WARHUNT (2022) 

A mixture of drama, horror and psychological thriller; WarHunt boldly combines a hodgepodge of genres. The movie, set during WWII and filmed in Riga, Latvia, is beautifully shot. At times the cinematography was so lovely I forgot I was watching a fairly low-budget flick. 

 

Director Mauro Borrelli makes the wise move of keeping the soundtrack/dramatic score to a minimum. It would have been easy to let a Mickey Rourke-led niche war drama flirt with camp, but Borrelli finds a way to balance the drama with the downright bizarre - at least for a while.

 

For a film cast with mostly unknowns, the acting is surprisingly solid. Mickey Rourke couldn’t be more perfectly cast as a tough-as-nails Army Major, and it’s easy to remember while watching why he has an Oscar nomination under his belt.

 

Though visually pleasing and well-acted, the pacing is painfully slow and the occasional bits of gore feel misplaced and tacky. Some of the dialogue, along with hair and costuming, didn’t feel authentic to the era. Little-to-no character development kept me from being particularly endeared to any character or getting too invested in their outcome. 

 

WarHunt gets an “A for effort” from me stylistically, but it falls short on plot and struggles to find its footing; bouncing back and forth between genres and barreling toward a conclusion that’s pretty much DOA.