The above-average World War II action thriller "Enemy Lines" depicts a daring Allied commando raid to snatch a Polish scientist from the clutches of his villainous Nazi captors. Washington wants to add this Pole to the ranks of other scientists toiling over the top-secret Manhattan Project to build an atomic bomb. Not only do the Allies-the British and the Americans-want this Brainiac for his particular genius, but a Soviet undercover squad of NKVD also wants him, too. Although the British, the Americans, and the Soviets waged war against Hitler's nefarious Third Reich, the Soviets are just as anxious to abduct this gifted scientist for Joe Stalin. Swedish director Anders Banke and "Amsterdam Heavy" scenarist Michael Wright, working from producer Tom George's story, have fashioned a competent, death-defying mission movie. The endless horde of Germans never gives them a break. "Enemy Lines" evoked memories of director Walter Grauman's vintage epic "The Last Escape" (1970), where Americans disguised as Germans nabbed a rocket scientist from the Nazis before Joseph Stalin's cronies can claim him themselves. Meantime, Hitler's henchmen were spitting bullets at their heels. Most World War II movies these days like "Enemy Lines" suffer from inadequate budgets, like my earlier review of "We Go in At Dawn." More often than not you had to fill in the gaps between the missing scenes for yourself in "We Go in at Dawn" because the tight budget excluded them. Happily, "Enemy Lines" doesn't suffer from that kind of shortcoming.
"Enemy Lines" is one of those movies that starts in the middle, with our stealthy heroes attacking the sentries outside the house of Dr. Fabien (Pawel Delag of "Schindler's List") during a freezing night. They slay the unsuspecting guards silently with their knives. Abruptly, however, the movie reverts back to the beginning. U.S. Army General McCloud (Corey Johnson of "The Bourne Legacy") and British Colonel Preston (John Hannah of "Sliding Doors") give U.S. Marine Major Kaminski (Ed Westwick of "Billionaire Ransom") his orders about his suicidal mission. Kaminski will command a quartet of professional British commandos as his team. This quintet will travel by trawler under cover of night to Poland, go ashore and usher rocket scientist Dr. Fabien and his family to the safety of a submarine. The best action movies always complicate the best-laid plans of heroes and enemies, so nobody has a picnic. No sooner have our heroes rescued Dr. Fabian than a lone German officer takes his wife hostage at gunpoint. Although a British sharpshooter kills him with a near impossible shot, the stubborn Nazi lives long enough to put a fatal bullet in Fabien's wife. Our heroes move out on foot, across icy terrain with the scientist and his grieving young daughter, but they lose contact with London when their radio craps out on them. Not only are the Nazis in hot pursuit, but also that lethal NKVD squad is following with their own ideas about grabbing Fabien. Indeed, "Enemy Lines" observes all the clichés and conventions of the war movie genre, especially the self-sacrificial displays of heroism by the British. Few survive the repeated firefights. Meantime, the Nazis mobilize literally everything in their pursuit of the Allies, including a couple of tanks!
Apart from John Hannah, who plays the irritable, tight-lipped Colonel Preston in the tense headquarters scenes, the cast consists entirely of either unknowns or foreigners. You may remember Hannah from the first two Brendan Fraser "Mummy" movies or perhaps the romantic comedy "Four Weddings and a Funeral." Leading man Ed Westwick has appeared in some big-name films, such as "Children of Men" (2006), "Son of Rambow" (2007), "S. Darko" (2009), "J. Edgar" (2011), "Romeo & Juliet" (2013) and "Freaks of Nature" (2015), but he hasn't attained celebrity status. Clocking in at 93 suspenseful minutes, this white-knuckled, wartime thriller delivers nearly everything any armchair general could ask for in a high-octane World War II actioneer. From fade in until fadeout, "Enemy Lines" qualifies as an entertaining, sometimes surprising yarn. The narrative twists and turns in the action will keep you guessing.
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