It is laughably ridiculous throughout.  This is sad because the movie lacks any planned humor.  It also lacks any real suspense.    I guess you have to admire the sincerity.  This does not help with the acting.  You never want to pair bad actors with sincerity.  The cast is less than stellar, as you would expect from a movie like this. Most of the passengers are on board as turbulence fodder (drink every time the plane is buffeted). Fortunately, the captain played by Fasan Tahur brings some gravitas to a stock role.  Like the acting, everything else is average.  This includes the CGI which consists primarily of faux Me 262s firing tracers. I have to give some credit for the twist of the alternative history.  Instead of having to worry about changing actual history, they have to find a way to change the history they are dealt.  However, by dangling an attempt to kill Hitler and then switching to simply dropping a radar set, the movie disappoints.  Imagine the laughs that the attempt on Hitler’s life would have produced!  When you are making a movie like this, go big!  You would think that would be the slogan of The Asylum.

 

GRADE  =  D

P.S.  Check out the poster.  Hilarious!  "Based on a true story" - yes, there was a World War II.  And why not Me 262s?

QUEUE CLEANSING: Ardennes Fury (2014)

                “Ardennes Fury” (also known as “Battle of the Ardennes: Fury”)  is a mockbuster.  If you don’t know what a “mockbuster” is, neither did I until I researched this movie.  A mockbuster is a movie that piggy-backs off a major release to either fool people into buying the wrong DVD or to offer less discerning viewers more (but vastly inferior) entertainment on the same subject.  In this case, the target was "Fury".  ”Ardennes Fury” was produced by The Asylum.  It is a studio that has a reputation for straight to DVD releases like “Titanic II”, “Transmorphers”, and another queue dust-gatherer entitled “Flight World War II”.   “Ardennes Fury” was directed, written, and co-edited by Joseph Lawson.  Don’t look for him at the Oscars anytime soon.

                We are dropped into the middle of a fire fight.  Other than the title, there is no reference to the Battle of the Bulge and there is no snow to be seen.  Although low budget, they did not spare on the blanks as the opposing sides hammer away at each other across a field.  No one shames themselves by going prone and there is a lot of firing from the hip.  It’s that kind of combat movie.  The plot centers on the crew of an M4 Sherman tank and a few infantry attached to it.  While the tank waits, a group of four led by Sgt. Lance Dawson (Tom Stedham) go off to rescue an orphanage after encountering Sister Claudette (Lauren Vera).  One of the men is black, which is another clue that the Lawson is not much of a history buff.  While the snowy Battle of the Ardennes did see the rushing of black soldiers into combat, they were still in segregated units and there is no implication that Sgt. Rose (Lawrence Garnell, Jr.) has been separated from his unit.  One of the four is a boat-rocker named C.K. (Bill Voorhies) who clashes with Sgt. Dawson about ass-risking. 

black sarge and white sarge

                The movie becomes something of a chase film as the group tangles with an evil German officer who is not above executing civilians and torturing prisoners (including a rather graphic fingernail removal).  While the men and their charges are on the run, the stationary tank is taking on a series of German tanks with never a miss and nary a scratch.  All of this is happening as the clock ticks towards Operation Ardennes Fury which is to be a massive aerial bombardment of the area.  (The moviemakers seem to have confused this massive bombardment with Operation Cobra of the Normandy Campaign).  The chase whittles down our pursued until the climactic knife fight between Sarge and the bad German.  Their charge is punctuated by a P-47 dropping a bomb between them.  C.K.s redemption arc is completed as the tank comes riding to the rescue.

                Now that I know what a mockbuster is, I will be more tolerant toward movies like “Ardennes Fury”.  It is what it is – a low budget rip-off.  But it is a war movie, it was “free” and streaming on Netflix, and it was entertaining in a low expectations sort of way.  The best c word for it is not cult, it’s cheesy.  The acting is amateurish, probably because the actors were amateurs (or should be).  Stedham does looked grizzled so he matches the sarge role, but his thespian skills are lacking.  The rest of the cast is game, but you get what you pay for.  They aren’t helped by dialogue written by someone who has watched too many 1940s B war movies.  Speaking of which, there are a number of classic clichés that the movie incorporates.  The mission changes for humanitarian reasons.  The small group caught behind enemy lines.  The redemption of the troublemaker.  The evil German pursuer.  It’s all very predictable and unrealistic.  This is tempered a bit by the fast pace.  The music also smacks of a thousand second rate war movies.  In fact, the only thing that separates it from a cheesy Old School war movie is the CGI.  Lawson uses computers to overcome his lack of resources.  Although he managed to score a WWII era tank and a few other vehicles, most of the armored combat involves CGI.  This includes the explosions.  I guess CGI does not work well for tank interiors, so Lawson films the crew as though the tank is a convertible!  A tank with a moonroof - nice option.  Where “Fury” could rightfully brag about its use of an authentic Tiger tank.  Lawson could include several using video-game like graphics.  I will not argue that the cinematography isn’t fake looking, but what do you expect from a movie with its budget.  As CGI improves, the future of war movies is bright.  The quality will improve and with companies like The Asylum so will the quantity.  I assume there will always be enough men who want to play soldier in front of a camera.

                With all that said, although I don’t regret I watched it and did go in expecting what I got, it still is truly a bad movie.  Watch it with a six pack and you’ll guffaw instead of giggle.

P.S.  When it comes to mockbusters, it's best not to trust the poster.  (see above)

GRADE  = D