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Monday, September 12, 2022

Wolves of War: Another Final Mission Movie

Wars are like the old Knicks-Pacers games, in that they aren’t over until they are truly, officially over. Jack Wallace understands that only too well. Even though everyone knows WWII is down to its final days, he is still recruited for a potential-suicide mission in Giles Alderson’s Wolves of War, which releases tomorrow on VOD.

Wallace is the only parent his little girl has left, but he worries his success as a commando might have profoundly changed him as a person. Regardless, there is no guarantee he will survive this mission to see her again. Under the command of Captain Norwood, Wallace and his hodge-podge squad must parachute into no man’s land Bavaria, to rescue expat Professor Hopper from the National Socialist “Werewolves,” the fanatical remnants of the SS engaging in scorched earth guerilla warfare.

Supposedly, Hopper and his daughter Hannah were trapped in Germany when the war broke out, but he was never a regime sympathizer. Obviously, he is not a political science genius. As it happens, he is a physicist, who has developed a rival atomic bomb. If Wallace’s team can secure the professor and his notes, they can call in an airlift. Otherwise, it will become a carpet-bombing airstrike.

In some ways,
Wolves of War is a throwback to old fashioned WWII films, but Wallace’s existential angst definitely feels contemporary. However, its stiff-upper-lip Britishness is appealing. The action is respectably gritty, but it lacks a big set-piece crescendo.

As Wallace and Norwood, Ed Westwick and Matt Willis are solidly intense and physically look appropriately tough, especially Willis. Max Themak also chews the scenery nicely as Von Sachs, the psychotic commander of the Werewolves. However, Rupert Graves portrays Prof. Hopper with the sort of emotional commitment you might expect from a guest shot on a mediocre 1990s syndicated genre TV show.

This is the second film of recent vintage to depict the German Werewolves’ terrorism, but
Burial has a sharper edge and wilder warfighting violence. There is nothing unprecedented in Wolves of War, but it is competently executed and it shows why wars sometimes need to be fought—to defeat evil—which is something of value. Recommended as an okay fallback for fans of WWII films, Wolves of War releases tomorrow (9/13) on VOD.