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This is surprising, but I actually kinda loved War Horse.
Yes, if a Hallmarkie has a Twinkie's worth of sentiment, you could fill a Ding-Dong the size of Antwerp w/ the sentiment in this. Yes.
But even if it's Spielbergian junk food, it's a good argument for it. https://twitter.com/filmobjective/status/1385616018987438081
This is surprising, but I actually kinda loved War Horse.
Yes, if a Hallmarkie has a Twinkie's worth of sentiment, you could fill a Ding-Dong the size of Antwerp w/ the sentiment in this. Yes.
But even if it's Spielbergian junk food, it's a good argument for it. https://twitter.com/filmobjective/status/1385616018987438081
I thought the film was going nowhere for about 40 min. Then they introduce this thread of pure empathy for the veteran father and what it starts to actually be about is bravery on all sides of war. A specifically male-focused empathy that explores that bravery in many forms.
The horse isn't REALLY the main "plot." He's just the POV through which war can be emotionally decoded. He's the warrior's heart in a British officer, a son's promise to a mom, a grandfather's hope, and so on. He's the boots in All Quiet on the Western Front turned into a movie.
Through that whole middle section of the film, I loved it. And Kaminski's photography and Williams' score are great throughout.
Where the film really ISN'T all that great is the ending, which begs for a little ambiguity that the film just doesn't have up its sleeve.
Where the film really ISN'T all that great is the ending, which begs for a little ambiguity that the film just doesn't have up its sleeve.
The unlikeliness of the conclusion and the scene in which it transpires is so Hallmarkie insane they even change the saturation of the film to make it more Christmassy.
It would not only be more effective but more ON THEME to have a little more ambiguity.
It would not only be more effective but more ON THEME to have a little more ambiguity.
Imo, the boy could have come home, reconciling his idea of his father, having become him and better, while the horse, just a passing dream of childhood, is somewhere free in the world, somewhere dead, somewhere new. We don't know. Still sentimental but just a little more real.
Eh, anyway. They don't make this kind of movie anymore! It's just a pure empathy epic that DOES veer into a silly amount of sentimentality a few times (too many "push-in revelation" shots) but I for one don't have a need to laugh at a movie that thinks highly of the world.
I was kind of starving for something uplifting. The middle has enough creativity to carry the bookends of sentiment and the art behind the film is serious. This is NOT a joke for Spielberg. It's a passion project in a world that doesn't always know the difference anymore.
And even if you don't care about horses, if you just like war photography and a story about mens' hearts, this is an old-fashioned epic w/ new-fashioned technique. Just a tad too much fluff, but it has it where it counts. The trailer doesn't do it justice at all.
