Opiniones de usuarios

Sergeant Michael Dunne (Paul Gross) survives a brutal vicious assault and finds himself in a Calgary hospital being treated by nurse Sarah Mann (Caroline Dhavernas). She and her brother David (Joe Dinicol) face problems arising from their German father who died for the German army. David's asthma keeps him out of the war which is looked down upon by his girlfriend Cassie Walker's father. Michael is facing desertion charges and possible execution back at the front despite winning a medal from the fight. The three of them eventually find themselves back in the war.

There are compelling bits of scenes here and there. It's kinda daring to have the protagonist bayonet a helpless German boy in the forehead. The shaming of the men who haven't enlisted is interesting. The story back home is way too messy encompassing too many elements. It's trying to do too much. Paul Gross is not gritty enough for this role. The first half becomes a sincere melodrama. The second half is more or less a big muddy WWI trench war movie. The production is not as high as Hollywood. The sincerity does keep it from being truly bad.

War movies are not exactly a typical Canadian genre, and so I've been wanting to see "Passchendaele" for some time. As a war movie, this is very well done. Both the opening - depicting Sgt. Dunne's role in an unnamed battle - and the closing - which follows Dunne and Mann through a portion of the Battle of Passchendaele - are graphic and believable representations of battle, and they provide a sobering view of war, which may be necessary (that's another debate for another time) but is certainly neither glorious nor noble, although the individual soldiers who fight may well be both. The subtle (or perhaps not so subtle if one has ever read the Gospel accounts of Jesus' crucifixion) religious overtone to the closing scenes of the battle as Dunne effectively carries his cross across the battlefield (it's necessary to watch the movie to understand that) is also powerful. The soldiers who lived through this insanity would also be carrying their own crosses for the rest of their lives.

The weakness of the movie is found in the middle hour, between the battle scenes. The portion of the movie set in Calgary raised significant questions about patriotism, loyalty, duty, etc., but is also rather slowly paced. Dunne, having returned home suffering from shell- shock after the opening battle is assigned to recruitment duty. Falling in love with the nurse who treated him, he discovers that her brother is anxious to sign up, in order to win the respect of the father of the girl he loves but more to regain his family's honour, which he feels was tainted by his father, who was born in Germany and returned home to fight for Germany, eventually dying in battle against Canadian troops at the Battle of Vimy Ridge. That story is interesting, but it's slow pace is quite a contrast to the chaos of the battle scenes - perhaps appropriately so - and makes this part of the movie seem perhaps even slower than it really is.

The performances from the two main leads (Paul Gross as Dunne, and Caroline Dhavernas as Sarah, the nurse he falls in love with) were excellent. I was a bit put off by the tear-jerker ending of the movie, but that turned out to be key to the last and haunting shot of the Canadian war cemetery, with rows upon rows of crosses (to paraphrase Lt. Col. John McCrae's famous poem) and a riderless horse in the background. An extremely well-done movie, indeed. 7/10

There was great hoopla around "Passchendaele" in 2008, with the hope that it would bring in great audiences when released. However, the box office take in its native Canada was only average, and it faired worse in the international market - the only foreign market it played in theaters was with a (brief) British release, and in the United States the DVD label that picked it up was a small DVD company that specialized in releasing public domain movies.

Seeing the movie, it's easy to see why not that many people were attracted to it. The first half of the movie is pretty awful. I know the intent of this first half was to illustrate war on the home front - which you don't often see in war movies - but it fails in its intentions. The dialogue is downright awful at times, the characters are very familiar, and it's REAL slow going. Even worse is that despite the expense put into the movie, the look and feel of the movie here is like one found with a cheapo drama broadcast on the CBC television network.

The second half of the movie - moving to the Passchendaele battlefields - is a bit more successful than the first half. The battlefield and the battlefield fighting come across as gritty and authentic, and the movie finally has a theatrical feeling to it. However, the movie still suffers from bad dialogue, throwing in ridiculous symbolism as well. Worse of all, the struggle for Passchendaele doesn't last that long - all of a sudden, we're told Passchendaele has been taken. Huh?

