The Yellow Birds

This film tells the story of two young soldiers and their mothers, who are devastated by the war in different ways.

It is a powerful anti war film, even though most of the time there is no blood and gore. The psychological effects of war on the soldiers and the families are profound, and the film portrays the feelings effectively. I'm also very glad to see two very famous actresses in this film.

This is a strong and compelling adaptation of Kevin Power novel involving the Iraq War. It has driven and poetic moments, and versatile and strong acting, but does have the almost jumpy feel to it as we go back and forth from real time to different engagements in the film. . The strength of Director Alexandre Moore elicits centered performances from his cast, including strong support by Aniston as a desperate mother, Collette as an exasperated one, and Huston as a veteran leader who defies the easy dramatic classifications of "good" and "bad." The strength and passion of the film lies with the two leads who are outstanding. Sheridan (Mud, Joe, Ready Player One) is a soulful actor who deftly conveys Murph's naïveté and eventual break and crisis. He's instantly sympathetic. Ehrenreich, who has swung hard from impressive work (Hail, Caesar) to less so (Solo: A Star Wars Story) is focused and settled as the damaged young man at the story's center. His Bartle is a true everyman -- without direction, not a star soldier, not a failure. The difference in him before and after he reaches his personal breaking point is clear; the sometimes-poetic narration seems to come from somewhere that didn't exist until it was unearthed by his experiences.

The levity of the film comes from the emotional and compelling performances. War pictures come across many ways and mostly with action and eye popping cinematography. This film comes at you in a completely different way and tells the story of what men and women see, feel and think in times of battle. Many are fearful, scared and become soulless to the graphic scenes they see. I like the film and feel it deserves many accolades. A superb story and perfectly captures the feel of war. A solid 8 out of 10

This movie is hard to watch for anyone prior service. Every five seconds I was pointing out a variety of errors. I have seen some ate up movies but this one ranks up at the top. It's like you took a chapter out of Army Wives. Hollywood people, please take note; you embarrass real Soldiers when you create movies like this one. Not to mention, our wives have to hear us point out every blunder. Hire some advisors so you don't make the US Army look like chewed bubblegum. A little research would have been helpful. Use the correct uniforms, buckle that chin strap, take your hands out of your pockets and never call an NCO sir!

The mechanics of this movie were good, the quality of the movie was good, the acting itself was just OK but a little bit lacking, for that it barely scratches a 5 for me. First let's get a pure aesthetic thing out of the way. If you are going to make a war film, get the actual equipment right. The U.S. Army uses Blackhawk helicopters and have for quite awhile now. Go to the military's public affairs office, find their office that works with Hollywood and the film industry and arrange for some Blackhawks not Huey's. The movie comes off as high quality enough to take that step. Oh, and you are not going to have those gun truck, Humvees with turrets, supporting you without someone in the hatch with some fire power.

Now. The acting here was just OK, not great, maybe good. The scenes though and the whole plot reveal at the end...it is just hogwash. Plain and simple. This is not how soldiers behave and not what I (as a veteran) can tell you, would even be imaginable. The platoon/ company/ chain of command dynamic is completely absent. The squad dynamic is altogether wrong, and those are huge plot holes. The writer has only a small vague understanding of how men and women in our armed forces behave, and interact with each other and how military operations work. I am trying not to give away any spoilers but the incident in the film is something that would be a million to one shot of happening in real life, and the way the follow on was carried out would have even longer odds. That doesn't even get to the odds that soldiers would think in this way, let alone carry out. Frankly, I can't even imagine a scenario where anything like this could actually even be conceived or even began to be carried out without hitting immediate large roadblocks that would cease it immediately in today's military. Again I can give it a 5 on some of it's cinematic merits but ultimately it doesn't overcome huge realistic obstacles. I don't believe it has any political/ideological objectives as far as being pro or anti-war. If it did it fails on that but I'm hoping that there wasn't one. Mostly this just suffers from a real lack of realism which draws in a lack of real connection and feeling. If they changed it into a more entertaining action movie that might make it more passable, but for the drama they were trying to portray it was overall lacking.

Yellow Birds was a flawed movie from start to finish. Despite the story being interesting and the quality of production being above average, this was an easily forgettable war movie. To start, it was exceptionally slow to start picking up, which is never a good sign (especially when the movie is so short). We never saw their friendship grow or really any character development occur. We were never provided with a clear reason as to why they decided to hid that truth and cover it up. And we have no idea how it was found out that they did that. Just loads of missing information throughout. Not a fan.