Story: "Follows five battle-hardened American soldiers assigned to hold a French Chateau near the end of World War II. Formerly occupied by the Nazi high command, this unexpected respite quickly descends into madness when they encounter a supernatural enemy far more terrifying than anything seen on the battlefield."
I've been waiting over a year for this one. One of my most anticipated movies so far. I wasn't expecting this to be American Beauty when I saw the trailer but damn if I wasn't expecting this to be so terrible. I admire what the director was trying to do though even if he didn't execute properly. To me, a reveal in the final act completely destroyed what had come before. Not totally unexpected but silly.
I can finally understand why this one took so long to come out.
The cast does what they can with paper thin characters that don't really have much to do. Specially Alan Ritchson (Smallville) who's totally wasted and has about 10 minute screentime tops. Brenton Thwaites (from Oculus & the main reason I wanted to see this because the guy is gorgeous) doesn't even feel like the lead. Skylar Astin (Pitch Perfect) & Theo Rossi (Luke Cage) make for solid eye candy (at best) but it is Kyle Gallner (The Haunting In Connecticut) who steals the show (in a way) with him being the more interesting of the bunch.
For the better half I was very invested in the ghost story taking place in WWII with Nazis. I liked the mix of ghost horror with war drama and for the most part it was done properly even if not very original. Some jump scares got to me (even if these ghosts had crappy cgi) and I liked the setting in a French Chateau.
* SPOILERS *
There's a sequence where a group of Nazis enter the Chateau and get picked off by ghosts with bad cgi and I think that's the best part this film has to offer.
As the mystery unfolded I was glued to the screen right until the final act which betrayed the whole thing in my opinion. I guess the twist is somewhat unique even if it comes at a bad time and feels completely out of context. I have not been this angry with a movie twist. Completely ruined the whole affair. But I admire what Eric Bress (The Butterfly Effect) was trying to do. He wanted to bring something different to the subgenre. I'm not gonna say anything about said twist because maybe you'd enjoy it more than I did.
At the end of the day Ghosts Of War is not a complete disaster but leaves a bad taste in your mouth. You can do so much worse (like The Chilling Adventures Of Sabrina for example).
Watch the trailer:
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