Unbroken (2014)
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DIRECTOR: Angelina Jolie
CAST: Jack O’Connell, Domhnall Gleeson, Finn Wittrock, Garrett Hedlund, Jai Courtney, Miyavi
REVIEW:
Unbroken, Angelina Jolie’s second time in the director’s chair (following 2011’s In the Land of Blood and Honey), is a good-but-not-great docudrama adapted from the same-named non-fiction book by Lauren Hillenbrand (author of the less harrowing but similarly earnest and “inspiring true story” Seabiscuit) telling in competent but somewhat unremarkable fashion the true story of Olympic athlete and WWII POW Louis Zamperini.
Continue readingFury (2014)
DIRECTOR: David Ayer
CAST: Brad Pitt, Logan Lerman, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Bernthal, Michael Pena
REVIEW:
One of the most intense, gritty, and brutal WWII films since Saving Private Ryan (possibly even surpassing it for graphic bloodshed), and one of the best war films to come along in years, Fury dispels the notion that the Allies’ post D-Day race toward Berlin (a race they lost to the Russians) was any kind of cakewalk. Leave it to the likes of Patton to show montages of Allied columns roaring triumphantly down roadways as rousing music plays; Fury takes us down to the ground, spending much of the action inside one tank with one small crew slogging their way through Germany. Of course, that is no criticism of Patton, just that the two films show the war from complete opposite perspectives. Those who enjoyed (if “enjoyed” is an appropriate word) Saving Private Ryan should appreciate Fury. In fact, Fury goes even further than Steven Spielberg’s epic in being completely devoid of any flag-waving patriotism or idealism. This is a war movie that lives up to the saying “war is hell”. Continue reading
Valkyrie (2008)
DIRECTOR: Bryan Singer
CAST:
Tom Cruise, Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Terence Stamp, Tom Wilkinson, Carice van Houten, Kevin McNally, David Schofield, Eddie Izzard, Jamie Parker, Thomas Kretschmann, Christian Berkel, Tom Hollander, David Bamber
REVIEW:
During his twelve-year reign, Adolf Hitler survived over forty known assassination attempts, at least fifteen of which were made by Germans. But the most hated man of the 20th century was also one of the most extraordinarily lucky. Something always managed to go wrong; Hitler would cut speeches or conferences short, avoiding timed bomb blasts, the explosives themselves would fail to detonate, and the forces arrayed against him often proved to be unfortunately uncoordinated and indecisive. The final, most famous, and most nearly successful attempt on Hitler’s life came on July 20, 1944, orchestrated by a group of rebel German military officers and politicians spearheaded by decorated injured war hero Colonel Count Claus von Stauffenberg. Continue reading
The Good German (2006)
DIRECTOR: Steven Soderbergh
CAST:
George Clooney, Cate Blanchett, Tobey Maguire, Beau Bridges, Jack Thompson,Ravil Isyanov, Tony Curran, Christian Oliver, Leland Orser
REVIEW:
The Good German is director Steven Soderbergh’s (Traffic, Ocean’s Eleven) adaptation of Joseph Kanon’s 2001 novel, but Soderbergh chose not to simply do a straightforward filming of Kanon’s book, but used it as his chance to attempt a film experiment of his own- making the movie, set in 1945, as if it had actually been made in the 1940s. Continue reading
Kingdom of Heaven (2005)
DIRECTOR: Ridley Scott
CAST: Orlando Bloom, Eva Green, Jeremy Irons, Marton Csokas, Brendan Gleeson, Liam Neeson, Ghassan Massoud, Alexander Siddig, David Thewlis, Michael Sheen, John Finch, Edward Norton
REVIEW:
In a number of his previous films, Ridley Scott has proven he knows how to make an epic. With its desert landscape and ancient setting, Kingdom of Heaven bears the closest resemblance to 2000’s Oscar-winning Gladiator, but in some ways is an even more technically ambitious production. Unfortunately, it’s a far less engaging motion picture. Continue reading
Der Untergang/The Downfall (2004)
DIRECTOR: Oliver Hirschbiegel
CAST:
Bruno Ganz, Alexandra Maria Lara, Corinna Harfouch, Juliane Köhler, Ulrich Matthes, Thomas Kretschmann, Christian Berkel, Matthias Habich, Heino Ferch, Michael Mendl, André Hennicke, Ulrich Noethen, Doneven Gunia, Thomas Thieme
