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Battle of the Damned Blu-ray Review

     Actors: Dolph Lundgren, Melanie Zanetti, Matt Doran
  • Director: Christopher Hatton
  • Format: Blu-ray, NTSC, Widescreen
  • Language: English
  • Subtitles: English, Spanish
  • Dubbed: English
  • Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Rated: R
  • Studio: Starz / Anchor Bay
  • Release Date: February 18, 2014
  • Run Time: 89 minutes




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            I was actually surprised at how decent the effects were in Battle of the Damned, especially considering how ridiculous every other aspect of the film is. Dolph Lundgren is a far better actor than he gets credit for, especially being able to handle this material with a straight face. The only saving grace to Battle of the Damned beyond Lundgren’s weathered mug is the willingness to throw logic out the window when creating the script. An absurd addition of fighting robots to the story halfway through the film is inexplicable and strange enough to keep this from becoming just another low-budget zombie disaster.

     


            Lundgren plays a fairly generic role as Max Gatling, a former commando turned mercenary hired to enter a quarantined zone in Thailand to retrieve one woman from the zombie apocalypse. This mission costs Max all of his men, and even when he finds the girl he must still find a way out of the quarantined zombie zone. This is slightly more feasible when a small army of killer robots appear from Japan, ready to take Max’s orders in killing the zombies. This absurd twist is laughably fantastical, but this only further highlights how normal zombie apocalypse seems by comparison.

     

            The effects are halfway decent, including some of the zombie make-up and death sequences, but all of the digital alterations can’t help the poor acting. Only Lundgren remains halfway believable, and mostly does this by doing as little as possible in each scene. The other actors suffer, and none are helped by filmmaker Christopher Hatton’s dialogue or direction. The Blu-ray special features include a making-of featurette.

           

    Entertainment Value: 3/10

    Quality of Filmmaking: 3.5/10

    Historical Significance: 1/10

    Special Features: 3/10

     
     
     

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