“Ultramarines: The Movie” Review

Steve,

This may come as a surprise to you guys, but I know very little about the Warhammer 40,000 mythology. That aside, I REALLY enjoyed Ultramarines: The Movie. Despite being a straight-to-DVD CGI film, it’s particularly well done. But before I go into specifics in my review, here’s the plot of the movie in a nutshell.

“Ultramarines” is set in the far, far future, where Earth has become an empire and is at war against evil forces from across the universe. A distress signal is sent from the planet Mithron, and is received by Captain Severus (Terrance Stamp), leader of the elite group (or, “chapter”, as these teams are called) of Space Marines known as the Ultramarines. Responding to this apparent cry for help, Severus and his loyal crew land on the planet in order to find out what’s going on, only to come upon the aftermath of a bloody, brutal battle. The outpost the signal originated from has been taken over by unknown forces, and it becomes horribly clear that the mighty team of warriors, including main protagonist Brother Proteus (Sean Pertwee), have walked into a trap. With their backs against the wall and death closing in, Proteus and his fellow teammates make a desperate last stand for survival, while trying to find out the reason why the distress signal was sent.





Made by UK studio Codex Pictures, the movie is a brutal, yet fun treat for both fans of the Warhammer 40K mythos and newcomers alike. It provides mildly complex, yet engaging storytelling that respects the source material it comes from, while giving explanations about the various types of characters and characters for people who, know little to nothing about the shared universe of books and table-top games the movie’s set in. In short, despite me being a Warhammer 40K newcomer, myself, I had fun with the movie and understood who everyone was and what was going on. The voice acting, despite mostly consisting of complete unknowns, was top-notch, with the 3 lead actors being the best out of all of them (the third actor, by the way, being John Hurt, who plays a surviving Marine that helps the group in their attempt to get back to their ship later on in the movie).


Overall, “Ultramarines” can be considered a worth addition to anyone’s DVD collection. If you are a fan of science fiction, action, or even a fan the Warhammer 40,000 mythology, it’s worth buying. The only way you can get it is in a 2-Disk Collector’s Edition DVD through the film’s official website, UltramarinesTheMovie.com for only $40 in the US (it’s also available on the site in the UK, Europe, and other countries). It may be pricy, but you won’t regret picking up this awesome movie!


Rating: 9/10

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Comments (7)

  1. Good review. I watched it myself and enjoyed it greatly. I’m not a quite a hard-core WH40k fan but I have read some of the novels and I am more or less familiar with the universe. The plot was entertaining and well done, and I enjoyed the voice acting, but the visual style and sound effects were the real highlights of the film for me. Everything from the engines to gunfire sounded suitably powerful and the faithfulness of the appereance of armor, ships and weaponry was truly enjoyable. I had no doubt that the company behind this really respected the source material, and that was a great thing to see.

  2. So the whole reason why you enjoyed the movie so much was BECAUSE you don’t know the 40k “mythology”. In that movie, the authors completely ignored their own concept and system.
    For one, a scout is not allowed to be a tactical marine until he’s served as a reserve/devastator handling lots of different types of weapons. Let alone become a captain after his first day as a tactical soldier.
    Their armors are meant to be heavy ceramite (some super metal) plates, that would, logically keep you from jumping across bridges. It would most likely protect you pretty well from bullets as well. Their helmets are meant to be attached to bionics in their skulls, in other words, harder to take off than they are in the movie. They remind me more of some bike helmets or something.
    A Space Marine has two hearts, in case one would fail. In the movie, one of the marines was shot in the left side of his chest, and he died right on the spot. What happened to the second heart and all the other special enhancements you need to be a true Space Marine? They have especially resistant bodies, they will heal much faster than a normal human, they even spit acid!! AND THEY DIE LIKE FLIES IN THE MOVIE?!?!?!

    Those are but details. The biggest problem with this movies is that they tried to make a survival horror movie out of it. You know, a squad of soldiers land in the “jungle”, most of them die there, and when they go back to their ship, the horror has somehow managed to get onto your battle barge!! Killing the rest until only two men are alive. Doesn’t quite show the real power of the Space Marines.

  3. @Noss: You forget that they are fighting Chaos. They have have Bolters which tear nearly anything apart, super human or not. So no, their armor will not protect them from that. And no the second heart wont mean anything when his entire insides is blown to bits.

    What really made me mad was that the Chaos didn’t put up a true fight..

  4. The voice acting and actors were awesome, however.. Being a fan of the universe, aswell as a established sci-fi author. This felt like more of a let down short story, surprising enough abnett has come out with some of the best Black library books released thus far. This movie however did not do the Astartes justice. I was not impressed with the animation either, my 89 year old grandmother is more nimble then the animation in this movie. Also, come on now every space marine in this movie is a ragged old man?? Studs in the forehead are a sign for how many centuries a astartes has served the emporer. But the old ragged ass men in this movie only have 1 or none studs. Some of the oldest astartes that are not venerable dreadnoughts live 500-700 years old, now they might look a bit old. But come on, one hundred years to a space marine might mean 10 years. Hopefully GW and the blacklibrary choose another studio next time. Also abnett, ultra marines are not the most interesting guys. Give us a Horus heresy movie next time. Not just a 70 minute movie on marines running from a fight. But I will give it to the chaplain in the movie, he is well done and the perfect vision of a chaplain. All in all I give it a 3 out of 10.

  5. I would like to mention that animation is very expensive, and Codex pictures (the animators of the movie) received not a single penny of funding from GW. Codex is a small independent studio and they had to pay for every inch of animation and release. For what its worth, this was good animation all things considered, if you want a better movie buy the limited edition and help fund Codex so they can make an even better sequal.

  6. I would like to mention that animation is very expensive, and Codex pictures (the animators of the movie) received not a single penny of funding from GW. Codex is a small independent studio and they had to pay for every inch of animation and release. For what its worth, this was good animation all things considered, if you want a better movie buy the limited edition and help fund Codex so they can make an even better sequal.

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