REVIEW:
The third major film depiction of the last days of Adolf Hitler (following 1973’s Hitler: The Last Ten Days, starring Alec Guinness, and 1981’s The Bunker, starring Anthony Hopkins) but the first internationally-released German production to feature Hitler as a main character, Downfall is director Oliver Hirschbiegel and screenwriter Bernd Eichinger’s frank confrontation of a man and legacy that has stigmatized and haunted Germany for sixty years. Continue reading
Alexander (2004)
DIRECTOR: Oliver Stone
CAST:
Colin Farrell, Angelina Jolie, Val Kilmer, Jared Leto, Rosario Dawson, Anthony Hopkins, Christopher Plummer, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, John Kavanagh, Brian Blessed
REVIEW:
Best-known for controversial, politically-charged fare like Natural Born Killers, JFK, and Nixon, Oliver Stone’s latest venture, the epically-mounted but narratively disjointed historical drama Alexander, is more cinematically straightforward than his previous efforts but unfortunately lacks the focus and drive to maintain consistent interest throughout its three-hour running time. Continue reading
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)
DIRECTOR: Peter Weir
CAST: Russell Crowe, Paul Bettany, Billy Boyd, James D’Arcy, Robert Pugh, Richard McCabe, Lee Ingleby, Max Pirkis, Max Benitz
REVIEW:
An adaptation of the exploits of characters created by Patrick O’Brian, who wrote twenty novels in the Master and Commander series, The Far Side of the World (which takes its name from one of O’Brian’s books but includes plot elements from several) differs from lighter entertainment centered around high-seas derring-do such as the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy in the rigorous pains it takes to be technically and historically accurate. The specific adventure portrayed is not a true story, but it is set in the historical backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars, and the filmmakers did extensive research into warships of the time period. Australian director Peter Weir (Picnic At Hanging Rock, Witness, Dead Poets Society, The Truman Show) filmed an actual typhoon and blended the authentic footage into a scene in which the crew battles a storm at sea. What little special effects there are are blended into the real thing with indistinguishable versimilitude. Continue reading
We Were Soldiers (2002)
DIRECTOR: Randall Wallace
CAST: Mel Gibson, Sam Elliott, Madeleine Stowe, Greg Kinnear, Barry Pepper, Chris Klein, Keri Russell, Ryan Hurst, Don Duong
REVIEW:
From writer-director Randall Wallace (writer of Braveheart and Pearl Harbor) comes this intense and powerful Vietnam war film covering the previously relatively obscure Battle of the Le Drang Valley—-not inappropriately known as the Valley of Death—-in November 1965, in which Americans and North Vietnamese met each other in major combat for the first time, with 300 men of the Seventh Cavalry under Lieutenant Colonel Hal Moore desperately holding their surrounded position against wave after wave of a total of 4,000 North Vietnamese troops.
Continue readingPearl Harbor (2001)
DIRECTOR: Michael Bay
CAST: Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett, Kate Beckinsale, Alec Baldwin, Jon Voight, Colm Feore, Tom Sizemore, Cuba Gooding Jr., Dan Aykroyd, Mako
REVIEW:
Pearl Harbor is intended to be a crowd pleaser, combining a wartime historical backdrop to rouse patriotic American audiences flocking to the theater with one of those melodramatic wartime love stories from the 1950s or 1960s. Considering it’s a product of producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay, it also features lots of splashy special effects, “dramatic” slow-motion shots, cheesy one-liners, corny “patriotic” speeches, over-the-top flag-waving, and stuff blowing up real good. When it comes to the centerpiece depiction of the Pearl Harbor attack, the $135 million budget is all over the screen. It’s a pity a little more effort couldn’t have been spent on the script. Also, that centerpiece sequence only occupies about 35 minutes of a bloated 183 minute “epic” runtime.
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