Review of The Trench (1999) by Stuart K — 06 Feb 2015

Written and directed by William Boyd, best known for writing films such as Chaplin (1992), A Good Man in Africa (1994) and the acclaimed TV series Any Given Heart. This war drama is Boyd's only effort as director to date.

It does capture the claustrophobic nature of the WW1 trench, but it lacks heart, and the characters come across as a bit one dimensional, despite the good pedigree of actors here. Set in 1916, it focuses on the 48 hours on the eve of the Battle of the Somme, which was one of the bloodiest battles during World War 1.

It focuses on one platoon of soldiers, who mostly consist of teenagers, including 17 year old Billy MacFarlane (Paul Nicholls), who is there with his older brother, Eddie (Tam Williams), there's also Colin Daventry (James D'Arcy), Victor Dell (Danny Dyer), Rag Rookwood (Cillian Murphy) and James Deamis (Ben Whishaw).

The troops are being led by the battle hardened Sergeant Winter (Daniel Craig) and the intellectual Lieutenant Hart (Julian Rhind-Tutt), who prepare the young troops for what's about to come. It was done on a shoestring, and it sadly shows, as nearly all the action takes place in the trench, and another small problem is that the dialogue comes across as cliched rather than powerful, having said that, it does have some good performances, with Craig turning in a very good performance.