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The online film magazine Combustible Celluloid offers new movie reviews, DVD reviews, film reviews, actor interviews, actress interviews, director interviews, film books and all things cinema related for the thoughtful and passionate. Online for ten years! Over 3000 reviews!

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Overlord (1975)

Rating: 3 1/2 Stars (out of 4)

War Lore

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

Buy Overlord on DVD

Featured in the great 2004 documentary Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession, this unknown 1975 classic from England now gets a second chance. Directed by an exiled American, Stuart Cooper, the film crosses breathtaking documentary footage (much of it shot from the air) with the story of a quiet young man, Tom (Brian Stirner), entering military service during World War II. Tom doesn't quite grasp the horror of the war; he gets himself into trouble during basic training, carries a copy of Dickens and worries about his cocker spaniel. But when he finds himself landing on the beach on D-Day, his movie-style life merges with the documentary harshness of the war itself. A restored black-and-white print opens today at the Balboa, and a DVD from the Criterion Collection will follow.

DVD Details: It arrives in April of 2007, and Criterion is not kidding. The new DVD comes with a hi-def digital transfer approved by director Cooper, plus a commentary track with Cooper and actor Stirner. Then we have a video about film archivists, a photo essay with Cooper talking about photographer Robert Capa, one of Cooper's early short films, two WWII-era films from the British Ministry of Information, journals from two D-Day soldiers read by Stirner, and a trailer. The booklet contains an essay by film critic Kent Jones, a short history of the Imperial War Museum, and excerpts from the novelization, written by Cooper (and Christopher Hudson).

Starring: Brian Stirner, Davyd Harries, Nicholas Ball, Julie Neesam, Sam Sewell, John Franklyn-Robbins, Stella Tanner, Harry Shacklock
Written by: Stuart Cooper, Christopher Hudson
Directed by: Stuart Cooper
MPAA Rating: Unrated
Running Time: 75 minutes
Date: October 6, 2006