Gives you the meat and potatoes but forgot to heat them up

Rating: 6/10 (10 January 2015)

I felt somehow vindicated when the first review on IMDb I saw was from a user who said exactly what I felt. This is a powerful and inspiring story but poorly adapted for the big screen. It is gritty and visually very disturbing with some potentially powerful scenes but it feels too harsh and lacks emotional depth or heart. It just has no warmth and I don't mean that story about a POW war camp should be warm and fuzzy but when you're trying to appeal to people's sense of hope and heroism and unbreakable spirit...don't just constantly show the torture. The characters are very underdeveloped and you need to relate to these guys. It is a powerful story and the acting is decent and the style is very good but the script...sort of sucks. You almost feel bad saying that because of the content of the story and I honestly assumed a film like this would be a surefire hit for me because I love War stories like Saving Private Ryan, WarHorse or The Book Thief. I kept waiting to feel something...whether it be anger or fear or hope or sadness but I just watched like I would watch a straight forward informative documentary. I just wanted more and this didn't provide it for me. Finally after two hours of the film you get one incredible scene that moved me. Why did it take so long to get there?
Everyone who stars in this film is good. No one gives a terrible performance. The problem is that no one stands out on their own. All the POW's are the same, all the captors are the same and its a 2 1/2 hour ode to watching them go through torture. Jack O'Connell gives a good performance but I can't call it a leading performance because the character isn't given enough. We know he's an Olympian and showing us a few minor scenes from his childhood doesn't make us understand him any better. Domhnall Gleeson, Garrett Hedlund and Jai Courtney are good in their roles but I promise you unless you know these guys to see them you wouldn't be able to tell which role they played. That's how generic their characters are. I can't honestly say they even captured the brotherhood between them very well although it wasn't terrible. Takamasa Ishihara is okay as sort of the "head" captor in the camp. This should be a pivotal and villainous role but it is as generic as the rest.
Now it sounds like I'm trashing the film and I'm not entirely. I think I can completely understand what Angelina Jolie was trying to do with this film. As I said a couple of times, the way it is short is very nearly brilliant. Its so grey and depressing and gritty. The dust in the air and the damp, awful POW conditions are shown perfectly. I think she really focused all her energy on making that aspect of this story come to life. She wanted to make it feel real. But I think what an experienced film director would tell you is that you need more than that to connect with your audience. Even the score of the film wasn't grand enough to move you when it should. Jolie absolutely has an eye for artistic style but she needs to see the film from our perspective. I'm a little surprised the Coen Brothers helped write this script, although I've always thought they're a tad over-rated. They do know how to really show off some character depth so I'm not sure what happened here. Maybe I'm missing the point but I've been utterly, devastatingly moved by other World War 2 films and this one just sort of gave me a half decent story and then said goodbye. Average at best. 6/10