Boots on the Ground follows a group of British soldiers that take shelter in an abandoned fortress during the Afghan war. As the soldiers try to fend off the Taliban outside, they come under fire from supernatural forces inside. Revelations and the forces within threaten to tear them apart.
Boots on the Ground Review
In a found footage style, this film had the potential of blending haunted house and gritty war drama genres into one. What we get is something that isn't very interesting and quickly becomes repetitive and predictable. It isn't realistic enough to legitimize its soldiers and it isn't scary enough to warrant fear. Instead, it drags in both arenas and fails to excel at either.
It's difficult without being raised in the British culture to determine the sentiment towards its military, but this movie left a bad taste in my mouth in its interpretation. The message was muddled behind a maze of misdirection towards the motivations of characters and their supernatural pursuers, making it difficult to get the intended message or grasp the goal.
The action equates to the quality of many found footage films, dragging us through constant bickering and stammering for a handful of in-focus scenes that don't add up to anything worth the wait. The occasional glimpse at the supernatural forces has its moments, but nothing special or noteworthy.
We spend most of our time wandering aimlessly in the dark, struggling to recall which character we are following from time to time. Kind of like the first time you see Black Hawk Down, but imagine that from a first-person perspective. Yeah, all that gear makes it difficult to tell who you are following, but when you aren't even getting a chance to see faces at all, it can be difficult to follow, or even care about, what's happening.
I cared little for the outcome of the characters, especially after the twist of the film has made itself clear. It makes the whole film hardly worth trudging through and limits any recommendation I can muster for the film.
Horror Qualifier: 8/10
Horror Quality: 5/10
Film Quality: 3/10