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OCCUPATION
Director: Luke Sparke Cast: Dan Ewing, Temuera Morrison, Stephany Jacobsen, Zachary Garred, Charles Terrier, Rhiannon Fish, Izzy Stevens, Trystan Go, Charles Mesure, Felix Williamson, Jacqueline McKenzie, Aaron Jeffery MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:59 Release Date: 7/20/18 (limited) |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | July 19, 2018 Occupation takes a familiar story—about an alien invasion—and does only the familiar with it. To be fair, coming from Australia, this was made a meager budget, compared to the sort of similar fare that one would expect from Hollywood, and writer/director Luke Sparke does a decent-enough job in copying the blockbuster mold with those restrictions. That doesn't make the movie itself any better, but it's worth mentioning. The story has a group of bland people forming a ragtag rebellion against alien invaders. To go through the dozen or so main characters would be useless and a chore, since Sparke only gives them enough personal drama to fill in the gaps when they aren't evading or fighting aliens. The main hero is Matt (Dan Ewing), a retired rugby player with some indistinct health issues that basically disappear once the aliens attack a charity match in his small town. His counterpart is Jackson (Charles Terrier), another player who's a bit more headstrong than Matt. The two men have girlfriends—Amelia (Stephany Jacobsen) and Vanessa (Rhiannon Fish). The most that can be said of their characterizations is that Vanessa is pregnant and, inevitably, gives birth during a shootout. The rest of the characters are primarily male and fit into some sort of rugged archetype. Peter (Temuera Morrison) is an ex-con trying to live a quiet life with his family (half of which is abducted by the invaders). Dennis (Zachary Garred) is a homeless artist who scraps his way through life, and Arnold (Charles Mesure) is a farmer with some military experience. The rest of the characters only exist in their relationships to the slightly more established ones. The humans survive and occasionally bicker amongst themselves, while the aliens plan attacks and harvest humans for slave labor. Months pass, and the human characters have set up a mercenary force that excels at guerrilla tactics, while the aliens, who are haphazardly portrayed with a sympathetic eye, plot for some final move involving a big bomb. The action sequences are serviceable enough, if too explosion-happy, and the potentially silly details are kept a relative minimum (It is amusing how the higher-up aliens wear capes). The tone is kept serious, but within its the wide cast of characters, Occupation doesn't possess a single one whose story or personality gives us a reason to care. Copyright © 2018 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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