Onslaught will be released in theaters on September 4.
Onslaught is an apt title for Adam Wingard’s continuation of the world the director established early in his career through You’re Next and The Guest, because it just never lets up. The platonic ideal of a “midnight movie,” Onslaught serves up heaping helpings of gruesome action, witty dialogue, Nazi experimentation, pro-veteran and anti-government sentiment, and three militarized Michael Myers figures hunting a community of unsuspecting trailer park residents. If all that sounds distasteful and exhausting to you, the rest of this review is not for you: you’re a lost cause and I invite you to go back to watching paint dry or whatever it is you do with your free time. For those with a taste for debaucherous mayhem in your cinema, pure and crazy… Onslaught, baby!
Over 92 rocket-powered minutes, Onslaught follows the classic “survive the night” story structure with a simple premise which Wingard imbues with all manner of schlocky adornment. At base level, Onslaught is about a trio of super-soldier experimentation subjects programmed to kill anyone in their path escaping containment and fulfilling their purpose in the desert community of Moriarty, New Mexico – the very same town at the heart of 2014’s The Guest. Onslaught finds a no-bullshit hero in Celeste (Adria Arjona), a veteran sniper struggling with PTSD and motherhood as she seeks peace at the Windy Oasis Trailer Park, where most of the movie’s back-half takes place. Celeste is quick to anger, but at least adept at directing those feelings in a constructive direction once the super-soldiers lay siege to her home. Across quiet character moments and very loud, raging action beats, Arjona carries the movie beautifully and it’s consistently fun watching her settle so easily into the action hero persona. Sarah Connor would be very proud.
With their painted faces, tactical gear and glowing eyes, the imposing trio driving Onslaught’s anarchy look like bosses that walked right out of Call of Duty’s Zombies mode. Even though they have cool codenames – The Crybaby, The Cockroach, The Butcher – there’s no discernable or relevant differences between the three once things go off the deep end. Since the action taking place at the trailer park is so narrowly focused, this is of little detriment to Onslaught, giving the characters multiple tough-to-beat foes to have to work their way through and allowing Wingard to stage cat-and-mouse games that start off especially chaotic when the trio is at full strength, and become more dread-inducing as the odds start to shift away from the trio of elite soldiers. Wingard does overplay his hand late in the game by attempting to use one of the super-soldiers as a thematic exclamation point long after Onslaught needs any more depths to plumb.
It’s the fringes of Onslaught’s idiosyncratic world that really make you lean forward. Wingard’s The Guest and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire collaborator Dan Stevens returns here as Dr. Kammler, a third-generation Nazi scientist with a penchant for white cloaks and being dominated by his wife, Frau Kammler (Rebecca Hall). Kammler can hardly contain his sensual glee at being on the precipice of delivering the Übermensch through his experimentations at a secret government base not far from the trailer park. Stevens is always at his most interesting playing weirdos, and here, he swings for the campy fences and knocks one out of the park.
Onslaught could have used more of Stevens’ off-beat performance to really shore up the “clean-up” efforts of the shadowy organization that produced the super-soldiers, but some of that sting is lessened by the other performers who shoulder that responsibility more as the story goes. Cyrus (Drew Starkey) is deployed to monitor the soldiers’ attack on the trailer park, and from the moment we meet him zonked out of his mind in a sex mansion, he manages to walk a fun tonal line of being both in over his head and completely in control at the same time. His most interesting material comes in his interactions with Frau Kammler, who winds up being one of Onslaught’s more interesting and enigmatic figures. The power dynamic between the elderly, milky-eyed Doctor Kammler and the much-younger Frau Kammler is intriguing to try and suss out, and only becomes more perplexing as Frau Kammler and Cyrus work with each other to maintain some level of operational control over the situation at the trailer park. Where Stevens aims for broad camp in his performance, Hall is much more restrained and lends Onslaught a lot of gravity.
Wingard’s most interesting thematic work comes through how this pack of freaks, whose aggression and sadomasochistic relationships with the intent to control are easily transposable onto any number of current events, something Onslaught crystallizes in its opening montage, which tracks the American government’s relationship to global war over the last 40 years.
Celeste isn’t alone in her fight against the test subjects, and the supporting cast at the trailer park counter the bizarre team of villains with down-home charm and no shortage of one-liners. Celeste’s main ally is Josiah (Reginald VelJohnson), himself a Vietnam War vet who, despite his ferocity and bravery once things go down, is quite gentle with Celeste as a mentor figure. That, of course, doesn’t stop VelJohnson from putting his Die Hard legacy to excellent use as a quip machine and sharpshooter in the fight against the soldiers.
Wingard also throws Eric Wareheim, he of Tim and Eric fame, into the mix as Kovacks, a sloppy Moriarty cop who knows nothing of either ferocity or bravery. Onslaught has no shortage of dark comedic energy, but Wareheim’s rhythm and ineptitude are always welcome and work well to cut especially tense moments. Celeste’s sharp edges are also well-rounded off by Daisy, her young daughter whose wealthy dad picks the worst weekend possible to dump her with mom. Daisy clearly spends most of her time in more civilized company, calling Celeste “ma’am” and doing chores around the house without being asked. Blake Kennedy, the young actor who plays Daisy, is a breath of fresh air and strikes the rare balance of naturalism and precociousness that never crosses the line into interminable “kid acting.” Daisy feels like a real, good egg and any time she’s in danger, it’s impossible not to care a little more about what’s going on, especially during one sequence where she has a real close call after being separated from Celeste.
Onslaught looks and sounds great, too. Oren Soffer’s cinematography does a fantastic job of highlighting the austere natural beauty of the Moriarty, New Mexico, setting, with blazing flames, kicked-up dust, and the warm glow of the trailer park’s lights giving the action a gritty, dirty feel that works to make that setting feel more real and not just gritty for gritty’s sake. Wingard lets the supernatural strength and resilience of the super-soldiers speak for itself, resisting the urge to get overly stylistic with how he stages the action and instead covering skirmishes with a more classical, straightforward approach that reinforces its ’80s action lineage, and these efforts are supported by a clear preference towards practical special effects throughout. Matt Pusti’s synthy score gives Onslaught a pulsing energy that really underlines the clear John Carpenter influence that Wingard is celebrating here, with simple repeating melodies that especially evoke two of Carpenter and Alan Howarth’s greatest scores: Escape from New York and Prince of Darkness.
feedzy_import_tag
About the Author
