Review: It is a cliché to say a movie is like history come to life. However that is the best way to describe this film. This movie is so close and intimate that by the end we feel we know these people. Of course we can never fully know or understand what these young men went through, but this movie gives a clearer vision than any other World War One documentary I've seen.
For those who don't know what this movie is, director Peter Jackson and his crew took 100 year old footage of World War One and restored and colorized it. The result is incredible. I am normally not a fan of colorization, but what Jackson and his crew accomplished here is incredible. I do not believe this should be applied to all silent movies or even most, but the result works perfectly for this film. The way it is filmed is so close and intimate that it feels like it could have been filmed yesterday. Even more incredible is this film's use of audio. Since the original filming of World War 1 was silent naturally there was no audio. This film does add sound effects and bits of dialogue. However the real treat is the narration. Most filmmakers would have used modern narration from historians here, but this film does so much better. The point of this film is not to give a history lesson. The point of this film is to let you spend time with the men who fought and as such the narration used is actually from real archival interviews for the 1960's. So what we are hearing is the actual men who fought telling us about what we are seeing on screen. The effect is incredible. It feels like we are watching this footage along with the real men and that we get to relive these memories with them. Because of this the movie ends up feeling like no other war documentary I've ever watched.
I will state this movie has its R rating for a reason. Many of the images are downright gruesome. Still despite this the movie shows the men making the best out of their situations. They were surround by horrors, but they did not lose their sense of humor. As well as seeing them suffer through the horrors of war, we see them laugh, smile and joke around with each other. There is something absolutely beautiful in this. It shows that beauty and joy can still be found in the worst of places. Again we see the gruesome side of war very strongly in this movie, but that makes these light moments have a stronger sense of depth and power than anything a fictional Hollywood film can dream up.
It is too often today, that history is viewed as just empty words in a textbook we read in school. This is not true. As this movie shows history is as real as the lives we are living now. History was full of human beings who were well human. History is something intimate and personal. This movie shows that perfectly, and I can see someone who doesn't think they have an interest in history becoming fascinated with World War One after watching this movie. This is a movie I think everybody should see. This movie would be perfect to show in a high school or college history class to let the students see for themselves just how real what they are studying is.
I must also say that this movie has made me appreciate veterans and those who have died in war, even more. These people are truly amazing and how they make it through something like what these men went through is something I'll never understand. If you are reading this and have served or are serving, thank you for everything you do, you are incredible.
-Michael J. Ruhland
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