Had writer/director/actor Paul Gross had set the movie entirely on the battlefield AND had someone smart working with him to correct the shortcomings of his screenplay, we might have had something here. But as it is, the movie ends up being a big disappointment. What's worse is that this movie's mostly bad reception means that it will probably be a long, long time before some other Canadian tries to make a "big" movie that will attract a large domestic audience - if ever.

Passchendaele is a decent World War One film, one of the best out there and there's not too many it has minor flaws but does the job brilliantly. Paul Gross has done a great job acting in and directing this film. Some may be put off by the love story but for me this just reinforces and shows the losses of many people during this time period and era. Passchendaele shows how many people who once lived to together as neighbors are divided by stupid things like family nationality and false loyalty and bad promises of adventure and glory.

The love story isn't for everyone but wow many girlfriends and wives lost partners and how many young men never came home to true love or had a chance to live full lives? This film does get you thinking!

Of course this is no Band Of Brothers in terms of scale (I know that's World War Two) but Paul Gross has done extremely well acting and directly. I find this film to be a good tribute to his Grandfather and to those who lost something because of World War One.

The film is low budget however this doesn't really show to be honest and this is a fitting tribute and good story! With regards to the low budget the battle scenes could have been bigger and better but this is by no means a bad film.

The acting and casting is spot on and this film really does show the stupid ill placed passion and faulted logic of young people in this era and, it shows the pressure many had to go through and be forced to fight for freedom not knowing what the loses and costs would be. World War One was a slaughter and waste of millions of lives and the deaths of certain characters and the gruesome way they die shows this war was not the fairy tale adventures many painted it to be at the start.

Among all the blood and slaughter there is a story and the film does well to reflect and show not everyone fighting was a murderer or cold blooded killer and many just wanted it to end.

We need more World War One films like this to teach young people the truths and to keep history alive so we don't make the same mistakes again.

I recently took a large group of students (150) to go see this movie. While it was extremely well done, in terms of historical accuracy. I found the movie spent a little too much time in Calgary developing the story. This was actively promoted as a Canadian WWI movie - however, I felt there wasn't enough time spent focusing on the actual war.

I did enjoy this movie and appreciate what Paul Gross has attempted to do. Canada's role in the world wars tends to be overshadowed and definitely deserves to be put into the light.

My biggest problem with the film is the end. All the realism that had been built up was completely dashed away with the extremely overpowering Biblical allusion - I am Christian and I found it WAY to much to stomach. As I stated it completely took away from any realism the film had going (which was a lot).

All and all educating people on Canadian's role in WWI is very much appreciated. Next time, leave religion out of it.

Paul Gross' Passchendaele provides a unique perspective of the Canadian effort during the First World War. Those who are expecting just battle scenes will likely be disappointed.

For those looking for character development, some romance, an interesting perspective on recruitment pressure, and yes -- AMAZING battle scenes -- then yes, this movie is for you.

As a Military History student, I had no issues with the historical accuracy of the movie. Paul Gross based the first 5 minutes on his grandfather's story, and the rest is historical fiction. In general, it is an excellent representation of the period, and certainly provides a much more realistic version of the soldiers' perspective on war in 1917 than many other war films out there.

I highly recommend this film.

This is no 'Saving Private Ryan' or 'Letters from Iwo Jima', the two top war films that come to my mind. And I have no idea about the historic accuracy of the episode in WWI depicted here. I am not interest in that either. I was watching a movie and I knew it.

As a film, a romance story set in the backdrop of war, it is not a bad one. The brutality of war was well depicted, and the battleground setting fairly well done. The acting was decent by all actors in the film, and the romance credible. As far as I am concerned my 2 hours was a worthwhile investment and I got entertainment out of it.

I noticed some reviewers rated this film one-star. Don't know if it is because this is a Canadian production. I bet if the same film came from Hollywood most of the one-star ratings simply would not be there. Just a thought.

Passchendaele is part unabashed romance and part horrific and quite graphic war story.

