Daniel Craig is very good ... believable ... in this. Very much the sergeant. He is also excellent in Archangel (Russia). The jury is still out about his James Bond, which is entirely different.
There are some good, realistic, and disturbing undercurrents in this psychological portrayal:
There are indeed jarringly inconsistent unrealities: only 1 little rat, clean uniforms, no gloomy constant Northern European rain/drizzle as someone else has pointed out, No Man's Land looking verdant when it should look like The Craters of the Moon especially after the bombardment, ... but the film's military social and mental message outweighs them
Lots of people are eager for a "major war" these days - Tyler Cowen in the 13 June 2014 New York Times, for example - and their friends and families should see this.
There are some good, realistic, and disturbing undercurrents in this psychological portrayal:
- Craig's sergeant is a career soldier and family man - 2 daughters and 1 son - who is realizing his life is about to be wasted by his Army/corporation.
- The corporal being a scared but nonetheless vicious bully pushed to his psychological limit by his fear of his impending death.
- The nude girl in the corporal's nude photos apparently being the postal worker Pvt McFarlane has a crush on ... or fantasy about ... or maybe just similar face ... implying the lower class's girls back home are being corrupted into prostitution while their boyfriends are being wasted.
- The lieutenant's alcoholism.
- The randomness of death in the trenches and the certainty of death of going up over the top out of them.
- The irony of the one brother being wounded ... and surviving.
- The squadie asking the visiting colonel if he is going to accompany them in the attack, the colonel uneasily (albeit not guiltily) admitting (after trying to pump them up telling them how easy it will be) he won't be, and then the squadie being taken around the corner and slapped upside the head by the career sergeant for (having the guts ) to speak up.
- The lying chain of command telling them first that they will be in the 3rd wave with a better chance of survival and then unforeseen difficulties putting them in the first wave. Or was it dooming retaliation for the squadie's question?
There are indeed jarringly inconsistent unrealities: only 1 little rat, clean uniforms, no gloomy constant Northern European rain/drizzle as someone else has pointed out, No Man's Land looking verdant when it should look like The Craters of the Moon especially after the bombardment, ... but the film's military social and mental message outweighs them
Lots of people are eager for a "major war" these days - Tyler Cowen in the 13 June 2014 New York Times, for example - and their friends and families should see this.