I'll tell you why so serious

An Exercise In Nonsense

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

I just finished watching this movie and am still wondering what the conclusion was supposed to be. The actors did a great job at what they were told to do, but it was obvious that the director shouldn't quit his day job. The British accents of Germans was interesting enough, but the flashbacks, dreams, and memories of the supposed characters left much to be desired and would challenge even Sherlock Holmes in figuring out exactly what was going on. I felt as if the only people that screened this film were those intimately involved in making it, as any "outsider", such as myself, was left to be lost. The general ideas presented in it (horror/war combined, hidden motives of soldiers, war stress turning into other things, etc.) are great, but poorly played out. Character development, etc. all seemed to be an inside joke. To sum it up, I was very disappointed in this movie.

We are on the German/Belgian border in 1944 and a group of German soldiers are holed up in a bunker trying to survive. But just as they find a tunnel system underneath the bunker, and the enemies outside are closing in, they suspect that something very sinister is down there with them......One of the most frustrating British films I have watched in a very long time. You see there is a real great movie at its core, one that is desperately trying to get out, but instead of a top notch eerie thriller we get something that looks like a chopped together homage to John Carpenter. Definite shades of Carpenter's chiller, The Fog, and Russell Currie's great and creepy score sounding suspiciously like a reworking of Morricone's scoring for The Thing. The production is not helped by using an array of non German actors for this German soldier based picture. Much as i like Jason Flemying and Christopher Fairbank {my reasons for watching this film}, it's a bit of a stretch to accept them as German soldiers.With a better director than Rob Green at the helm, Clive Dawson's story could have been fully realised as a serious and dramatic horror film. Instead the end product comes off as something that was too big a task to handle, and sadly the nicely tuned atmosphere is lost amongst the insipid and unimaginative cop out that the film invariably is. 3/10

German soldiers(who sound awfully British)have to take refuge in a bunker when Allied American forces have surrounded them. Only an old timer, a bit off his rocker, and a young soldier are present inside the bunker to protect it until they join them. With hardly any supplies and little ammunition, they are easy sitting-ducks ready to be picked apart. Within the gut of the bunker is a creepy, dark, dank tunnel which might lead to a way out if the Americans haven't found out about it. But, something sinister lives within the tunnels where a large crop of human skeletons and bones are stored. The tunnel seems to be a sort-of burial ground for dead soldiers put there by the German Reich. But, as wise tales of the tunnel's creepy past begin to fester in the minds of those in the bunker, paranoia, mistrust and irrational behavior set in with disastrous results.Ambitious film doesn't have the budget to quite succeed. It tries it's hand at making the soldiers human, but it's hard to care about their fates knowing who they are. You almost feel like cheering for whoever is causing these soldiers to turn inside out. The dark tunnel is a highlight providing some chills, but I felt it has lots of potential in it's "ghostly" story-line it fails to capitalize on. That could be because not enough money was present to provide us with ghastly looking ghouls, but it seems director Rob Green is aiming for what you don't see than showing us ghosts with decaying corpses or skeleton soldiers going for revenge. There is an interesting reason behind a certain violent deed these particular Nazi soldiers did that plagues on them which might provide the motivation of acts against them in the bunker. There's also a running theme about desertion as one soldier goes mad wishing to eliminate all those German soldiers who came to the bunker after departing war when it was getting harsh.

When I opted to watch this movie, I honestly expected (hoped for) just a good war movie. I did not get what I hoped for I got more. I, like many of my fellow contributors am a history buff and I too noted a few errors with the uniforms. However, though not a true expert like some here, I know that as late as 1944, things weren't going well for the Germans and they did have to improvise from time to time. Desperation is just as much a mother of invention as necessity.With that said, I wish to comment on the substance of the movie itself as I feel it's the more important issue.A quick plot summary; It's 1944 on the Western Front and a group of German soldiers escape an ambush in the Ardennes Forest only to take refuge in a bunker on the Siegfried Line. They know the Americans are out there and very much out number them, but they cannot see them. They are ordered to hold out and assist the bunkers remaining defenders, a teenage boy and scruffy old World War One veteran who has been called back to service. The kid is impressionable and has not experienced war yet, the old man has and being a local native, also knows some of the areas grizzly past which he shares with his new comrades. As time passes and things get more desperate the unit begins to face terrors they did not expect.I just watched it last night for the first time. I was spellbound. This terrific little film is not a monster movie per se. It's a psychological thriller were the monsters are not 'out there' but inside each man. For some it's the loss of a comrade or relative. For some, it's guilt. For some it's the need to prove themselves and drugs take their toll on one man as well.This is not a movie for those who enjoy cheesy slasher flix. Sure, they can be entertaining, but this is a movie that makes you think. You see these men who, if they truly are in an elite unit have nothing to prove, unravel under the worst of circumstances. Towards the end, even those who "held on" mentally still come face to face with the demons in their minds as they struggle to survive.I would not only recommend this to anyone who really loves a good horror movie, but would seriously suggest it for viewing in a psychology course.