In film World War One has been a neglected war compared to the more morally unambiguous Second World War and the more recent Vietnam War. And films that aren't about American participation are just as neglected. Passchendaele fills that void.

The movie moves quickly and switches between home life and battlefield with surprising ease and effect. I was not bored for a moment of this movie. The movie will make you care about these people when they are at home living their lives and then fear for them at war. While the battle scenes are quite brutal, they are not sensational or exploitive, since to have made them sensational or exploitive would defeat the great effort this movie takes in showing how men had to cope with life after the war and the memories of what they lived through.

Undoubtedly there will be cynics who will decry some moments as contrived or melodramatic, but these are the small-minded who have missed the real emotion of this film. The movie is great entertainment, but there is something going on beneath the surface. This is the first time I can recall a film where the main character is someone who has been both emotionally damaged by the war, but does not succumb to it. I suspect there must be many men coming out of the war who were damaged, but quietly lived with that damage their entire lives. For that depiction alone, this is a great movie.

The movie is not without humour and it has one of the funniest seduction lines I've ever heard uttered by a woman in a movie.

The movie is entertaining, but there's a lot going on and much I haven't mentioned as I don't want to click the spoiler warning. There are scenes I'm still thinking about, which doesn't happen with every movie I see.

First of all, I would like to mention that the first 15 minutes and last 1 hour show WW1 battle scenes.

Filled with lots of - often exagerated - symbolism, this movie may still be considered a worthwile watch. Especially since it makes clear how (young) people were pressured in joining the army without them having any idea to what risks they are signing up to. It also shows that the rich and connected were in safe places that would mostly prevent them from getting harmed.

I think it might be worthwile if an alternative "director's cut" of this movie is created. By putting more focus on the excellent action scenes and removing much of the symbolism, this movie could very well result in a feature of 1hr30min which would easily achieve above 7.0/10. I also wonder what material is still unpublished: i.e. The "B-roll". If you see the effort put in recreating the battle scenes - including the detailed recreation of "no man's land" - I wonder what extra film material is available that wasn't included in this movie.

"Passchendaele" gives us twenty plus minutes of brutal, miserable, genuinely horrific trench warfare towards the end of the film. During that time it is the sort of gritty, relentlessly (but not gratuitously) violent war film many will and have gone into the theater thinking it would be. Apart from the short five to ten minutes which opens the film there are no other scenes of battle, and the movie is better for it.

What Paul Gross has attempted here is to give Canadians their own war epic (and on a minuscule budget when compared to most Hollywood war films). The film is not interested in philosophizing and 'making a point'. It's something like a far, far better version of what Michael Bay was doing with "Pearl Harbor"; the film is an unabashed romance and period drama, with Passchendaele being not the focus, but the event at the end of the road which the audience knows is coming.

Paul Gross has achieved something with "Passchendaele". We see so many Canadian films every year, but very few if any of them are ever about Canada, about being Canadian (and the film doesn't shy away from depicting some of the darker sides of that, we see the hatred and pain many German Canadians experienced simply due to their origin reflected in Dunn's love interest). More than just that, "Passchendaele" is a love letter to Canada, and although I might be biased as a Calgarian and Albertan (where the film is set), I think that every Canadian will find a reason to be proud in this film, in spite of the fact that it's depicting a war where nobody really knew what they were fighting for. "Passchendaele" has its flaws. There's some really, really heavy-handed symbolism (which thankfully doesn't ruin the film) and cloying sentimentality. While I normally abhor cloying sentimentality, "Passchendaele" must be doing something right because I was with it every step of the way. There isn't a moment in this film where the characters don't feel real, where the story doesn't affect you, where the romance doesn't feel genuine (including a love scene which could have been laughable but ended up being one of the year's most beautiful scenes).

