War Horse Review | 2011 Movie by Steven Spielberg

Today I had the opportunity to indulge in a HD Blu Ray copy of this War Horse movie. I had not seen it before but had heard it titled as Steven Spielberg’s Masterpiece. As a fan of many Spielberg movies that quote certainly got me interested. Unfortunately I suffered a nervous breakdown in early 2012 so it has taken me quite a while to get back into movies but now that I have seen this film, here is my honest review. From the little I had heard about the film, I still refused to get on the band wagon about how this film was sure to be about a horse. Even if that statement was to be proven true I still believed it would be something more special than a film with a horse as the main star. It was I that was proven correct. This movie is more about the people who were involved within the horses life. Kind of like the owners of an unusual car, the car is pretty much irrelevant but each owner of that car has a life story. The movie starts with the birth of the Colt and sees him sold at auction, unbroken, to a farmer who’s drunken state sees him arrogantly outbid his own landlord. Even though the farmer overspent, he had intended to buy a horse that day but not this type. He needed a horse capable of ploughing a field and this type of horse was not it, or was it? Things start going downhill for the farmer and then the story get’s going. All in all, the horse gets involved with maybe a dozen or more people throughout war time Europe through various people from all walks of life but I will not go into details about all that as I do not wish to give out spoilers.

“Something I should mention before going into other aspects of this movie. About 18months ago we bought a new TV with 200 hertz refresh rate. Every film we watch is so life like that it takes away the magic of movies by making what you see appear as though you are watching actors on a stage. Stick to 100Hertz or less if you want to preserve your movie enjoyment!”

Back to the War Horse review. The film’s music soundtrack was kind of right for the movie but also wrong. It suited the film but did not not stir up the intended emotions in me. However, maybe I can disregard that because of my recent nervous breakdown. The cinematography was excellent throughout. I thought Spielberg gave a realistic common view of how soldiers and Englishmen were real Gentlemen in the day’s of the war. It also show’s the best of human nature, even in times of great turmoil. All in all I would say it’s worth a watch if you have nothing better to do, or if you just want to escape for two hours. I disagree with the claim it is Spielberg’s masterpiece but it’s definitely Spielberg. My score is 6.5 / 10. Probably would be a 7.5 / 10 on a different TV.

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