Loud, bombastic, overblown

Rating: 5/10 (12 February 2020)

Sadly, not even the fine ensemble cast which included Patrick Wilson, Woody Harrelson, Dennis Quaid, and Aaron Eckhart could save this bombastic, overblown, overloud film.
While the movie appears to be historically accurate with regard to the main events leading up to and including the Battle of Midway, what spoilt it for me were the usual heroic tropes that Hollywood movies of this type can't resist including. You know the ones: the loud-mouthed, boastful, overconfident jock who inevitably matures over the course of the film to be a real 'stand up guy'; or the man who suffers a failure of nerve, only to rise to the occasion after the obligatory morale-boosting speech. These, and other recurrent themes plague big budget movies of this sort, and come straight out of Hollywood's giant book of cinema clichÃ©s.
Compared to 1917, the excellent World War I film directed by Sam Mendes, Midway will almost certainly be forgotten once it disappears from your local megaplex- only to return year after year on our television screens to mark the date of the actual Battle of Midway.
If you have a real interest in the events covered by this film, I recommend searching online for documentaries about the Battle of Midway, where you will get the facts without the bombastic grandstanding, and overblown heroics