What makes war films so great? It isn’t just their depiction of various battles, instead it is about humanity and how that humanity is both present and missing from the war. War films can be categorized as action-driven dramatic ensemble pieces. There’s a lot of action present, but because of our personal involvement with the soldiers the action scenes take a greater meaning. Now instead of just admiring how cool the action scenes are, you worry for the characters you like and hope that they will all survive at the end. War places our lives at risk and it is during that time that who we really are, what we really value and what we love comes out. Now take all that and put aliens in it, and you have Battle: Los Angeles.

In the wake of a systematic global attack on every nation’s most important coast cities, the human race faces its most threatening enemy: aliens. As the aliens forces attack and annihilate various cities, we are taken to the Battle in Los Angeles where the US Marines attempt to rescues survivors and destroy the aliens. Lt. Martinez (Ramon Rodriguez), his second command SSgt. Nantz (Aaron Eckhart) and their squad are sent to rescue some civilians trapper in a police station near the coast. As they soon find out, they have almost no chance against an enemy who is far more advanced than they are.

At the beginning of the film where the Marines are being briefed on the situation of the war, I had a bit of trouble trying to look pass the ridiculousness of their situation. You quickly have to let go of that kind of mindset, let the film take you and that way you’ll fully enjoy the experience. Even by doing that, I had a few problems with how generic some parts of the film were. The things that happen here with the character is everything you would expect from a war film: conflict between members of the squad, a civilian who has a hero moments and saves a marine, a compelling speech from the marines leader, etc. The moments of character development and conflict are the moments where the film loses strength. Thankfully though, the actors involve manage to elevate those moments and breath truthfulness to the at times generic dialogue.

As you might’ve guessed, the film strength lie in the various action pieces. Battle: Los Angeles is an amazing work of action, every time the Marines are attacked by the aliens things get gritty and awesome. Even though you can sort of tell which marines will die, you still care for them and feel somewhat sad when they do die. Like I said before, thanks to the investment we have with the character we really care about them and want them to survive. However and I know this going to sound a bit morbid, the way the aliens attacked and killed the marines was so cool that I kinda wanted most of the marines to die. Yes that’s very insensitive, but what can I say? More Marines deaths meant more wickedly awesome action scenes. Also, the scope of this film is awe-inspiring. I really hope it becomes a box-office hit.

Battle: Los Angeles will by no means be one anyones best of the year list, but it is nonetheless the quintessential summer film. And when summer films are done right they work perfectly. The action is amazing, the special effects are even more amazing, there’s a lot of funny and dramatic moments that will both make you laugh and get all teary eyed. Battle: Los Angeles is easily the coolest most badass film of the year so far.

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