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‘Unbroken’ made up of three movies that range from superb to OK
Dec 24, 2014, 11:13 AM | Updated: 11:13 am
“Unbroken” follows the real-life story of Louis Zamperini as told in a 2010 book by Laura Hillenbrand.
Zamperini, played by Jack O’Connell, survived in a raft for 47 days with two other crewmen after their B-24 bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean, only to be captured by the Japanese and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp.
This film was directed by Angelina Jolie and it’s very much her movie. Jolie said recently on a promotion tour that she wanted to depict a human story, one that gives hope, noting that war “brings out the extremes,” both the good and the bad, in people.
This is a long film and it’s three films in one, really. There’s the film of him as a bombardier, flying dangerous missions in the Pacific in World War II. There is the movie of his survival on the raft for 47 days. Then, the movie of him in the prison camp. Those three movies range from superb, I mean thrilling edge of your seat top-flight cinema, to barely OK.
The superb is the bombardier footage. This portion is just stunning. This is very well directed. The prison camp stuff, I just don’t’ think is well done. A lot of it feels like a movie version of a prison camp, rather than the real thing.
The prison camp portion is the part where not only do you want to cover the kids’ eyes, you also want to cover your own eyes. I am stunned that it is rated PG-13. As you’re going through his prison camp experience, because people know it’s Louis Zamperini who survived and lived to be 97, you’re wondering, why am I watching this? Because it goes on and on and there is no particular point.
Are the uplifting moments enough to overcome the torture scenes?
There are about two uplifting minutes in the film at the very end where they show some footage of the real Louis Zamperini, and where they tell you what happened to him, and that is very uplifting. It’s very well done.
There are reasons they call it the greatest generation and this film at its best reminds you of them.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
