Unbroken - I was broken after this turkey

Rating: 3/10 (12 October 2019)

Other reviewers have been very eloquent and specific in their reviews and I cannot match their perceptiveness but I have to leave some review to state how disappointed I was with this very poor film which could have been a cinema classic if the book had been adapted in a better way.
This film will have huge appeal for sadomasochists as a great proportion of it was taken up with men being hit with a stick and punched in the the face, suffering unspeakable punishments and terrible hardships.
I feel embarrassed if this was an attempt by Jolie to show that women could make as good a movie as men, book by a woman, directed/produced by a woman, and casting director. It's ironic that Jolie seems to have targeted this directly at Academy awards looking for a big scoop yet the only Oscar nominations went to men and Alliance of Women Film Journalists nominated it for Movie You Wanted to Love, But Just Couldn't. There are great female directors but this wasn't one to remember. The book by all accounts is a massive best-seller and Laura's two non-fiction books, this one and Sea Biscuit, have sold over 10 million copies and Unbroken has 28,000 reviews on Amazon almost all 5 stars whereas this film averages just over 50% on Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes.
I can only imagine the Coen brothers must be mortified to be involved with this film as the screenplay was truly dreadful and I suspect the brothers put their name to it and took a cheque. The film did make money as I think the box office went well off the back off big names, a great story and book, and massive PR and marketing.
I love gritty war films, tales of great human endeavour, strength and courage, guts and determination, athletics, triumph over adversity, true story - this book had it all, the film had all the potential ingredients of a historic top 100 greatest films of all time in the genre of The great escape, Forrest Gump, Castaway, Hacksaw Ridge, Shawshank, Green mile, Saving private Ryan, but Jolie ruined it and she churned out a TV 'B' movie which dragged on and on and an inspirational life story was turned into a monotonous bland documentary with lots of gratuitous violence.
Yes we get it the Japanese prison warden was a cruel evil man but the story had more to offer than an hour of beatings and blood. The book reported that Watanabe stated the prisoners were 'enemies of Japan' so the film reiterated this mantra ad nauseam. These men were confined in close quarters together for months on end in awful conditions, in a liferaft, in various prisons and camps and yet there was nothing but the briefest, unemotional dialogues of the "pass me the salt old boy" type. There was no character development or relationships and bonds. Staring at photos of loved ones with a glycerine tear running down the cheek is a very poor substitute for great dialogue and acting and makes for a low-quality film. The hair and makeup was a joke as a nobody grew a beard after a month in a liferaft or in remote prison cells. None of the men outside of the main stars got any dialogue and just moped around looking dirty and glum and then when forced to punch our hero in the face they hit him as hard as they possibly could then moped away again. The important scenes of drama and emotion were very poor and the whole film really felt like a docu-drama as opposed to making a great story into a great film. The casting was poor as the main characters were picked for looks and the ability to look skinny when starved rather than any acting ability, in particular Watanabe was especially weak and lacking substance.
If you want some great Japanese war acting go watch Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence and Bridge of the river Kwai and for athletics and war what about Chariots of fire, for bombers what about Dam busters and Memphis Belle.
What a wasted opportunity to make an all-time classic, I only hope a talented, experienced director gets to do a remake one day.
Truly the best part of this film was the beautiful track 'Miracles' by Coldplay but unfortunately you had to wait until the credits rolled to hear it!