"Passchendaele" is Paul Gross' heart poured onto the screen. The man is perhaps best known for his light-hearted role on "Due South", but he is a phenomenal dramatic actor and his performance here is probably the best I've seen this year from a male lead. You can feel his character's pain, his joy, his suffering, his love. Gross spent 12 years on the screenplay, and while I'd love to say the final result is perfect it is not. It is still, however, a screenplay so filled with genuine emotion and such passion that it ends up being something rare and special. It's a wonderful, wonderful film, one which attempts no grand statement on what war is or should be, it simply shows us the emotions of those involved in it.

I could go on at length complimenting the wonderful cast, explaining the story, discussing the film in detail, but that would be pointless. It's a film every Canadian should see. I honestly don't know if there's anything here for non-Canadians, although I imagine the film is populist enough to entertain most people (there's even a healthy dose of well-written humor, and the movie has one line so hilarious and yet oddly seductive that I'll probably never forget it). I've said it already, but I'll say it again: writer, director, and star Paul Gross has achieved something special with "Passchendaele". It's a tribute to many things. Less importantly perhaps it is a tribute to Calgary and Alberta (only a Calgarian could have made this film), and more importantly it's a tribute to the pure, certain feeling of true love, to our war veterans, to the troops currently fighting in Afghanistan, to all Canadians, and ultimately and most importantly to Canada.

The Great war was devastating for a whole generation of Canadians. It has rarely received treatment on the big screen or on television in works of fiction. Passchendaele is a rare exception. Here are a few exceptions for those of you who may be interested in learning more.

The Wars (1983) based on the novel by Timothy Findlay was an early attempt. It benefited from some early federal government tax incentives back when the Canadian film industry was struggling to define itself and compete against the big Hollywood money machine.

Going Home (1987) is a little known film starring Nicholas Campbell (of DaVinci's Inquest). It is worth a viewing. An intense, superb drama. The battlefield sequences (in flashback) are wrenching.

The Halifax Explosion shows the war at home. The returning hero, disillusioned and bitter must keep silent about his terrible experiences or be branded un-patriotic. His family and neighbors do not want to know about the real war, they prefer to be cushioned by the propaganda and lies they are being fed by King and Country. Then the horror of War follows him home when two munition ships explode in Halifax harbor.

All three films are very much worth a look.

6.4/10

"Greater love hath no man than this, that man lay down his life for his friends"

The only time I remember watching this film, was when it first came out in 2008, and I was young, and still considering joining the military. While this film didn't impact my decision on joining. It gave me a sense of pride, as a Canadian, to see a war movie that referenced my nation.

This film is actually quite good despite the fact it focuses heavily on romantic relationships. However, the love interests aren't as cheesy as that of "Pearl Harbor" (2001), and they don't detract from the stories end goal. Sacrifice.

The acting overall is good. Paul Gross does well depicting the hardened war veteran, and Joe Dinicol equally portrays the recruit. Caroline Dhavernas and Meredith Bailey bring forth the love interests in a compelling light.

The pacing of the film is alright as at one point it begins to drag on, and my interest in the film began to wane. If they cutdown on the build-up it perhaps would've been more interesting, but for what we're given, by the time the fighting parts happen, I'm ready for the film to end.

Lastly, I was impressed with the cinematography and sound by how well it's held up ten plus years later. It still feels like war. Minus physically joining the actors in the mud and the rain it does feel like you're in the thick of it with them. Therefore bringing more energy and emotion to the forefront.

Overall, a film that I would recommend checking out at least once if you like the genre of military. Emotionally this film was impactful, but is lacklustre in its pacing.

Thank you for reading my review. Until next time.... Enjoy the show!

At last a genuine Canadian movie... Calgary is Calgary... The Americans didn't win the battle, didn't even turn up anywhere... There were no Stars and Stripes in every office. Okay, the plot --- a sort of WW1 Saving Private Ryan effort set against the bloody Belgian battle --- is a little far fetched. But the scenes --- both in 1916 Calgary and in the mud and horror of the battlefield --- are as good as those in any WW1 movie I've seen. There are believable characters well portrayed both in the script and by the actors. The effects are superb. The lighting and cinematography are sensitive and creative. And how very impressive that Paul Gross was a triple threat man. He wrote it, he directed it and he starred in it. That totals 300% This is as good as they come.

