1917 is the latest film from the highly acclaimed director, Sam Mendes, who recently gave us one really great Bond movie in the form of Skyfall, and one rather bad one in the form of Spectre. The story for this new film is based on a tale that young Sam's grandfather used to tell him, of a vital World War I mission to try and prevent the unnecessary loss of thousands of lives. As Colin Firth explains to us all, another General believes that the Germans have retreated, but thanks to aerial surveillance photos Firth's General now knows that is a trap and they are lying in wait. ready to mow anyone down who is foolish to charge.
A young soldier by the name of Lance Corporal Blake, played by Dean-Charles Chapman, is given the task of travelling through previously occupied enemy territory to try and reach the other General before he sends his men into certain death. Blake is told to choose one other soldier to help and support him in this task, and he chooses Lance Corporal Schofield, played by George Mackay. The doomed attack is due to take place at dawn the following day, so the two soldiers don't have a lot of time to get the job done.
It's an exciting premise, and I was really looking forward to seeing this film, especially with all the recent Oscar hype surrounding it. Sometimes hype can be the enemy though, because I ended up feeling slightly underwhelmed by the whole thing. I still think it's a good, solid film, but I was never jumping up and down in my seat in excitement throughout the duration. The cinematography is handled by Roger Deakins, who is probably my favourite cinematographer of all time, having worked on pretty much all of the Coen brothers movies and the fantastic Blade Runner 2049. He's done a great job here too with some fantastic looking sequences.
About a month before I went to see 1917, I saw an extended trailer of it which was like a mini documentary, showing how the film was made. As you may already know, the movie is filmed like it is one continuous, unbroken shot, and this documentary showed off how that was achieved and how they managed to hide cuts from the audience - when the camera goes behind a pillar for example. It's very clever and quite interesting, but I wish I had seen this after I had seen the film and not before, because it think it spoiled the magic for me a little bit.
Sometimes when you go and see a film for the first time, you're just not in the right mood or you're distracted about something and don't give it the attention it deserves. I think that's what has happened here, and I am definitely going to give 1917 a second chance when it is released on Blu Ray and streaming. War films have never really been a favourite genre of mine. The closest I've come to liking one is A Very Long Engagement, which is only partly set in World War I, and is actually a romantic mystery film for most of its duration. Many blokes out there get excited about stuff like Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers, but they've never really done anything for me, so that maybe another contributing factor in why I just didn't click with 1917. I would still recommend going to see it for yourself, because chances are you will probably love it!
A young soldier by the name of Lance Corporal Blake, played by Dean-Charles Chapman, is given the task of travelling through previously occupied enemy territory to try and reach the other General before he sends his men into certain death. Blake is told to choose one other soldier to help and support him in this task, and he chooses Lance Corporal Schofield, played by George Mackay. The doomed attack is due to take place at dawn the following day, so the two soldiers don't have a lot of time to get the job done.
It's an exciting premise, and I was really looking forward to seeing this film, especially with all the recent Oscar hype surrounding it. Sometimes hype can be the enemy though, because I ended up feeling slightly underwhelmed by the whole thing. I still think it's a good, solid film, but I was never jumping up and down in my seat in excitement throughout the duration. The cinematography is handled by Roger Deakins, who is probably my favourite cinematographer of all time, having worked on pretty much all of the Coen brothers movies and the fantastic Blade Runner 2049. He's done a great job here too with some fantastic looking sequences.
About a month before I went to see 1917, I saw an extended trailer of it which was like a mini documentary, showing how the film was made. As you may already know, the movie is filmed like it is one continuous, unbroken shot, and this documentary showed off how that was achieved and how they managed to hide cuts from the audience - when the camera goes behind a pillar for example. It's very clever and quite interesting, but I wish I had seen this after I had seen the film and not before, because it think it spoiled the magic for me a little bit.
Sometimes when you go and see a film for the first time, you're just not in the right mood or you're distracted about something and don't give it the attention it deserves. I think that's what has happened here, and I am definitely going to give 1917 a second chance when it is released on Blu Ray and streaming. War films have never really been a favourite genre of mine. The closest I've come to liking one is A Very Long Engagement, which is only partly set in World War I, and is actually a romantic mystery film for most of its duration. Many blokes out there get excited about stuff like Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers, but they've never really done anything for me, so that maybe another contributing factor in why I just didn't click with 1917. I would still recommend going to see it for yourself, because chances are you will probably love it!
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