A 12-hour clock counts down to an inevitable massacre in “Onslaught,” the kind of elevated, razor-wire genre romp that director Adam Wingard and writer Simon Barrett used to make before studio outings like “Godzilla vs. Kong.” It isn’t the most polished of the duo’s output, and often feels in need of just another draft to tighten its nuts and bolts. But despite its occasional failings, this military-infused slasher thriller is their most aesthetically accomplished work, and a fun bookend to a jam-packed movie summer, before the transition to spooky season in the fall.
A trailer park for U.S. army veterans plays host to Adria Arjona’s paranoid, gun-toting Celeste, a former sniper and the compound’s manager. Her continued target practice is plagued by black-and-white memories of war, but she’s soon interrupted when her well-to-do ex-husband shows up out of the blue to drop off their conscientious daughter Daisy (an adorable Blake Kennedy). As Celeste tries to keep the young tyke entertained, events at a covert military base nearby threaten her hard-earned domestic normality.
These strange happenings take the form of a markedly different, often more exciting movie that doesn’t actually cross paths with the mother-daughter drama until quite late into the 92-minute runtime. In a more heightened setting, the heavily made-up German scientist Dr. Hans Kammler (Dan Stevens) and his domineering wife Hanna (Rebecca Hall) complete their bunker experiments on a trio of sociopathic super-soldiers for a private military contractor. The film’s snappy opening montage, which goes backward in time through several American wars, maintains a particular focus on Operation Paperclip, hinting at Kammler’s Nazi ties as he details his torturous methods on his human weapons — at least two of whom are Black. (The third’s face is intentionally obscured.)
