Ghosts of War (2020 film)

Ghosts of War
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Eric Bress
Written by	Eric Bress
Produced by	D. Todd Shepherd Shelley Madison Joe Simpson
Starring	Brenton Thwaites Theo Rossi Skylar Astin Kyle Gallner Alan Ritchson Billy Zane Shaun Toub
Cinematography	Lorenzo Senatore
Edited by	Peter Amundson
Music by	Michael Suby
Production companies	Miscellaneous Entertainment Highland Film Group Ingenious Media
Distributed by	Vertical Entertainment
Release date	June 18, 2020 (2020-06-18)
Running time	94 minutes
Countries	United Kingdom Bulgaria
Language	English
Box office	$345,289

Ghosts of War is a 2020 supernatural horror film written and directed by Eric Bress. The film stars Brenton Thwaites, Theo Rossi, Skylar Astin, Kyle Gallner, and Alan Ritchson. It was released on DirecTV on 18 June 2020.

Plot[]

Nazi-occupied France, 1944. A company of five American GIs - Lieutenant and leader Chris, sniper Tappert, medic and radio operator Eugene, Butchie and Kirk - are assigned to guard a countryside chateau that prior to its liberation had served as a command post for the Wehrmacht. En route they ambush a German jeep, killing its occupants, before encountering a group of Jewish refugees from a concentration camp.

They arrive at their destination and relieve the anxious comrades they find at their post. Strange occurrences unsettle the company - unexplained noises and apparitions permeate the building. Chris interprets a repetitive banging sound coming from the fireplace as morse code, which Eugene transcribes as a message saying "I have no legs". The following day, Eugene confides to the group that he distrusts the psychologically-imbalanced Tappert, whom he found having slaughtered a group of Hitler Youth in Paris.

Eugene later finds a journal kept by a young German soldier who had previously occupied the chateau, in which he detailed the fate of the Helwigs - the aristocratic family whose home it was. The Germans, having discovered the Helwigs had been sheltering Jews, brutally murdered them by burning the father alive, hanging the daughter and drowning the son in a bathtub. As Eugene is transcribing another morse code message, his hand moves without his volition to spell out the message "If you leave, you die".

That night, a German patrol attacks. The Americans kill most of their number but Butchie is mortally wounded after throwing himself on a grenade to save his comrades. Elsewhere, the men are shocked to witness some of the Germans being killed by unseen forces in the same manner as the Helwig family. Before he dies, Butchie rants that what the men are experiencing isn't real and exhorts Chris to "remember".

Convinced that the building is haunted, the survivors elect to leave and take up position in the nearby woods. However they find themselves repeating the experiences that brought them to the chateau - the ambush of the jeep, the encounter with the refugees. Believing they are cursed and that their only hope is to give the bodies of the Helwig family a proper burial, they return to the chateau. An invisible force grabs Chris and hauls him towards an outhouse. The rest of the men follow and find that they have been led to the bodies of the Helwigs.

After burying the family nearby, Eugene consults the diary and finds that the text is no longer German but Arabic and that the Helwigs were Afghan. As they prepare to leave, the four men are assailed by the apparent spirits of the murdered family, one of which tries to drown Chris. The shock of the experience induces hallucinations before he finally snaps awake and finds himself being attended to by doctors in a futuristic hospital, surrounded by the mutilated and unconscious bodies of his comrades. Doctor Engel and his staff inform Chris that what he and his friends had been experiencing was a simulated reality based on World War Two intended to help soldiers suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Chris' memories begin to return. He and his men are not Second World War veterans but in fact soldiers of the present-day American military. Their final mission in Afghanistan was to evacuate a family called the Helwigs, who had been collaborating with the Americans, before an Islamic State patrol ambushed them. Ordered to hide by their CIA handler, the men watch from a hide as the Helwigs are interrogated by an IS commander. They are about to intervene when enemy reinforcements arrive, causing Chris to order his men to do nothing. Despite the mother of the family's pleas for help, they watch as the father is burned to death, the daughter is hung and the son is drowned. The IS forces leave and the men prepare to depart before the despairing mother of the family detonates a suicide bomb, mauling the five men. With her dying breath she utters the word "Vetrulek", a word that the men had witnessed in their simulation and which is revealed to be an ancient curse that forces its recipients to endlessly relive their trauma.

Back in the hospital the power fluctuates, confusing the medical staff. Chris realises that the curse is real and that the spirits of the Helwig family now haunt the simulation that the men are experiencing. Convinced the only way to lift the curse is to confront the family, apologise and atone for their sins, Chris begs to be returned to the simulation. He reawakens where his experiences began - camped out at night with his comrades as a figure watches from the shadows.

Cast[]

• Brenton Thwaites as Chris
• Kyle Gallner as Tappert
• Alan Ritchson as Butchie
• Theo Rossi as Kirk
• Skylar Astin as Eugene
• Billy Zane as Dr. Engel
• Shaun Toub as Mr. Helwig
• Alexander Behrang Keshtkar as Leader
• Kaloyan Hristov as Helwig Boy
• Yanitsa Mihailova as Christina Helwig

Production[]

In February 2017, it was reported that Brenton Thwaites would star in Ghosts of War, with Bress directing from his own script. Miscellaneous Entertainment's D. Todd Shepherd, Shelley Madison, Joe Simpson, and George Waud are producing and financing the film alongside Colleen Camp.^[1] A month later, Skylar Astin, Theo Rossi, Alan Ritchson, Kyle Gallner, and Shaun Toub were cast in the film.^[2][3][4]

Highland Film Group is handling international sales. Principal photography took place in Sofia, Bulgaria. Using the Vrana Palace as the mansion.

Release[]

Ghosts of War released on DirecTV on 18 June 2020. It was released via virtual cinema screenings, On Demand, and digitally on 17 July 2020.^[5]

Reception[]

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 40% based on 43 reviews, with an average score of 4.7/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "Ghosts of War blends supernatural horror and period war drama to produce a muddled mashup that proves some ingredients are better left separate."^[6] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 38 out of 100 based on 8 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".^[7]

References[]

External links[]

• Ghosts of War at IMDb