The true story of the Battle of Midway during
World War II, and the soldiers who fought it. ACTION/BIOPIC/WAR
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Midway (2019)Directed by Roland Emmerich
Written by Wes Tooke Starring Ed Skrein, Patrick Wilson, Luke Evans, Aaron Eckhart, Nick Jonas, Etsushi Toyokawa, Tadanobu Asano, Luke Kleintank, Jun Kunimura, Darren Criss, Keean Johnson, Mandy Moore, Dennis Quaid, Woody Harrelson |
During WWII, there was a small island called Midway. This was a very important island as it was positioned perfectly to act as a forward operating base for whichever side owned it. Japanese could use it to beat American forces and vice versa. Naturally, a battle ensued. Now, for what makes this battle so special. This was the first major naval battle when either fleet never saw one another. Instead, the battle was fought by the planes being launched off the aircraft carriers. It’s also even more impressive if you take into account how outnumbered we were during the battle, yet we still won. A significant moment in history for sure. But not one I was ever expecting a movie on. Yet, here we are. Now, let’s see if it was any good.
As for the good first, Emmerich is still a master at shooting mass scenes of destruction. From the bombing of Pearl Harbor to the titled battle, these scenes are quite a sight to watch and will keep you entertained. I also liked how there was a push to tell the entire story and include as many people involved as possible. It shows there was care for the real life people who fought and died during this. But that also leads me into my negatives. Mainly, the human side of it. Since there are so many characters, there’s a lot of jumping around constantly to new events and characters. It gets to the point where it’s hard to get emotionally invested into anyone. Therefore, it makes the death scenes hard to get invested into. Again, it doesn’t seem like this is on purpose, just too much to handle in one movie. As someone currently serving in the Navy, there was quite a bit I already knew about the Battle of Midway. It’s something we’re taught when joining. So, from a historical perspective, this movie does a lot right with the facts. But, where it fails is the human emotion. It tries to cram as many of these people into the story as possible, it’s hard to really connect. Nonetheless, this is still an entertaining film which tells about a battle most people don’t know about. |