Fury
Starring: Brad Pitt, Logan Lerman, Shia LaBeouf
Directed By: David Ayer
Reviewed by Brendan Dousi
[Rating: 3/5]
If you’ve found yourself wondering to yourself, “Wow, they need to make another World War 2 film!” then you’re definitely in luck. It seems year after year there’s always going to be a couple of films to add to the good ol’ ‘War Film’ genre. No one can blame Writer/Director David Ayer, or any of the others, it’s a rich and pivotal time in our recent history that is rife with conflict and drama, a scenario set out to test the very fabric of humanity. But, have we not seen it all by now? Any and all possible takes on World War 2 must already have been taken to film, right? Well, all that’s left to do is see if Ayer will be able to surprise and delight with a unique and interesting perspective on the great war, or if he is simply adding another stock-standard film into the already bloated genre.
Fury is the name given to one of the American tanks that was occupying Germany towards the end of the second World War. The film follows the rag-tag group of soldiers in charge of running the tank. Led by Don ‘Wardaddy’ Collier (Brad Pitt), this particular group has miraculously avoided any casualties of war, but a battle gone wrong sees one of their owns face (literally) blown off and the honour of replacing him goes to the innocent and horridly inexperienced Norman (Logan Lerman). Tensions grow as the group puts Norman through his paces and a brotherly-bond grows as the horrors of war deepen. All of this may be for naught, however, as the superior German tanks close in and Fury finds itself stranded deep within enemy territory.
Fury has some really good scenes, some relatively unique set-pieces and amazing performances to prop itself up on. Unfortunately, it also succumbs to a lot of war-film cliché, muddy character arcs and a level of uncertainty of what it wants to say about the war it’s depicting and the characters caught in the middle of it. There is also an intense level of violence, which at first was actually quite affecting and shocking. You got the sense that you were truly seeing the horrors of war. But, unfortunately, as the film goes on this sense of shock wanes and the excessive levels of violence seem to border on gratuitous as heads explode left and right from tank fire.
Fury is disturbing, bleak yet beautiful in its own way and certainly has value in watching, unfortunately it also has a large number of flaws that needed ironing out and these bog the film down, preventing it from reaching the lofty heights it was clearly aiming for. Come for the war-porn, but stay for the Pitt, Lerman and LaBeouf. The performances truly ground this film, even though half the time it sounds like everyone’s talking with cotton balls in their mouths.
