PopHorror Let's Get Scared
“Yeah *sarcastic* Nazis are a barrel of laughs…” -Bernie (The Paper, 1994). Movies about killing Nazis are always fun to watch. Whether it’s Clint Eastwood singlehandedly mowing down about four hundred of them in Where Eagles Dare or Brad Pitt’s band of merry men scalping them in Inglorious Basterds, it’s always good to see the “krauts” (as my dad would say) get theirs. Phil Blattenberger (Point Man, 2018) makes his contribution to the effort with the release of CONDOR’S NEST.
Watch the trailer below, then read on for our review!
Condor’s Nest – So What’s It About?
An American jet crash lands in the middle of German-occupied France during World War 2. Will Spalding (Jacob Keohane – Halloween Kills 2021) hides out in a nearby house as a battalion of Germans led by Colonel Martin Bach (Arnold Vosloo – The Mummy 1999) guns down the rest of the American crew.
Ten years later Spalding is in South America, brutally torturing and killing any runaway Nazi he can find until one of them can lead him to Bach. Finally, he gets his man in Dr. Albert Vogel (Al Pagano – Incident At Blood Gorge 2005) a scientist that is on the run from Nazis. He’s defecting to the Soviet Union but also is hunted by the Mossad. A wrench is thrown into Spalding’s plan when Mossad agent Leyna Rahn (Corinne Britti – Take Care of Emily 2019) shows up and demands Vogel’s head.
To keep himself alive, Vogel reveals that there is a secret base for Ex-Nazis called the Condor’s Nest. It’s located in the Andes. Not only is Colonel Bach there, but the hideout also houses none other than the alive & well Heinrich Himmler (James Urbaniak – Death of a President 2006)!
Can Spalding and Rahn end the Nazi menace once and for all? Watch the movie and find out!
*SPOILERS AHEAD*
A Few Issues…
Before going into the good things about CONDOR’S NEST, I have to go into the criticisms that had me facepalming. There was an essentially completely useless scene toward the end where an archeologist named Edmund Kunst (Torsten Keller – Kringle Time 2021) rants and raves about how the first Aryans descended from the city of Atlantis which was destroyed when the moon collided with Earth. Then he whips out a skull and says here’s the proof. Gerhardt Schrude (Bruce Davison – Insidious The Last Key 2018) then laughs at him and asks how the skull is any proof. If the purpose of the scene was padding or to establish Nazis as insane, sure, but otherwise it was out of place in a movie about Nazis plotting to re-take the Earth while setting up shop in South America.
My only other criticism is they had A-List actors in the poster such as Arnold Vosloo, Davison, and Michael Ironside, but the truth is they’re barely in the movie. Davison and Ironside appear in one scene apiece while Visloo is in maybe four. Ironside plays Vogel’s Soviet contact and he’s on-screen less than the Americans that were shot in the opening scene. As for Visloo, he’s supposed to be the primary villain but he pretty much takes a back seat when Himmler is introduced. That’s like in Final Fantasy 4 when you chase Golbez through the game only to fight Zemus in the end. One historical inaccuracy I spotted was since the Mossad was established in 1949, it was highly unlikely a woman would be their top agent going after Nazis in South America. But that’s just serious nitpicking and has no real bearing on the movie.
What’s To Like?
Now there were a lot of good things. There’s a posse of Nazis led by Fritz Ziegler (Jackson Rathbone – Twilight 2008) and Jackson Rathbone did such a great job playing a jerk that you’ll want to jump through the screen and beat him soundly yourself. As usual, Arnold Vosloo did a great job playing a villain, while Al Pagano looked to be having a blast as the nazi scientist that has several cards up his sleeve. The story was a bit farfetched, but I like how they switched up the cliche of “nazi leader wasn’t really killed/back from the dead” to having it be Himmler instead of Adolf Hitler.
For those that never bothered to read a history book, Himmler was the driving force behind the extermination of Jewish people and it was his Final Solution that led to the Holocaust. The acting was adequate, the story only slowed down during the cockamamie Atlantis scene and yes, Nazis get clipped throughout the movie.
Condor’s Nest – Final Thoughts
So when all is said and done can I recommend CONDOR’S NEST? For a popcorn flick, absolutely. It doesn’t quite have the Nazi body count that Where Eagles Dare has and it doesn’t have the character development that Inglorious Basterds had, but it serves its purpose. If you want to watch Nazis get bullet-ridden again and again, this is the movie for you!
You can watch the film now on VUDU and other streaming platforms. Go rent it, stream it, see it, steal it….okay maybe not that, but definitely give CONDOR’S NEST a watch when you can.
