Viewed in
2012
Formats
Movie theater
Premise
English boy meets horse, horse goes to war, boy goes to war to look for his horse. You know how this ends if you know it's directed by Steven Spielberg.
Liked
WWI production design
Thoughts
This was one of those films that was good at many things, but nothing really stood out. It was well-acted, had good production value, and well-integrated special effects. The cinematography was very good, and with an excellent production design, it created some haunting images of the WWI trenches in the forever bleak No Man's Land. Clearly, the WWI scenes were the best parts, with a really interesting moment when both sides partner to help out the horse in need.
Some parts of it was cheesy, and other parts were simply implausible. But Spielberg still has his fastball with the boy-and-his-dog stuff that I couldn't help but succumb to its emotional payoff at the end, even when I knew how it will turn out.
Had it not been directed by Mr. Spielberg, I probably wouldn't have bothered to watch War Horse. It was a good movie. But the fact that it got nominated for best picture is either A) an indication of the dearth of elite films in 2011, or B) questions the Academy's decision-making that year (Drive wasn't even nominated).
