Film review: War Horse (12A)

Published on Tuesday 10 January 2012 00:00

MUCH as I loved Pig In The City, horses have a distinct advantage over their porcine pals, along with sheep, cows and chickens.

They look noble beasts, even when they are really just compacting something for the roses. In movie terms, a horse is very like putting Olivia de Havilland in Gone With The Wind. On screen, horses and de Havilland are sweetfaced thoroughbreds, and only a French butcher would allow a mean thought to cross the mind.

Steven Spielberg’s War Horse already has one thing going for it then, as it approaches the gate. Furthermore, it is based on a best-selling children’s book and an award-winning National Theatre play. But just as you wouldn’t bet on Olivia de Havilland in the 4.30, sometimes even a sure thing can stumble in the wrong arena.

This is not a bad film, just an odd fit, where Spielberg, a feelgood jockey, is given the reins for an attempt to communicate the bleak realities of the First World War, and the result is a film that pulls heartstrings yet comes up short on authentic emotional power.

War Horse is at its most schematic in the first half hour, which tracks a thoroughbred from birth to horse market, where he is bought as a colt from under the nose of a cartoonishly mean landlord (David Thewlis) by a thrawn Devon farmer (Peter Mullan). Joey is a born racehorse but as Mrs Narracott (Emily Watson) bluntly notes, what the farm needs is a workhorse capable of pulling a plough. Nevertheless their teenage son Albert (Jeremy Irvine) manages to train Joey to accept a plough collar and save their failing farm, only to have his heart broken when his father sells the horse on to a decent cavalry captain (Tom Hiddleston).

The First World War has begun, and although Albert is too young to go to war, Joey is not. After losing Hiddleston in his first battle, the horse passes through several sets of hands both French and German. Some of his owners are benevolent, others brutal, but no-one hangs on to his reins for long.

An overhead shot of human and horse corpses littering French farmland is one of the most striking images of War Horse, but none of the war scenes here is as bloody as the opening of Saving Private Ryan because, of course, War Horse is aimed at young adults. It’s unlikely that very young children could sit through this two-and-a-half hour tour de horse, while adults may whinny at the pile-up of coincidences, a drawn-out equine deathbed scene, and the cyclic plotting of Black Beauty with bayonets. When Albert teaches Joey to come to him when he whistles, you know just what noise will be reuniting them further down the line.

Above all, if you are allergic to sentimentality and show-off effects (Spielberg shoots the modest Devon farm as if it is Tara) then you may need steroids during some scenes. Rather ruthlessly, when Joey passes through the hands of a bossy sickly French girl and her doting grandfather, I wondered if their end couldn’t arrive a little sooner. On the other hand, writers Lee Hall and Richard Curtis shape a nice exchange between a German and a British soldier when they join forces to free Joey from a barbed wire nest. There are echoes of the famous 1917 Christmas football game, but more than that their exchange is small-scale, rueful and ironic, qualities that War Horse could have used more often. «

War Horse (12A)

Director: Steven Spielberg

Running time: 146 minutes

****

On general release from Friday

Comments

There are 2 comments to this article

Order by:

• Newest first
• |
• Oldest first

Page 1 of 1

• 1
• Show all

2

[e-mail]

Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 01:48 AM

If that's your idea of a bad film mate, you clearly don't go out more than once a year. Not the best, but certainly not the worst

• Report Unsuitable

1

josephlafferty

Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 07:44 PM

I have seen this film in america. It is complete rubbish and probably the worst film I ever paid to see. Read the financial times review. 1 star out of 5 and that was generous

• Report Unsuitable

Order by:

• Newest first
• |
• Oldest first

Page 1 of 1

• 1
• Show all

Logged in as:

Comment here. Start typing your comment here:

Post comment

Please adhere to our Community guidelines

Your view

Please sign in to be able to comment on this story.