Fury

I never served in the military.  I never had to go to war.  So, when I watch a war movie, I can never know for sure what it is getting right and what it is portraying falsely.  Given what data I have, however, Fury struck me as doing a pretty good job of showing some of the horrors, the camaraderie, the general fucked-up nature of what people on the sharp end have to deal with, and most of all, the strange mixture of adrenaline and numbness of combat and the times before and after battle.

Fury is not the sort of WWII movie I grew up watching.  Filthy, brutal, and costly to all involved, the film gives you an idea of the prices soldiers pay.  Brad Pitt is superb as Wardaddy in a performance as nuanced and complete as anything we've ever seen from him.  Shia LaBeouf, whose acting I usually dislike, here turns in an excellent portrayal of a deeply religious soldier who is also a stone killer when the job demands he be one.  Michael Pena and Jon Bernthal, the other two regulars in Wardaddy's tank, are similarly strong.  Logan Lerman, the fresh meat thrown in with them, is the weakest of the group, but he still does a good job.

The film beats you over and over with its violence, the pain we feel the tiniest shadow of what the men of the tank Fury must endure.  As you would expect, no happy ending awaits us in this movie, and what happiness we see is laced with irony.

You have to be willing to endure the ride, and it is a rough one, but if you are, Fury is a very good movie, one well worth seeing--and one well worth remembering the next time you consider what it will cost us to send anyone into battle.