Very high contrast of pre- and post-war lives

Rating: 7/10 (30 November 2015)

The movie is indeed a great work, portraying the contrast of pre-war and post-war lives of the characters. The movie took the long way in planting the pre-war lives into the audiences' minds, that the contrast in the post-war only need a few sequences to make. The war scenes are also greatly done. This feels somewhat special since the movie doesn't depict much on the war side. Yet the movie succeeded in exploiting the more dangerous side of war, the psychological side of it. The whole psychological game of the Russian roulette gets to be the nice metaphor, getting repeated several times along the movie. The acting overall is just great. Robert DeNiro did great in applying the the right level of his role's emotions. Christopher Walken balanced DeNiro's work perfectly, pulling the audience into the their characters' relationship. Meryl Streep did well in putting live in the state-side sequences.