War Horse/2011
Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Peter Mullan, Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson, Niels Arestrup, David Thewlis, Tom Hiddleston
The Film: War Horse is a handsome horse -his film is a handsome film. If it seems like Steven Spielberg raided the foreign acting pool to loot the best talent money and reputation can get you.... he did. Peter Mullan, Niels Arestrup, (wonderful in A Prophet) Emily Watson, David Thewlis, and Tom Hiddleston (great in Midnight in Paris - less great here) all give this new film an air of distinction - even if the rest of the movie stinks.
The so-called War Horse, Joey (also known as The Miracle Horse ) is basically a galloping curse on the war-torn battlefields, valleys, and rat-infested trenches of WWI-era Europe. As the film runs it's wandering course, and as Joey trades hands and national allegiances, (there were two types of people during Spielberg's version of WWI... people who either fall hopelessly in love with Joey at first sight, or mean to torture him to death) it's apparent that to find Joey, to ride on Joey's comfortable back, to feed him, to love him, to feel his warm muzzle press up against your frozen face on a cold night... is a death sentence.
Misery, suffering, and excruciating destruction are Joey's gifts to mankind.
Though the film would argue that a horse - a very, very, special miracle horse - could remind us what it means to be human in a place as corruptable and inhuman as a World War... I would like to point out that Joey is an obvious omen of doom. That to love him is suicide, and in that respect, he fits in perfectly with the theme happening in France during 1914.
Every bad instinct we thought Spielberg shed after making Schindler's List is in War Horse like a great, malignant infection. Throbbing boils of melodrama and weeping sores of shmaltz and one-dimensional characters score the skin of the film like rotten disease. Whatever bad mood Steve was in when he created great films like Jaws, Schindler's List, Saving Private Ryan, A.I., Catch Me If You Can, and Munich...?
That season has passed fans. Although you could argue that a little bit of that guy leaked into the much better The Adventures of Tintin... War Horse got nothing but dross.
If this is a PG-13 film - a Spielberg PG-13 film, which usually means Temple of Doom levels of violence and content (they invented the rating because of this guy after all) - why does it feel so Norman Rockwell? So Disney afterschool special? And why does The Adventures of Tintin - a PG family film - seem so adult by comparison?
War Horse poses the question if a war movie can be made strictly from the point of view of a horse. War Horse is proof that it can. But maybe we should now wonder if a good war movie can be made from the point of view of a horse? Maybe it can't.
And if you're going to treat said horse as if he were Lassie - and give him human traits like courage, sacrifice, honor, and love - while still trying to create an authentic war film...?
You're kidding yourself. Worse yet - you're kidding your audience. We're not this stupid yet. Some of us may pay fifty bucks to see Breaking Dawn five times in the theater, some of us may even attack fellow holiday shoppers with a lightsaber, but most of us will never believe that a horse will sacrifice itself for the life and health of another horse. And that's not a spoiler folks. Joey breaks the barrier between animal and human acuity routinely. Prepare to have your suspension of belief crushed into rubble.
The Verdict: As a Spielberg film, War Horse joins the proud legacy of the director's movies like Hook, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and The Terminal, where a master filmmaker went completely off his head and spawned bastards instead of treasures.
War Horse is a bastard.
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