This film is okay

Rating: 5/10 (11 December 2016)

This film is unexceptional in many ways but I think exceeds in some areas.
The acting is fine. Andrew Garfield is good, though the character is not one which really gives him much room to display a whole lot of nuance given how simply he is written. There is nothing wrong with the character per say, just that it can be a little underdeveloped. Speaking of underdeveloped characters, the romantic interest in this film is completely bland and pointless. The girl that Andrew Garfield's character is with comes across more like a prop than an actual character and there was no sense that she had any other motivation besides serving the arc of the main character. As far as the rest of the cast is concerned everyone did fine and Hugo Weaving completely stole the show.
As far as the film making is concerned Mel Gibson is competent in most everything. There was a choice he made for the audio though which came across as a bit goofy. I understand the effect that it's meant to have on the scenes they're in, but they end up being executed in a way which sort of has an opposite effect. The one way in which Gibson really excels is in his portrayal of violence. It is frank and shocking. He really goes the extra mile to illustrate the horrors of the battlefield and given the arc of the main character it greatly compliments the war part of the film to show the consequences of war in gut wrenching detail. Overall though, I don't think that the stunning violence is really worth it to see this film in its entirety, and it might be best to either pass or if you do decide to watch it, skip any of the romance because those scenes are pretty much worthless and add nothing to the story.