Battle: Los Angeles (2011) Dir: Jonathan Liebesman

An alien invasion movie directed by the man that brought us the shambolic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning has got to be a load of old cobblers, right?
Wrong.
The plot: It's 5 months into the future, and mysterious meteors suddenly appear approaching Earth. Astronomers are baffled and bewildered, particularly when they determine that the meteors are due to strike the Earth just off the coastline of most major cities around the globe. The military are mobilised and are equally mystified when it is demonstrated that the meteors, rather than plunging into the ocean at terminal velocity, are actually slowing up right before they hit the water.
With defences set to high alert, the front line soldiers are torn asunder by ruthless alien adversaries emerging from the sea, the strikes simultaneous and strategically co-ordinated.
Quickly it becomes clear: The world is at war.
With the first wave decimated, we follow a unit of Marines with a two fold mission.
1: Shore up defences a couple of miles inland in Santa Monica.
2: Rescue the civilians holed-up in a West Los Angeles police station.
Outgunned, outmanned and quickly cut off from the rest of the defensive force, the question soon becomes not how many can they rescue, but how many of them will escape with their lives?
The director has been quoted as stating that he wanted to make a movie that was part Black Hawk Down, part alien invasion and, in every single regard, he succeeded.
The movie kicks straight into the action, and never really relents, save for the occasional mawkish interlude where we are reminded that 'soldiers have feelings too.'
The battle sequences are intense and relentless, perfectly crafted, the down at ground level directorial style plunging you right into the heat of warfare. In many ways, the movie reminded me of the First Person Shooter Kill Zone, the visceral nature of the carnage all absorbing.
There is the odd moment of chest thumping, Über-patriotic American guff, sure to annoy some European viewers, but it is tolerable and in keeping with the events on screen.
Pulse pumping, adrenaline fuelled and absolutely riveting form beginning to end, this is a straight tie here at Smell the Cult HQ for movie of the year with Black Swan.
Whilst critics will argue that it doesn't add anything particularly new story-wise to the genre, that would be radically missing the point. This is not about reinventing the wheel, rather about fine tuning it and, honestly, I don't think there is a movie quite like this out there, Cloverfield and Skyline notwithstanding.
For alien invasion movies, the bar has undeniably just been raised.
Outstanding.

5 out of 5

The Adjustment Bureau (2011) Dir: George Nolfi

Christ, this movie frustrated.
The plot: Matt Damon plays a politician running for office, quite successfully, until a college prank hits the media and his ratings take a nose dive. Preparing his runner up speech in the gents, he is surprised when a beautiful woman emerges from one of the cubicles and, quick as you can take your super-powered hat off, they are locked in a passionate kiss, before she vanishes from his life, apparently for good, with security hot on her heels. A chance meeting on the bus a little while later sets in motion a chain of events that will shatter his world, for their blossoming relationship has come to the attention of The Adjustment Bureau, a shadowy organisation, intent on keeping them apart.
But who are The Adjustment Bureau?
What do they want?
And why do they all look like characters out of a Raymond Chandler novel?
Based on a short by Philip K. Dick, this has all of the trappings of a classically cool paranoid sci-fi outing but, thrown in with the genre stuff, we have a weak as gerbil's piss romance between the two leads, a will they-won't they tug of love that would have embarrassed even Ross and Rachel.
Whilst the core sci-fi elements are great - doors used as portals, mind control, meddling with timelines - the huan interest angle sucks out the gravity so that at no point do you truly feel anyone is in any great peril, at no point do you even consider that our lovebirds won't end up together.
Too sentimental and syrupy for the nerd audience, too sci-fi for the sentimentalists, I suspect this will struggle to find a true fanbase. Sure, it will pull a few people in through Damon's presence alone, and the trailer is intriguing enough to get saps like me through the door (mainly as it doesn't hint at the freakin' love story aspect), this is being pitched as Bourne meets Inception and, trust me, this is way below the standard of either of those concepts.
Desperately average.

2 out of 5