Review of They Shall Not Grow Old (2018) by Romethesecondti — 25 Jul 2019

“They Shall Not Grow Old” – most of the men we see in the film in fact did not – is an anti-war film, “celebrating” the end of what was then called The Great War. The final result, Director Peter Jackson has said, “is that we see the war the way they saw it.

” Of course, Jackson has chosen the arc of his film – from joy to ennui to disillusionment at best, death at worst. And he has chosen the voices we hear. We see combat the way the director wants us to see it.

The film is a technological wonder. Jackson slowed down the 100 hours of silient, jerky film he got from the Imperial War Museum to life-like speeds. He employed lip-readers to determine what the soldiers were saying and supplied those voices.

Then he added voice-overs from interviews with more than 120 surviving war veterans whose recollections were recorded in the 1960s and 1970s. His film, though arguably one-sided and focusing on trench warfare, is a tender paean to the men who sacrificed their lives, limbs—and sometimes, faces—for what others thought was the greater good.

When you are faced with death, a veteran says, “They say your past comes up in front of your eyes. I was only 19. I hadn’t had any past.