12/25/14: UNBROKEN REVIEW! (Spoiler Free)

So I used up my Christmas spending time at the movies, the big one being Angelina Jolie's Unbroken. the unbelievable true story about Louis Zamperini from Olympic athlete to survivor of 47 days floating in the Pacific Ocean and years as a POW at a Japanese prison camp during World War II. So, does Unbroken live up to the story in which it focuses on or does it break like I would probably do in Zamperini's shoes? Let's find out:

Unbroken Fact Box
Genre(s):  Biography, Drama
Running Time: 137 min (2 hr 17 min)
Starring: Jack O'Connell, Takamasa Ishihara and Domhnall Gleeson
Summary: The extraordinary tale of a man who wouldn't let himself be broken, fighting to survive 47 days out in sea and years at a Japanese prison camp.
Rating: PG-13
Release Date(s): December 25, 2014
Source: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1809398/?ref_=inth_ov_tt

Director: Angelina Jolie (also directed In the Land of Blood and Honey)
Writers: Joel and Ethan Coen, Richard LaGravenese and William Nicholson

Brief Plot Overview: Italian-American Louis Zamperini starts as a troubled youth who smokes, drinks, steals and gets into fights. As you can probably guess, his parents aren't too happy about this, and as much as they try to discipline him, his older brother starts getting him to run after discovering he's good. He helps him train, and it pushes him into a high school superstar.
Eventually, he reaches the Olympic level and although he didn't win, he ran his last lap the fastest. When World War II came around, he joined a position in a B-52 bomber. While flying over the ocean, the plane malfunctions, resulting in a brutal plane crash, in which only three survive---Louis, Mac (Finn Wittrock) and Phil (Domhnall Gleeson)---and are stuck together on a raft in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. 47 days of eating raw fish, fighting against sharks, getting shot at by a standalone Japanese plane and surviving storms, they wash up onto an island holding a Japanese prison camp as POWs. Louis is eventually separated and is on his own, struggling in prison camp against the sadistic leader nicknamed "The Bird" (Takamasa Ishihara) who wants to break him. But Louis won't let him and is willing to fight till the end.

What I Liked: Angelina Jolie's a decent actress, but I was glad to say I was impressed by her first major film directorial job. It was shot well, capturing the scale of the setting and the size of the story, which could've only been done by a good director. Sure she isn't the best director in the world, but it was still nice for someone who acts for a majority of the time. Speak of acting, the acting is pretty nice, especially by O'Connell who played out the spirit of the star. The movie kept maintaining the incredible story of this unbreakable man and his journey of "survival, resilience and redemption." Jolie was good with the big picture and telling the story, but the details and the conveyance matter as well.

What I Disliked: First off: the writing. The writing was terrible. And the Coen Brothers, the geniuses behind Fargo, No Country for Old Men and The Big Lebowski, that were well-written films, just filled the script with utter crap. I'm sorry.
There's no better way to say it. It's all just inspirational mumbo jumbo that does nothing but build on the message of the story: become unbreakable, which is so shoved down on our throats by the end it's really irritating. Next up is the character development. Look, I know Louis's the star, but at least build on some other characters while you're at it. One second I see the dad spanking his son and the next he's giving him a standing ovation and by the end he's hugging him like he hasn't seen him in years (okay, he actually hadn't seen him in years). I didn't know he even had sisters. And there's no brother anymore by the end, even though he picked him up from trouble and brought him to the track. Everyone---even "The Bird" and his best friend Phil---are pretty one-dimensional. The last and definitely least thing is the beard. He goes from shaved to little beard to lots of beard to shaved to little beard to big beard. HOW COULD'VE HE SHAVED DURING HIS TIME AT THE PRISON CAMPS? It was a small thing, but it stood out for me. Also did I mention it was predictable and cheesy? Amazing story nevertheless, but that's really the thing that holds the movie together. Without it, well, it wouldn't even be a movie.

Conclusion: The writing and characters could've had some major improvements, but overall it was a well-made film that told the journey of one man who wouldn't give up in a "big picture" type manner.

Rating:

7 out of 10