With time between Tolkien Middle-Earth and late Beatles-mania projects, Peter Jackson got in the trenches with WWI vets for this remarkable documentary largely sourced from long unseen actuality footage shot (in more ways than one) at The Front - 1914 to 1918, now moldering in London’s Imperial War Museum. Mountains of century-old film less restored than resurrected using a mix of digital enhancement techniques to clean, stabilize, pan/scan and colorize. The efforts undeniably interventionist; the results entirely involving, especially for nonspecialists unused to watching ‘thru’ visually compromised antique elements. Yet Jackson’s true masterstroke not visual but aural, pulling us in with the exclusive use of recorded interviews by real WWI veterans to tell their story. No officer’s offering the broader picture, battle plans or grand strategies, but a grunt’s viewpoint, narrowly focused on getting thru the next watch or special operation. Often brutally coarse, disinterested in the big picture, but the real thing. Mesmerizing, and withal the gore & terrors, holding a terrible beauty in the memory of battle horrors seen clearly.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Jackson took eight hours to get thru THE HOBBIT. (And considerably more in the extended cuts.) Yet manages WWI in an hour and 38 minutes.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: Made while memories were fresh and sound technology rapidly advancing, the 1930 version of ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT/’30 remains an astonishing achievement, far superior to the much lauded, oddly unfaithful recent remake. But since that’s the one covered on this site . . . (Both films taken up in the post.) https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2023/01/all-quiet-on-wewstern-front-2022.html
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