Battle: Los Angeles (2011)

All Critics (196) | Top Critics (32) | Fresh (69) | Rotten (130) | DVD (10)

Terminally stupid.

December 6, 2011 Full Review | Comment (1)

Michael Wilmington

Chicago Reader

Top Critic

If the talk had been surgically removed, leaving only the sights and sounds of combat, this could have been a striking, semiabstract display of aggressive energy; as it is, any viewer over twelve will go for the laughs.

March 21, 2011 Full Review | Comments (3)

Anthony Lane

New Yorker

Top Critic

Excitement? Not so much.

March 12, 2011 Full Review | Comments (6)

Stephen Whitty

Newark Star-Ledger

Top Critic

With his hawklike profile and square jaw, the hyperstalwart Eckhart looks like a comic-book hero and acts like one, too. He's so stalwart he creaks.

March 11, 2011 Full Review

Peter Rainer

Christian Science Monitor

Top Critic

This film feels so much like a videogame your hands keep reaching for controllers -- shoot the aliens, shoot the aliens, shoot the aliens.

March 11, 2011 Full Review | Comments (23)

Tom Long

Detroit News

Top Critic

Don't mean to boast, but I can suspend my disbelief as willingly as any credulous moviegoer. Yet not even an industrial crane would have helped here. Nope, Battle: Los Angeles completely defeated me.

March 11, 2011 Full Review

Rick Groen

Globe and Mail

Top Critic

It's not new, it's not novel and it's not art. But as a popcorn movie a couple of months out of summer season, it'll have to do.

January 23, 2013 Full Review

Roger Moore

Movie Nation

Just the worst, most cliché-ridden bunch of faceless cannon fodder you've ever had the misfortune to watch die.

September 28, 2012 Full Review

Ali Gray

TheShiznit.co.uk

Jonathan Liebesman's "Battle: Los Angeles" is one of those rare films that fails on just about every level a film can fail on.

September 21, 2012 Full Review

Jeff Beck

Examiner.com

Eat some leatherneck lead, E.T. -- and semper fi, space scum!

September 9, 2011 Full Review | Comments (5)

Neil Pond

American Profile

Not as bad as the other recent invasion movie Skyline, but still nothing to be excited about.

September 1, 2011 Full Review

James Luxford

The National

For an alien invasion film, this one is a solid effort, though there's a bit too much violence and not enough introspection.

August 15, 2011 Full Review | Comments (2)

Wesley Lovell

Cinema Sight

...Battle Los Angeles fizzles out long before it reaches its tedious, anticlimactic finish.

June 16, 2011 Full Review

David Nusair

Reel Film Reviews

... this humorless film as unimaginative -- and as exhausting -- as you can get.

June 14, 2011 Full Review

Sean Axmaker

MSN.com

Liebesman wants you to feel trapped in the middle of the action. He wants you to feel the heat of combat on your cheeks. Apparently, he also wants you to barf up your popcorn, with a quaking camera aesthetic that's intolerable.

June 9, 2011 Full Review | Comment (1)

Brian Orndorf

BrianOrndorf.com

a kind of cross between what I imagine the first person shooter video game experience to be and an episode of the HBO series Generation Kill

May 15, 2011 Full Review | Comments (2)

Philip Martin

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Wears its valor and vigor on its sleeve daring to be old-fashioned in its depiction of American heroism. The spirit of "Semper Fi" hasn't been this much fun in a long time.

May 12, 2011 Full Review

Bruce Bennett

Spectrum (St. George, Utah)

For all the blazing guns and s*** blowing up, it's only sporadically thrilling.

May 4, 2011 Full Review

Rob Humanick

Projection Booth

... lock-and-load sci-fi - "Full Metal Jacket" meets "War of the Worlds.

May 4, 2011 Full Review | Comments (12)

Glenn Lovell

CinemaDope

From beginning to end, this thing just keeps jackhammering at your nerves. Sure, there are a few moments of comic relief, both intended and not.

April 29, 2011 Full Review | Comments (3)

Grae Drake

Movies.com

...looks good but the story lacks soul.

April 27, 2011 Full Review

Jonathan W. Hickman

Daily Film Fix

Action packed from beginning to end, "Battle: Los Angeles" is the bigger, badder brother to "Independence Day."

April 22, 2011 Full Review | Comments (8)

Michael A. Smith

Moviehole

• 1. Sgt. Major: At 14:46 Pacific Standard Time, 12 different locations around the world were breached, in what appears to be a coordinated attack by an unknown enemy. All breaches were along the coastline, in what is a campaign of rapid dominance. This is a textbook military invasion. There are massive casualties in New York, defensive lines are being setup in Boston, and at 13:15 Zulu Time we lost communications with San Francisco and San Diego, their status is unknown. What we do know is that we are the last offensive force on the west coast, we can not lose Los Angeles.
  – Submitted by Typhon Q (8 months ago)
• 1. 2nd Lt. William Martinez: That was some real Joghn Wayne shit Staff Sergeant
  – Submitted by Alex M (15 months ago)
• 1. Ssgt. Michael Nantz: Lets take back Los Angeles!
  – Submitted by Jack P (17 months ago)
• 1. Ssgt. Michael Nantz: Retreat, hell.
  – Submitted by Tim H (21 months ago)
• 1. 2nd Lt. William Martinez: This is Lieutenant William Martinez, Echo Company, Second Battalion, Fifth Marines! Hoorah!
  – Submitted by Andrew M (21 months ago)
• 1. Ssgt. Michael Nantz: Move to live, Marines.
  – Submitted by Tommee P (23 months ago)