Absolutely Fantastic

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

The movie ist disrespectful against the Greeks and Armenians . The story is full of shit. It's based on lies. The turks killed millions of Christians between 1914-1920 and somehow they are here represented as the good guys. It was released in the same week of Armenian genocide memorial. This film is a prove how money can buy everyone and even change history. people will believe everything they watch. I once respected Russel crow but not anymore. Overall this movie is disrespectfull to Greeks, Armenians, Assyrians and all the Christians that were killed by the barbarian turks. Shame!

From the first second I started this movie it had me on the tip of my seat for the rest of the duration of the film. So much suspense and thrill and hurt and emotions..... The battlefield scenes were so touching. Him talking about his children. The few flash forwards and the fact that he just felt things he could have never known for sure just really touched me. Now mind you, I am Aussie nor am I Turkish. I am a humble girl from Holland and even though I have loved my history classes (up to a certain extent), here they have never taught us anything about the battle of Gallipoli, just a faint story about Troy, so this was all the more interesting to me as I am just a fan of war stories - not so much a fan of war, just to be clear - and a good flash back in time to make me feel as if I was there, right in the middle of it is just everything for me. To feel every emotion they are feeling and/or must have been feeling at a certain point in, for a certain period of time....all that to come to that crappy ending! The synopsis of the ending itself was fine but it just stopped so sudden I just thought ''what in the frock is this.''I just thought the ending could have ended just a bit more subtle. Now it was just like ''okay well this is the end of the movie and you know it so.. bye bye!''That just kind of ruined it for me. Especially since it's often the ending that stays with one the longest.This still should not prevent you from thinking that this is a crappy movie, cause this is definitely a must-see. MUST. Still, crappy ending.

An Australian water diviner, Russell Crowe, loses three sons at Gallipoli in Turkey and after the war travels to the battlefield to retrieve their corpses. I know. It sound lugubrious -- a heavenly choir, the vanquishing of red tape by empathy, as the water diviner divines the skeletons of his sons, one by drawn-out one, and schleps them back home to Australia, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.Actually, it has plenty of color and dash and it doesn't turn out as expected. Shot in Australia and Turkey, there are some marvelous location shots as we're introduced not just to the battlefield but to Ottoman culture. A stunning shot of the interior of the blue mosque.Among the Ottoman artifacts is Olga Kurylenko. Somewhere, a religious cult should be established in her honor, its symbol her sternoclavicular notch. What a dish. Body by Bernini, neck by Modigliani. Suddenly, that line from "Dr. Strangelove" -- "toe to toe with the Russkies" -- doesn't sound like such a bad idea.The romance is subdued, as is Russell Crowe's performance. He's gained weight and lost definition since "L.A. Confidential" and his bulk now resembles that of John Wayne, a kind of massive heft that his brain orders about. He's quite professional as a director too, fond of overhead shots, but not too fond.The editor should be fired. Sometimes it was easy to get lost. There are flash forwards of whirling dervishes only you don't know they're flash forwards. The whirling dervishes are the decorous public kind, clean and dazed looking, not the Dionysian wild men of the tribal areas. I don't know how they can do it without falling down after the first few minutes.The film is more sympathetic to some of the Turkish soldiers now occupying the battlefield than it is with the British and Australian graves unit. The villains are Greeks, and there are scenes of battle resembling the perforated train sequence in "Lawrence of Arabia" and one or two echoes of "Young Churchill." The bloody combat scenes are disturbing in that they cause you to worry somewhat about just what the solution to the Middle East is.

Russell Crowe has been directed by many good and qualified directors, so by now he must have picked up on many of things. Which I reckon can be seen in his directorial debut. Would it have been better if he had just concentrated on one thing though? Tough to say, especially because it does not seem to affect his acting in the movie at least. The direction on he other hand ... that's up for discussion, unless you argue it was the script that needed improvements.Having said all that, the movie is emotional and it does take you on a (literal) journey. It also seems very strong on making a point in showing gray areas in war and laying out blame. To a certain degree that is, because you do get some "bad people" to, which is a shame and not consistent to what the message should be about. Not to mention an overly dramatic ending, that really was unnecessary. Other than that, this was more than a decent film debut