Review of War Horse (2011) by Josh R — 09 Aug 2013

This film gets a pass on some bumpy story arc progression simply because there are so few WWI films and this one gave a fantastic representation of The Great War. The film didn't take the path I thought it would exactly. I was very excited about the notion we would be treated to a WWI film with Hiddleston and Cumberbatch, only to learn they were barely in it for longer that 20 minutes. (But what a 20 minutes they had!).

My biggest gripe is probably some confusion when it came to showing the German side of things once the "Pickelhaube" style helmets were taken out of use. The characters often sounded French (if not British) and so for awhile in the middle parts of the film I didn't even realize it was the German army we were following and not the French. The uniforms just did not have enough clear identifying marks. I appreciate that not every filmmaker wants to go with non-English language characters speaking the native tongue, but there are artistic ways to address this that were not taken here for whatever reason.

I will also say that I doubt I would have given this film much of a chance if I hadn't seen the Lord of the Rings extended editions and Viggo Mortensen talking about the highly intelligent behaviour of the horse he was assigned (and later bought) during the shooting.

Overall I think there would have been far bigger emotional payoff if Albert would have re-entered the story in the Army hospital instead of where he did.