Onslaught Review: It Never Quite Comes Together.
Image Courtesy of A24.
With the amount of things available for people to watch these days, I try to be as intentional as possible when deciding what I choose to give my time to. Onslaught, on the other hand, is one of those films I just decided to go see on a whim. I didn’t watch any trailers, didn’t read a synopsis, and I didn’t even know who was starring in the film. But I know A24 has a fairly strong reputation when it comes to the movies they put out, so I wasn’t too scared to go in completely blind.
According to Wikipedia, Onslaught is described as an action-horror film, and I can kind of see why. The movie opens with a pretty bizarre montage referencing things like Operation Paperclip and MKUltra, along with imagery of a Nazi eagle morphing into the Great Eagle of the United States. It’s an odd way to start the film, to say the least, but it does give you an early idea of the kind of exaggerated and chaotic tone the movie is going for.
Then there are the antagonists themselves. The violence surrounding these characters gets incredibly intense, and I could definitely see some viewers being horrified by just how brutal things become. That being said, I wouldn’t necessarily call Onslaught scary. At least for me, the horror comes more from its imagery, violence, and overall weirdness than any real attempt to frighten you.
Let’s get into this review.
Image Courtesy of A24.
Onslaught follows a U.S. Army veteran named Celeste, played by Adria Arjona, who now works as the manager of a trailer park. I’m not sure if I somehow missed something while watching, but I honestly didn’t feel like there was much of a plot here. The movie gives you just enough information to understand what’s happening, but beyond that, it feels pretty straightforward.
We’re initially introduced to a Nazi scientist named Dr. Hans Kammler, who has genetically modified a group of soldiers and essentially turned them into superhumans capable of causing an insane amount of chaos. As you can probably guess, things go horribly wrong, setting off the events that drive the rest of the movie.
The three soldiers — The Butcher, Crybaby, and The Cockroach — are easily the most exciting aspect of the film, but they also kind of highlight why Onslaught ultimately didn’t work for me. I was hoping for a little more substance, but it ended up feeling like mostly spectacle. They literally have no dialogue, which isn’t necessarily a problem. If anything, it helps make their presence feel even more intimidating and unpredictable. The issue is that there isn’t much beneath that surface, so after a while, their actions start to feel a little meaningless.
The movie also suffers from something I’ve noticed in plenty of other stories. I can never understand why characters are built up to be almost impossibly powerful, only for the movie to eventually deal with them in ways that feel surprisingly trivial. It takes away some of the threat they spent so much time establishing in the first place.
Image Courtesy of A24.
The performances in Onslaught are all pretty serviceable, with Adria Arjona doing well as Celeste with what she’s given. Again, though, nobody really gets the depth they deserve here, so I don’t feel like there’s a whole lot to say about the performances themselves. Reginald VelJohnson’s Josiah brings some warmth to the movie as Celeste’s fellow-veteran neighbour, while Eric Wareheim’s Kovacks is mainly there for comic relief and gets a few funny moments out of the wildness. They add some personality to the film, but like most of the characters, there just isn’t enough done with them for me to become particularly invested.
Honestly, a lot of it felt like the movie was holding back certain story and character elements for a sequel, and Drew Starkey’s Cyrus is probably the biggest example of that for me. He’s introduced into the story in, let’s say, a pretty intriguing way, so I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t expecting him to pop off at some point. The way he was introduced made me think he would eventually play a much bigger role, whether that meant taking down the super soldiers or at least assisting in some meaningful way.
Instead, he spends most of the movie feeling like he’s constantly one step behind everything that’s happening. Maybe I missed something with that aspect of his character, but considering how much attention was placed on his introduction, I was surprised by how little payoff there ultimately was.
Image Courtesy of A24.
All in all, Onslaught was just an okay experience for me. There are definitely moments where the action, violence and sheer intensity of the super soldiers make for an entertaining watch, but I kept waiting for the movie to give me something more to latch onto beyond the spectacle.
If you’re not looking for a heavy plot and just want to watch some cool action sequences with plenty of brutal violence thrown in, I could definitely see Onslaught working better for you. For me, though, the lack of depth surrounding its characters and story made it difficult to really care about much of what was happening.
I had fun with certain moments while they were happening, but once the credits rolled, there just wasn’t much that stayed with me. Onslaught has the spectacle, but I wish there was a little more substance behind it.
