Attila (2013)

The Asylum has been producing movies since its formation in 1997.  David Michael Latt founded the company with David Rimawi and Sherri Strain, and began turning out low budget horror movies.  They weren’t huge successes because other studios were doing bigger things with horror at the time.  This would be the start of something special, though.  When The Asylum released their War of the Worlds movie in 2005, they realized that there was a market for mockbusters, movies with similarities to big releases.  People would seek them out to watch either out of confusion, or as a schlocky alternative.

Though the mockbusters have become the biggest piece of The Asylum’s output since 2005, they aren’t the only movies put out by the studio.  They, of course, have their animal attack movies like the Sharknado franchise.  Then there are the sex comedies like The Coed and the Zombie Stoner.  They do still put out some of those low budget horror movies that they began with too.  One such movie was 2013’s Attila.

Attila was a military horror movie.  Vito (Chris Conrad) was a soldier tasked with leading a team to fight the Nomad (Cheick Kongo) and retrieve a mystical staff.  General Thadeus (M. Steven Felty) collected legendary artifacts for the government, and the staff had the ability to resurrect Attila the Hun.  He had an archaeologist helping him out to ensure that every artifact he found was the real thing.  Especially the staff, which would grant immortality to the people who knew how to properly use it.

The first thing that should be noted about the movie is that it was called Attila, though the main bad guy wasn’t actually Attila the Hun.  Most online descriptions tout the film as a sort of military vs. Attila story.  That’s not the case.  The Nomad was Attila’s son, and Attila only came into the story through the “ability to resurrect Attila” portion.  It was some false advertising that fit with The Asylum as a studio, but could be misleading to people who don’t know what The Asylum tends to do with their promotion and marketing.  What little promotion and marketing there typically is for a movie from The Asylum.

As for what Attila ended up being as a completed film, it was entertaining, yet forgettable.  There were things to like while the movie was also filled with the setbacks of low budget filmmaking.  Mind you, it’s The Asylum, so their low budget has more funding than some of the micro-budget films that come through this blog.  There’s enough of a budget that they can get decent equipment to help make their films.  They can secure actors who get semi-regular acting jobs instead of people that the filmmaker knows from their neighbourhood.  This allows for a better overall quality on a technical level.

That’s not to say that things end up being perfect.  Attila had its setbacks.  The most notable setback was from the location in which it was filmed.  The main location was supposed to be the American wilderness where the government had hidden a series of bases.  Trees, hunting trails, dirt roads, and all that stuff should have been abundant.  There were trees, for sure.  There were some dirt roads there, too.  But it all looked like a park of some sort.  The trees and roads all looked deliberately placed.  The location, though the outdoors, felt as though it was manufactured.  People had clearly been involved in the layout of the location, which took away from the fact that the manmade base structure was supposed to be hidden within the wilderness.

To add to the bad aspects, the writing of the man character was atrocious.  He was a highly trained soldier who was respected for his skills but disrespected in every other way by his superiors.  Every mission he went on, his team would be killed.  This would easily cause anyone to experience trauma.  He had a bad case of PTSD, yet his superiors continued to use him.  He would constantly argue with his superiors and defy their orders at first.  They would still force him to go on the mission instead of reprimanding him.  Perhaps it wasn’t him that was poorly written.  Perhaps it was the military system itself.

There was some good writing throughout Attila, though.  Specifically, the interactions between Vito and his team were well done.  They fit together as a cohesive unit who had rapport with one another.  Whenever they lost a team member, it felt like they lost a team member.  It didn’t feel like fodder for the Nomad.  There could have been more work done to make their deaths more impactful.  A better connection could have been built between the characters and the audience.  But, as it was, there was enough work put in to make the comradery feel real between the characters, and that counts for something.

The other thing that deserved praise from Attila was the use of effects.  Usually, movies by The Asylum come with pretty bad special effects.  The explosions are cheesy, the muzzle flashes look fake, and the blood and gore look cheap.  The effects artists for Attila did some good work to mostly blend the effects together with the action.  The Nomad’s face was believably decayed, and though the rest of his body wasn’t decaying, it was the same drained flesh of a colour to match well enough that it wasn’t distracting.  The explosions were of good quality.  The grenade explosion with the Jeep was the highlight of those, being the best-looking explosion of the movie and possibly one of the best The Asylum had done up to that point.  Even the fire during the climactic scene of Attila looked better than most of the effects the studio had produced by 2013.  There was a lot of good to take away from Attila in terms of effects.

The story of Attila may have been what made it forgettable.  There wasn’t much to it outside of fighting with the Nomad through the park looking location.  For people who have seen many movies from The Asylum, however, there were some good things that could be taken away from it.  The character work and the effects showed promise.  There was something to those aspects that made them stand out.

The Asylum might be known for the mockbusters and animal attack movies that they produce more than anything else.  Those are the majority of their output.  Yet, 22 years into their existence as a studio, they’re staying true to their roots.  They still release under the radar horror movies like those that they began with.  They try new things while always remembering where they came from.  That’s how a studio lasts multiple decades.  That’s why The Asylum will go down in history.

These notes will go down in history:

• Sharknado was mentioned in this post.  Here’s the post for the first three Sharknado movies (week 190).  The Coed and the Zombie Stoner (week 102) was also mentioned.
• Anthony C. Ferrante was in Attila.  He directed the first three Sharknado movies (week 190), and had cameos in Sharknado 2: The Second One (week 190) and Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! (week 190). 
• Dylan Vox made his third Sunday "Bad" Movies appearance this week.  He was in Showgirls 2: Penny's from Heaven (week 170) and Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus (week 300).
• Bill Voorhees and Steve Hanks were in Attila.  They were also in Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark (week 300).
• Chris Conrad, who played Vito, was in two Sunday “Bad” Movies before this, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (week 140) and Airborne (week 301).
• Leona Mizrahi showed up again this week.  She was last seen in The Coed and the Zombie Stoner (week 102). 
• Finally, let's end off with a four-timer.  Terry F. Smith reappeared in Attila.  He was already in The Human Centipede III (week 180), Sandy Wexler (week 231), and Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark (week 300).
• Have you seen Attila?  What did you think of it?  Let me know in the comments.
• Twitter and the comments are where you can find me if you want to suggest a movie for the Sunday “Bad” Movies.  Any movies that you think would fit into future weeks of this blog are welcome.
• There’s an Instagram account for @sunday_bad_movies.  Check it out if you want to keep up to date with the blog through pictures.
• I do share clips of the bad movies I watch on Snapchat.  Add me (jurassicgriffin) if that sounds interesting to you.
• Next week, I’ll be going with a suggestion once again.  I only have a few of them right now, and I slipped one in for next week.  I’ll be watching the classic Cuba Gooding Jr. film, Snow Dogs.  If that sounds like something you want to read about, come back next week.  See you then.