Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks (2014) (aka Saints and Soldiers: The Void) starring Adam Gregory, Timothy S. Shoemaker, Michael Todd Behrens directed by Ryan Little Movie Review

Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks (2014)   2/52/52/52/52/5


K. Danor Gerald in Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks (2014) (aka Saints and Soldiers: The Void)

A Few Voids to Get Over

With the war almost over there is a more of a relaxed atmosphere between the men of a tank command unless you are African-American Jesse Owens (K. Danor Gerald) who still has to contend with racism from his own men. But whilst the men make their way through the Harz mountains in the North of Germany they not only find themselves with an extra crew member when they come across an English Officer but they also come across a group of Nazis hidden in the mountains ready to attack anything which tries to make its way through. With the end of war likely to be declared at any time the men must chose between turning back or dealing with them.

I will keep this review of "Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks", also known as "Saints and Soldiers: The Void", to just three points although there are lots more points which could be made about it. The first point is that it is a very visual movie with some neat opening credits to establish where in relation to pivotal war time events this movie takes place. There is also the definition of the image and when you have watched so many older war movies which lack definition when you get one where every speck of dirt on a face is clear to see rather than being a blur it adds something.

Adam Gregory in Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks (2014) (aka Saints and Soldiers: The Void)

But my second point is like so many modern, low budget war movies "Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks" suffers from a lack of attention to detail and things happen which just wouldn't in the real world especially when it comes to weapons. But also like many a modern war movie it chooses to keep things simple and never puts a demand on the audience to pay too much attention. In a way it relies on the strength of the visuals rather than anything else so you get scenes which are screaming out for atmosphere but end up all about the look.

That leads me to my third point and quite simply "Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks" is a boys own adventure style movie where we have soldiers sneaking around as they enter enemy territory and when there is action there is big explosions and so on. For some this will be disappointing but for young teen boys who might enjoy pretending to be heroic soldiers it might work in a similar way to when I was a child and me my mates re-enacted scenes from "The Great Escape".

What this all boils down to is that "Saints and Soldiers: Battle of the Tanks" is in truth pretty typical of modern, low budget war movies with the emphasis on the look more than anything and that means for adults it has noticeable short comings but might be entertaining for young teen boys who might enjoy the action side of things.


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