As a Great War Living History reenactor I was very interested to see this movie.

There was a very long lead up to the major combat at the end - to follow the "Private Ryan" comparison, you start and end with some intense combat footage, and a fairly slow-moving story for the rest of the time. However, the depiction of combat was first rate, showing the brutality of hand to hand fighting in the trenches (also fairly accurately depicted as strings of mud filled shell craters) Not all a saccharin-sweet romance, and certainly not the worst such movie I have ever seen; but it would be nice to see a story of the standard of "All Quiet On the Western Front" with the benefit of modern special effects that can allow the combat depictions to be more realistic.

Overall there seemed be some inaccuracies in the uniforms and equipment, although little that anyone not heavily into the history of such matters would notice or care about. The main character wears what appear to be lace up gaiters as worn by the American troops instead of the puttees universal among British Empire enlisted ranks; although such local individual adaptations did occur, particularly when such items could be "acquired" from other troops (the Australians were noted for this, particularly after Hamel), at the time in which this story is set it is unlikely that a Canadian soldier could have been in contact with AEF troops to obtain such items. The waist belt buckles appear to be more like the style used in 1937 pattern web equipment, as worn throughout World War 2, instead pull through style buckle correct for Great War Bristish style belts. However, one of the most obvious omissions is the lack of respirators. No front line soldier by that stage of the war would have been without a gas mask.

Wow. Great flick!

Besides being an admitted movie addict, I'm also a retired professional soldier and a combat veteran who's served in multiple theaters of conflict.

I usually find myself quietly disappointed with war movies in general, and their vain, highly stylized, cliché-laden attempts to realistically portray infantry warfare, and high-intensity warfare's effects on soldiers. Film-makers invariably seem to fall far short in their attempts to capture the essence of what war can be (or was) like, and what exposure to it can do to the people involved, both mentally and physically.

To his great credit, I think that in Passchendaele Paul Gross seems to have actually managed to capture a reasonably authentic glimpse into both the nature of such hellish environments and the men caught up in them.

The acting was superb. The performances were so convincing that the notion that I was just sitting watching a movie didn't even occur to me until the credits began to roll by, I was so totally engrossed.

This film was easily one of the best that I've seen in quite some time.

I'll definitely be keeping my eyes open for any future films by Paul Gross. Passchendaele stands as an extremely impressive testimonial to his obvious talents.

I watched this with high hopes - but I have to say that I never lost the feeling that I was watching a movie (ie unlike the famous first 15 minutes of Saving Private Ryan at Normandy). A lot of the characters were 2 dimensional - the English major esp was the kind of stereotype that one would expect in a US film - sadly even people here seem to fall into that - one reviewer wrote "It was the Canadians who did all the real hard work in this war" - sorry it was the British Army and French Army who fought from day 1 that took the heaviest casualties - not to diminish the role of the ANZAC troops - but there is no need to disrespect our war dead either and rather like the anti-Monty comment in Saving Private Ryan, the whole blundering British thing is a cheap shot - ultimately it was the development of a early combined arms doctrine esp in the British Army in 1918 using tanks, artillery etc along with all the Allies that broke the German Army. The film also seemed overly full of clichés and cinematic coincidences etc - the crucifixion scene at the end particularly especially, given that earlier on, Sgt Dunne comments that the 1915 Canadian crucified soldier story is just that - and then he (as director) goes and repeats it - it makes no sense as having crucified that annoying git, the German NCO/officer then lets him be returned to the Canadian lines! Kudos to Paul Gross though for trying to make something about a period that seems unfashionable and for which he obviously has a strong interest (as Tom Hanks did for WW2 in terms of making Band of Brothers which incidentally managed to reverse clichés brilliantly by for instance the scene of the demobilising German troops, where their commanding General in effect says that they too were a band of brothers who had gone through suffering together). I do suspect that this film exemplifies the danger of being script writer,director and lead actor - it becomes a pet project when in fact you need someone strong enough to say "NO" to certain bits.