BLASTED (2022)

BLASTED (2022)

Tagline: Bros Before Ufos

(Action, Sci-Fi, Stuff They Are Trying To Pass Off As Humor) [R]

Note: This movie did not get an MPAA rating, but I am pretty sure if it had been given a rating it would be a [R] just due to language. Streaming services also attached a TV-MA to the film. This was also distributed under the title BLASTED: GUTTA VS ALIENS.

We’re not a stupid city, we’re a valley alright. 

This film out of Norway features some childhood friends named Sebastian (played by Axel Bøyum) and Mikkel (played by Fredrik Skogsrud) who are trying to show a potential client of Sebastian’s named Kasper a good time for his bachelor party so he will fund a project. They go to a get-away cabin and decide to try paintball the following day. It doesn’t take long before they discover an alien invasion has started. Sebastian and Mikkel must recall their childhood talents as laser tag champions to resist becoming green-eyed alien zombies or getting killed. 

I think the first thing I noticed about this movie is that they almost feverishly say “ball tickling” and “boner”. Boner because that was the nickname for Sebastian who they also sometimes call “Seb”, but I have no idea what “ball tickling” is meant to mean in Norway. Kasper kind of gets into the meaning a bit at the beginning of the movie, but the term still feels wildly out of place for this film. The other odd thing is that Stine played by Evelyn Rasmussen Osazuwa seems to be the only “alien zombie” that has a jacked-up face. The rest of them all just have weird green eyes. 

This movie is low budget but aside from some of the “dumb crude” humor, we do get some actual funny moments the deeper we get into this movie. I think panic and speculation lead a lot of these characters down some fun roads. Hjørdis is a cop that has a pretty dry sense of humor, but she might be the funniest character in the movie. Her father is also my kind of guy. This guy is ready for anything. I also liked that we get a lot of references to pop culture. JOHN WICK, STARSHIP TROOPERS, and a few others get mentioned. There is even a comedic shot at TESLA which kind of backfires later in the film. One thing I really like in some films is really quick shots just to save time. Like scenes that get sped up really fast to create comical transitions. This gets used in a lot of action comedies, but SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD might be the movie that uses it the most. 

I wasn’t crazy about the pacing in the first half of the film, but it does eventually pick up and the character development draws us in making these characters more relatable. Well, “some” of them. This movie does get a little wild in some parts, and the plot gets to be a bit of a stretch so you will have to leave the part of your brain that tries to make sense of things at home. 

Regarding the score, it all works well, and the soundtrack is pretty interesting in a good way. Cinematically there is nothing magic here, but it’s decent enough. I did like the design of one of the aliens we get at the end of the movie, but most of these are zombie-like aliens with glowing green eyes. The acting is solid for what this script gave them to work with. 

Because most of the attempts at humor were not relatable and the plot lacks the stuff that should be connecting it to make sense, the best I can say is that this is a pretty fun non-gory but still at times crass bit of fun that lands at a 3 out of 7. I love fun little flicks like this, but I can’t overlook some of the issues. 

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF MISO FILM NORGE AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.