While the film Spectral might seem like a Hollywood blockbuster, it’s headed straight for Netflix. Here’s the trailer!
The idea of Netflix’s growing empire of original content is hardly breaking news. Yet, while the streaming giant has recently amassed impressive features across genres such as prestige war drama Beasts of No Nation, a belated sequel to an Oscar-winning outing in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny and an array of Adam Sandler movies, the trailer for their recent acquisition in sci-fi/action film Spectral showcases a popcorn action flick unique to the lineup.
Spectral brandishes a simple plot. An unnamed European city (the film was shot in Budapest,) is besieged with unseen forces dropping bodies everywhere. Thrust into a contemporary urban setting resembling the aftermath of a World War II battle, an elite Special Ops team of Delta Force soldiers are dispatched, armed to the teeth, ready to neutralize whatever threat they see. – Therein lies the problem, since their targets are misty apparitions. Mostly invisible, their incorporeal aggressors wreak wanton destruction. Thus, any hope of ending this reign of ectoplasmic terror rests with a scientific specialist played by James Badge Dale (Iron Man 3).
Spectral marks the directorial debut of Nic Mathieu, working off a script that he co-wrote with Ian Fried, John Gatins and George Nolfi. The cast, however, is filled with familiar faces. Besides the aforementioned Dale, Emily Mortimer (The Newsroom, Shutter Island) is onboard, apparently as an exposition-providing female lead that will play a key role in the attempted ghostbusting. Supporting players include Clayne Crawford (TV’s Lethal Weapon), Bruce Greenwood (Star Trek), Max Martini (Pacific Rim), Ursula Parker (Louie) and Jimmy Akingbola (Arrow).
A quick glance at the trailer for Spectral– not to be mistaken for a bootleg take on the most recent James Bond outing Spectre– will show a frantic, element-rich, genre-mixing tour-de-force of temerity, blending an intense upgrade of the time-tested trope of malevolent spirits with high-impact military action. The film certainly seems worth a watch when it debuts on Netflix on December 9. Check out the trailer below!