|
|
|
|
| WAR HORSE (2011)
|
|  |
|
SBD Star Rating:
by Chiara Adorno
View Credits | See Other Reviews
| |
War Horse has received positive reviews from most critics however, of note is the indelible Spielberg vision which ranks sentimentality above a more nuanced approach. The film is an emotional tug of the heartstrings containing Spielberg's customary flair. A horse named Joey, raised by a young boy (played by Jeremy Irvine) and given up by necessity, falls into the hands of soldiers as war breaks out. The horse's innocence offsets the horrors of war all around him. He passes from owner to owner, from one side of the conflict to the other, often ending on the receiving end of war's cruelties. Peter Rainer The Christian Science Monitor remarks that "Spielberg milks each scene for maximum memorability, which becomes wearing after awhile.... nostalgic tableaux that evoke the films of David Lean and even in a particularly overscaled moment at the end, Gone With The Wind..... Spielberg can do this sort of thing with such facility that he often lets his technical skills override his deepest engagement in the material." Simon Reynolds of Digital Spy was not so harsh in a similar assessment remarking "... the heart-on-sleeve emotions are pure Spielberg. At times it may slip ]the film] into gushy sentimentality and lack dramatic subtlety, but up on the big screen it's a magnificient crowd-pleaser." Keith Phipps of A.V.Club is more inspired by the film and concludes, "the characters are swept up in global currents they can’t control, forced to partake in bloodshed they never desired, struggling to hold onto the things — whether beast or idea — that reminds them of who they were.... Joey was born for something better than this [war]. Maybe we all were." |
|
|
|
