Imagine a divorced, PTSD, Army sniper, living with her daughter in a trailer park, only to face a trio of Frankenstein-ish super soldiers, who flee a military facility to kill, kill, kill. This is the premise of Adam (Godzilla x Kong/You're Next/The Guest) Wingard's thunderous, IMAX offering, Onslaught.
Celeste is the downtrodden protagonist, played by Adria (Morbius/Man of Tomorrow) Arjona, and her daughter is Daisy, played Blake Kennedy. The larger-than-life (and death) leader of the mutated soldiers is the Butcher, played by Alex "Poatan" Periera, who's accompanied by Crybaby, played by Tyler Hall, and Cockroach, played by Dave Campbell. (They invoke an unrelenting, Jason/Michael/Leatherface trios-team dynamic.) Dan Stevens is their mad geneticist/creator, Dr. Hans Kammler (a grandson of a WWII, National Socialist honcho), whose wife, Rebecca Hall's Hanna, acts like a kinky Lady MacBeth/ersatz Eva Braun. Michael Biehn's Baylor adds to the mayhem as an enigmatic bureaucrat and is joined by Drew Starkey's Cyrus, a quirky, clean-up man; Reginal VelJohnson's Josiah, a resolute, Vietnam vet; Eric Wareheim's quarrelsome but decent Kovacks; and Jacob Scipio's Griffin, Celeste's steady-headed, ex-spouse. All in all, the ensemble is agreeable, even when disagreeable, making the over-the-top scenario feel grounded (more or less).
Simon Barrett's screenplay does right by the premise (bolstered by Wingard's Carpenter-esque, The Fog/Assault on Precinct 13-inspired emulations and offbeat, pop-song seasonings). The structure is tight and unpretentious, relying on a survivalist thread, which references George A. Romero's zombie flicks, plus the Jurassic, Terminator and Alien sagas.
In this respect, Celeste is reminiscent of Lori Cardille's Sarah Bowman from Day of the Dead, Scarlett Johansson's Zora Bennett from Jurassic World Rebirth, Linda Hamilton's Sarah Connor from the Terminator movies, and Sigourney Weaver's perennial Ellen Ripley of Alien fame.
Arjona's Celeste is also beautiful and even though she's never dolled up, she remains magnetic throughout the madness, which may diminish her character's gritty, heroic endeavors, but hey, in my book, glamour (even if bloodied up) is always welcome. If Arjona is there to resume a little, old-time, easy-on-the-eyes charm, I endorse the move a hundredfold. (I also suspect Arjona wouldn't appreciate the compliment, but that's another story for another time.)
On the arguable, negative end, Onslaught, is quite derivative, borrowing blaring nuggets from the Outpost franchise, Overlord, Shock Waves, Frankenstein's Army, They Saved Hitler's Brain and The Frozen Dead. It's Nazi horror, even if it bypasses the label, and like the aforementioned examples, the premise at least conveys evil's extremes, though all the while slanted like a Brightburn-ish Captain America redux or more so, The Winter Soldier. And then there's that obvious-as-hell Universal Soldier nod, joined by similar, conceptional elements evident in Haley HeavyMetal's Friday the 13th-meets-Blade Runner, fan feature, Neon Fear, and well, I could go on and on.
I don't know if early September was the best time for A24 to release this one. I think it would have secured a bigger audience closer to Halloween, but there's nothing wrong with it being an early-bird enticer to get audiences set for the autumnal chill. Besides, if one digs bullet-blasting, action-monster movies, this one should please, no matter the day, night, month or season.
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