Cast of soy boys...
and good actors far too old for their role per usual. There seems to be no believable strong male leads anymore. Fat Tommen was a surprise. He was good-looking as a tween.
shareMalnourished soldiers suffering from spannish flu in the trenches dont tend to look ripped you know.
shareIt's not so much that they don't look "ripped" as that they don't look mature. I have a photograph of my grandfather in the WWI trenches at age twenty and he looks like a hardened man, not like a soft-lipped, big-eyebrowed member of a boy band.
shareAlthough I'm reluctant to say anything bad about the film, I have to agree with you that one casting was a mistake, imo. The guy who played the younger Blake was glaringly wrong. To me, he looked like a chubby, well-fed, pretty-boy Italian. To make it worse, he had facial mannerisms and poses that were the very epitome of a 2020's television actor. He almost managed to take me right out of the movie at the very start.
What kept me in it was George McKay. That man was virtually the very image of a soldier of his time. Something about his face and bearing was utterly convincing as a British soldier in WW1. And it never faltered at any point. In the Extras on the disk, the director remarked that George McKay has an "old-fashioned" look. How right that is! It's the first time that I can ever recall seeing an actor who truly, intrinsically looked the part, right down to his bones.
He didn't look soy-boy to me. On the contrary, he looked all man; serious, calm, and restrained, as all good men of that time were.
I'd seen him before, in "11.22.63", as a brash American caught up in the Kennedy assassination. When I went to watch "1917", I wondered how he would manage to pull off a British accent. Surprise, he's British.
Hopefully, we'll see more of him, in quality movies like this one.
He certainly has that hollow-cheeked look that the British seem to like. I liked the movie but I didn't find any of the actors memorable.
shareYes, he hasn't got classic good looks, but that's what made him more suitable, imo.
I was underwhelmed by a few of the other actors as well, particularly the well-known ones. Colin Firth seemed to be pulled way back and not allowed to shine. And Benedict Cumberbatch's turn was a miss-step. He just didn't have any presence.
Yes, I noticed that too, about Colin Firth and Cumberbatch. I thought it was an effort to pass the baton. Recognised actors bring an audience to a movie but younger actors need to be given an opportunity to build a reputation. If the good stuff only goes to the famous actors, then in ten years there won't be any new Colin Firths or Cumberbatches. I think if Benedict Cumberbatch sank into the background it was probably intentional on his part. Usually he just owns any scene he is in.
shareYes, that's a good point.
share[deleted]
Thats as the point. Some did look hardened, but in reality many were still young men/ barely not boys forced in to this horrible situation.
you clearly missed the entire point of the film. I dont thing ive ever seen a post so blatantly where someone bragged about their lack of getting a film so pathetically