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| (Universal) |
Angelina
Jolie’s Unbroken depicts torture, starvation,
sadism and brutality with appropriate grit and relentlessness. Its intentions
are wholly noble, telling a story of triumph, will and perseverance without a
shred of irony or cynicism. It’s also beautifully-done; the great Roger Deakins
finds a way to evoke the penetrating boundlessness of the open sea and the
dirty claustrophobia of a POW camp with equal levels of success, and a hefty
studio budget allows Jolie to stage some impressively-mounted set pieces.
Jolie
is competent and reasonably assured. But her Unbroken seems to have confused important with serious, and glory
with sap. In fashioning Laura Hillenbrand’s biography of Louis Zamperini,
an Olympic runner who underwent unthinkably traumatic experiences in World War
II, for the screen, the actress-turned-director carries out an exceedingly-narrow
vision. Her goal to merely honor Zamperini’s legacy is quelled by
easily-accessible material (including Hillenbrand’s book) that digs into the extraordinary
man with more depth. Her harsh albeit surface-level depiction of wartime
torture and severity is handily outdone by recent Spielberg-ian efforts
including Saving Private Ryan and The Pacific, and in canonical works such
as David Lean’s Bridge on the River Kwai
(1957) – Spielberg and Lean, among many others, match Jolie in grit and intensity,
but possess the vital moral inquiry that she lacks.
Unbroken
is monotonous as a two-note film – misery, triumph, misery, triumph, misery,
triumph – blatantly uninterested in anything especially complex or provocative.
Films can get by without digging deep – much of its first half, taking place on
a raft as Louis (Jack O’Connell) and two fellow soldiers battle the elements,
recalls a film that did just that in Life
of Pi – but this one is tone-deaf. Jolie gets off to a strong start, a
tense and ambitious aerial sequence in which Louis is fending off enemy fire,
but she abruptly cuts away to the past. Her handling of these flashbacks is embarrassingly
trite and clichéd, and sucks out every degree of impact mined from her opener.
Louis is introduced as a troublemaking kid – his cry of “I’m nothing!” is, apparently, sufficient
explanation as to why – moved by a Priest’s sermon that amounts to “love thy
enemy” and turned around by the sport of track. His brother encourages him with
a painful (and repeated) motivator: “If you can take it, you can make it!” Cue composer
Alexandre Desplat’s amping up the inspirational score. Jolie’s love for this
man runs deep – seriously, when she flashes back to his Olympic run, with the
roaring crowd and unrelenting sense of victory, you’ll have to look and listen
closely to realize he didn’t actually come close to winning.
There
is no argument against the belief in Zamperini as an extraordinary figure. But
Jolie goes to such pains to express this that the point is diluted. He’s
offered escape from the POW camp if he denounces America publicly: he refuses.
Starved and overworked, he’s tasked with holding a thick plank of wood over his
head for hours: he does it. This is the entirety of Unbroken: the film is willing you to exclaim, “Look at what he went
through!” and applaud him for taking it in stride. And yet, as a cheap title
card reminds, Zamperini was diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress and
contended with depression and alcoholism after he returned home. O’Connell is
good here, playing Zamperini with wit and believability. But he’s handed a
cipher, not a character: the toll of war, of what he went through, is glossed over.
Jolie wants you to see him persevere, not legitimately acknowledge and deal
with his inner-life. This is a serious problem, because you never get a sense
of the man being treated like a deity in front of you. In fact, you don’t
really get much of anything except a redundant contrasting of suffering and
willpower.
On
the raft, Jolie acquits herself better. The camaraderie between Louis and the
other survivors is essential, allowing the hardship and worsening conditions to
be felt rather than simply described. Again, even if Jolie’s not doing anything
especially probing or original here, Deakins’ camera keeps things interesting
and the actors – including Domhnall Gleeson of Frank – keep it authentic. It’s the last hour of the film where I threw
my hands in the air. Unbroken keeps Louis
within the confines of POW camps throughout its second half. He is beaten,
starved and humiliated, and the focus is constant and merciless. But: what’s
the point? We get this for over an hour, for the seemingly sole purpose of
identifying just how bad it was for Louis. The content in these scenes
is shocking, purely brutal, and yet entirely empty. Last year, Steve McQueen
went even further in his depictions of torture in 12 Years a Slave, but there was an overriding intent, a visceral
confrontation with history that shook you. In Unbroken, it’s only, “how horrible,” and Jolie doesn’t earn this: the
experience of sitting through the abuse for an hour, with nothing to mull over
or really feel besides senseless horror, ranged on insufferable.
The
script is credited principally to Joel and Ethan Coen, and their voices are so
distant from the final product that I have to think the rewrites by Richard Lagravense
and William Nicholson took the movie in a more digestible direction. But, even
so: these are four accomplished and distinguished writers, and yet the film’s
script emerges as hollow, with dialogue excessively-wooden and structure
somewhat shapeless. There seems to be intrigue and an attempt at commentary in
the relationship between Louis and “The Bird,” the sadistic POW camp commanding
officer played well by Japanese musician Miyavi. There’s a wonderfully
understated – a genuine rarity here – moment in which The Bird tells Louis, a
man he’d beaten to numbing effect, with deep and unexpected sadness that he is
leaving, and must bid farewell to his “friends.” The captor/captive narrative
is approached here, as the script hints at its mutually-corrupting nature. But
the approach stops. In looking upon its subject in awe, this film is solely
dedicated to paying tribute. Consequentially, there’s no room for a grey area. There’s
no perspective here, no real purpose – and it’s not an enjoyable viewing
experience, either. If you didn’t know how horrible the war was, I guess there’s
something in here for you. Unbroken
is sometimes a classically generic and well-mounted “great man” biopic, but Jolie
egregiously mistakes the mere presence of suffering for artistic value and
importance. Simultaneously, then, her film is dull and excruciating, honoring a
man without ever digging even an inch below the surface.
Grade: D+