FOOTE (****)
On stage the horses are created with puppets, which I understand is rather effective. The same sort of thing was accomplished with Equus in the seventies, when actors wore crowns that looked like the head of a horse and stood on hooves to create the illusion of a horse. It was a stunning effect, that when they made the film of Equus (1977) they left the illusion behind and went with real horses, which makes perfectly good sense. But the play was a deeply religious work, metaphorical, the imagery of man merged with horse essential to its message, so while Richard Burton and Peter Firth gave excellent, Oscar nominated performances in the film, the picture never quite captured the power of the stage play.
Spielberg’s film does, and more.
Though I do not place War Horse on a level with Schindler’s List (1998), it cannot be denied that the picture is one of the directors’ best and certainly one of the finest of the year. Spielberg seems to continue to grow as a filmmaker, leaving the debacle that was Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) a distant memory with this stunning new film that is among the most beautifully shot films of the year. Of course we do not go to the movies to look at the scenery, there must be a story with it and safe to say the one that goes along with War Horse is a deeply moving saga set against the backdrop of World War One. How many great films are there about that First World War?
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Tags: best picture, emily watson, film reviews, jeremy irvine, Niels Arestrup, Oscar hopeful, reviews, Steven Spielberg, war horse
