I’m watching this now. What an absolute delight. Thanks so much for linking this for me.
I think that’s war movie. It’s largely based on a war.
I haven’t seen it. I can’t… bring myself to see it. I try to see one or 2 WW2 movies a year. This year was Defiance, but… I can’t disconnect from the monstrosities, especially in today’s climate.
I put it in my list and think it is a fantastic film.
I also have no intention of rewatching it for another 6-8 years, when my son is older and I sit him down to watch it. I can’t do it.
Everyone should watch it once. Once is more than enough. So I totally get why you can’t do it, it is a raw and emotional film that understandably is too much for some.
You guys reminded me, I consider this one in some ways better than Schindler’s List, as least insofar as Spielberg didn’t indulge his penchant for overwrought sentimentality:
Yeah the weird thing is is that one has a lot of positives in it alongside the ugly but from what I gather, that one is going to stick with me even more because it was so well done and purposeful and ugh…
But I know when we talk War films most think soldiers and @Navaronegun kept the definition wide open, which I like. Like everyone else, there are movies in the list of others that I haven’t seen for years. I am fairly certain I saw The Thin Red Line years ago. I think that was a hard one to get through too so minimal repeat watching there.
It’s like The Killing Fields too. The atrocities and human cruelty are almost unwatchable. But how can one say it isn’t a “War Film”? It’s all about war. Multiple wars in fact (Cambodian Lon Nol Govt. v Khmer Rouge, Khmer Rouge v Vietnam…all with the Vietnam War dancing silent in the background). But so is Raid on Entebbe, an “adventure” Commando episode. Just different perspectives on different parts of War, right?
Very hard hitting film. Kind of lost in the shuffle at the time. It had a very ambiguous take on the events it depicted.
I haven’t seen Munich, I thought that wasn’t a very highly regarded film.
It’s a really good film. I think certain folks on both sides of the political spectrum didn’t appreciate its ambiguity. They wanted polemics.
It received mostly favorable reviews, but it’s not as tightly constructed as a lot of Spielberg’s films and I think a lot of critics were put off by the fact that it deliberately doesn’t try to answer the hard questions it asks.
I forget the details, I just was under the impression that Munich was considered “lesser Spielberg” for whatever reason. I’ll try to check it out.
In this sense, I think its because he kept it historical…and messy. Would you agree?
Yes, I think that’s fair.
It was a pretty good film. It’s not at all a war film though; it’s a spy thriller. It also has one of the worst sex scenes ever filmed.
This is true. Though I would say the many scenes in Lebanon during the Civil War qualify it for “War Film” status.
Not to mention the visual reference to the War on Terror at the end.
I thought Munich was ok at best, and definitely an action/spy film not a war film. I’m fine with classifying Schindler’s List as a war film. It just seems to me that it, and the almost as good Life is Beautiful (@Nesrie this may be an easier film to watch), Killing Fields, Sophie Choice, Emperor of the Sun all fall into another category, Holocaust films. (Or maybe just serious films by Steven Spielberg )
I might have to check that out. I do try and experience this critically acclaimed films but I have to be ready for it and, yikes, you can’t prepare for some of this stuff. I know what happened but sometimes the visuals just do a number.
The Killing Fields isn’t the Holocaust though. If there was another genre, it would probably be in the genre like those, maybe.
I agree, and I go on and on earlier in the thread about, even my namesake Film, is to me, an Action Film that you could call a War Film.
What fascinates me is how this exercise becomes a Rorschach test and how broadly that term “War Film” reaches.
Films about Genocide? I’m honestly not going to pursue that particular line of discussion and thought any further. Too depressing.