Were this film not directed by Angelina Jolie , would the public received it better?!

Rating: 9/10 (3 January 2016)

Saw this movie for the third time last night and found myself still in the same awe as the first time. The opening scene, with the bombing, still gives me goosebumps. The characters are heart- robbing. It's so finely, touchingly played, you can see into the depths of their sufferance also through some other techniques ( lights, the silence that replaces all words, the great make-up, Louie's fainting when he meets his torturer again), the main character's evolution from an optimistic light-hearted young man to a wordless, lustreless shadow , a nearly walking-dead and, of course, the powerful, tearing scene ( nearly close to the Passion of the Christ) of the final confrontation between victim and torturer which stays not in the muscles and physical abilities as it may seem ( and usually is in all the villain- hero confrontations) but in the duel of their looks. If it were not for the ridiculous beards they "grew" when floating endlessly on the raft, I would say the film is perfect. And, let me say now, coming out of the "hands"of a woman...wow!