Fortunes of War

This is a very long, but also very enjoyable movie (originally a tv series) set against the background of WWII. Guy Pringle (Branagh), a university professor, leaves Britain and comes to Romania to teach. He has a love for his wife (Thompson) and all the people surrounding them. We watch his passion to make a difference when other people are escaping from Germans marching toward their city and gain influence from within. Relationships develop between the couple and locals, and we start to care about most of them. We see how horrible everyday life could be with the constant threat of war, but how it isn't. We observe Guy treat everyone around him with good intentions, at the expense of his wife, and we want to shake him to come to his senses. We follow their journey to other countries, and the movie is a joy to watch from beginning to end. There are a few memorable scenes between Guy and his wife that I cannot forget, and Branagh really touches me when he cries. The acting by all the cast is simply wonderful, and the movie is definitely worth spending 3 hours.

It is an interesting story as it tells a tale about a group of people who live on the brink of the war without seeming to understand the dangers facing them.

In my opinion, Emma Thompson pretty much carries the whole thing, kind of showing how a very classy lady copes with lesser humans. While there are some story-filling war scenes it is not a war movie as we are used to seeing. It is enjoyable and humous on occasion, showing the foibles that one can encounter in life.

I've watched this 3 hrs+ movie a dozen of times already, and I am sill thirsty for more. This movie is packed with beautiful acting by nearly all casts. These English actors seem to know how to control their facial expressions, vocal tones, body movement with remarkable precision to convey all degrees of emotions and personalities. Directing, music, costume, editing, cinematography are all equally good as well, and together with the great actings, creates a beautiful harmony. This movie is made of one piece. Like "Lawrence of Arabia", whereever we slice it, the piece has a harmony, like the music by great composers.

If I have to live in a desert island and can bring one video with me, I guess I'll choose this one.

I don't know where I was when this first came out on PBS or BBC, but I know where I was when we rented it and watched it recently. Riveted and delighted. I award Fortunes of War a 9.5, from the marvelous real world settings to the splendid acting by every member of this incredible ensemble...and the story is simply superb. I didn't give it a 10 because I can't think of a 10 film at the moment with which to even compare. Enough superlatives. Watch it and be entertained and enlightened. Kenneth and Emma are joys to behold, the predicaments and conflicts totally believable, the insidious creep of Nazi Europe frightening, the subsequent war scenes thankfully subdued but still realistic. Rent it, own it, view it. Again and again.

Discerning Northern Irish actor Kenneth Branagh and the beautiful, brilliant Emma Thompson met and presumably fell in love here, as they play bohemian British newlyweds Guy and Harriet Pringle who arrive in Bucharest, as does the slothful, flat broke Prince Yakimov, who takes up an ad hoc job as a photojournalist of sorts on a British paper to save himself from total indigence. Harriet is introduced to her fellow expatriates, but their happy life is disjoined by the assassination of Romania's prime minister and Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland. Gossip murmurs of a German invasion of Romania and Guy, mentally consumed all the same in his work and arranging civil occasions, is gaulled by his Communism (no pun intended) to take peripheral measures to take care of the family of a Jewish student of his from the anti-Semitic Romanian regime. Although this premise sounds as if it gains momentum and grows more and more exciting, it decidedly does not.

Almost reminiscent of the Jean Renoir film Grand Illusion, Fortunes of War shows a group of people segueing through meetings with different cultures, a war raging on around them but not bothering them any more than some other long-term struggle. But unlike Grand Illusion, the conflicts between the characters are unrelated to the war. It is only one of the dominoes that instigates the many things they do, mainly because they, calm and collected, take refuge in their culture, which remains impervious to the effects all the other ones seem to try to impose upon them through each of these seven one-hour episodes. We watch Guy's lofty devotion to make a difference and boost morale from within. Histrionics mature, decelerate or sustain between the couple and those who come and go from their lives, and we start to care about most of them. With this apposing of following the Pringles subjectively and impartially observing their affiliates, we see how fearful daily life could be with the consistent foreboding of war, but how it isn't. We contemplate Guy with his wife as he preoccupies himself with good intentions towards so many, yet at her exasperated cost, and we want to rattle him out of his cerebrum for a breather in her heart.

In seven hours, the story goes through no significant mood swings, nor any real climax, even in the final episode. But that's just how all of its characters feel about it. Life just goes on, and on and on. Characters latch on, decisions are made, people come and go. My favorite part is when Pinkrose finally gets to give his lecture on Lord Byron.