tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6937848248469121586.post7680019637955243297..comments2023-12-24T19:38:00.242-08:00Comments on Mendelson's Memos: Review: War Horse (2011) is pure, unapologetic old-school melodrama.Scott Mendelsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08131426080984100749noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6937848248469121586.post-66024984281658727602012-01-19T18:46:42.605-08:002012-01-19T18:46:42.605-08:00I don't think this was a stallion.I don't think this was a stallion.Mhkansasnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6937848248469121586.post-56261267047496570922011-12-30T18:30:55.219-08:002011-12-30T18:30:55.219-08:00This movie was very disappointing to me also. Num...This movie was very disappointing to me also. Number one, the accents made alot of the dialogue unintelligible.<br />Many characters were introduced, but none were developed enough for the viewer to care a great deal about. Poor<br />Emma Watson was really wasted here. The young man who starred was adequate but far from compelling.<br />This is probably a personal bias,but the method of warfare was so outrageously stupid I found it extremely hard to<br />watch. Add to that the long vista shots and swelling music just seemed completely contrived, and forced. I was<br />embarrassed for Mr Spielberg.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />wLibbynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6937848248469121586.post-66836183251121478292011-12-28T07:13:59.707-08:002011-12-28T07:13:59.707-08:00As a horse lover I really wanted to love this movi...As a horse lover I really wanted to love this movie and dipped into a very tight budget to go to see it. Unfortunately I was hugely disappointed with this movie. I found it schmaltzy and over-wrought and often ridiculous. It was mystifying why each caretaker along the way immediately recognized the horse as exceptional - his life story and his intelligence, which none knew in full or at first glance, is what made him special, not the way he looked. For me this was particularly irritating in the case of the grandfather. Also, except for plowing the field and saving his friend from having to pull a cannon to his death (a bit of anthropomorphism that almost made me laugh), the horse really does nothing particularly heroic. It was the people who tried to spare him misery along the way who were heroic. The horse did what horses do - respond to kindness and try to survive. The episodic structure of the film added to my distaste. None - except perhaps the first - were allowed to develop well enough for me to understand why the people involved acted and felt as they did. They were brief - with no effort to suggest the passage of time beyond a day or two that may have justified the devotion the horse stirred in the characters - again especially the grandfather.<br /><br />I rarely have the opportunity to actually go out to a movie in a theater and sadly I feel that this one was miserably wasted.Linet_shorenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6937848248469121586.post-85367313553929914342011-12-27T22:19:02.703-08:002011-12-27T22:19:02.703-08:00Just saw this movie today (12/27/2011) and agree w...Just saw this movie today (12/27/2011) and agree with Scott Mendelson's reivew. A few things really bothered me beyond what is in this review. First, when Joey finally plows the field, it is done wrong. Fields are plowed across a hill, never up and down the hill. The reason is actually shown later in the movie but not really for the right reason. If you plow up and down a hill, when it rains, the water can run down the rows and ruin the crop, here though we are show the crops being ruined not because of how the field was plowed but only because the field flooded. This bothers me as if the family did this on their own it could be believable. But the whole town of villagers were watching them plow the field. None of them would have know the error? I think this is a fairly big oversight. It was done to show the horse could pull a plow up a hill. But it thumbs its nose at what is fairly basic agricultural know how and these were farmers. Another issue for me was the lighting in the film really bothered me at times. A lot of scenes had the sun behind the subjects and while it is common to light the subjects to improve the contrast, it seemed the color temperature of the lights was off a fair amount of the time; enough certainly to bother me. When there is a yellowish sun behind the subjects, I would not expect to see a much whiter light highlighting the subjects. Last, in one of the indoor barn scenes, the stone walls of the building just looked way to fake. Seemed to have been done in a way that would be similar to a high school production. Perhaps this all says something about the film that I nit-picked. If I had been thoroughly captivated by War Horse, perhaps I'd never had noticed these things. But as it is, I was just unsettled enough by the whole affair that I started picking it apart which is something I normally don't do with films. <br /><br />As Mr. Mendelson said, War Horse is a good movie, but I don't think it is a great film either. The hype has been much larger than what the movie actually is. It is not a bad film at all. But I have seen better this year, including another film that Spielberg had a hand in, which was Super 8. That movie is actually a film I'll watch a few more times. War Horse was most definitely a one-and-done affair for me.MidwestMildManneredMannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6937848248469121586.post-36399522920499451122011-12-25T04:05:58.794-08:002011-12-25T04:05:58.794-08:00Locations are all British, by the way, rather than...Locations are all British, by the way, rather than 'European' - the entire film was shot in England.Peter_Pedantnoreply@blogger.com