Borgarkeri A bit overrated, but still an amazing film

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Claire Dunne One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Janae Milner Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

jjc1-1 How a scintillating trilogy like this could be transformed into a lifeless parody of itself by filmmakers is a complete mystery. It is lugubrious, slow and mistakes slapstick for wit. Waugh would have been appalled by this work. He was a nasty man in private life--a friend of Randolph Churchill whose boorish behavior was legendary--but he had high literary standards. Daniel Craig, incidentally, does not do humor well. The first review on this site must have been written by the movie publicist. The actress who plays his first wife is as wooden as Craig himself -- zero chemistry there -- and there is a supporting cast who clearly didn't have their heart in any of this. A total waste of time, so don't bother. I hope I have made myself clear in padding this out to the full 10 lines required. Left to me, I would have kissed it off with a simple, "No, don't think so. Take your dog for a walk instead."

SimonJack If one is looking for or expecting a war movie filled with action, "Sword of Honour" will not do. Likewise, if one wants a nice English war film with some romance or loved ones left back home. No! Evelyn Waugh's trilogy put to film based on some of his World War II experiences is nothing like the romantic or heroic images we so often have from movies about WW II. Nor is it a gritty account of the gripping experiences of war, death and destruction so common in more modern war films that tend to bring the gore to the fore. "Sword of Honour" is none of these things. Yet it has traces of each, along with much more. The three novels incorporated quite well into this film are "Men at Arms" (1952), "Officers and Gentlemen" (1955), and "Unconditional Surrender" (1961). Waugh wrote his books from his diverse experiences of wartime service. He had kept a diary, and many of his characters are based on or are conglomerations of people he had known in the service. A couple of themes common to most of Waugh's fiction are present here. His Catholic faith and wrestlings with class distinctions are interwoven in his many exploits. The story outline and reviews elsewhere discuss the plot. I would just point out that this is a very unusual look at the military and wartime service. Comedies have a lot of fun poking fun at the military. But when a film is not a comedy – as this one is not, the exposure of so much that is wrong or that goes haywire is truly unflattering. As such, this film is satirical without being a satire. It gives account after account of ineptitude, fraud, incompetency, irony and miscues that belie any honorable notion about the military services and wartime culture. All of this is seen as experienced by Waugh's main character, Guy Crouchback, played very well by Daniel Craig. He encounters a plethora of characters. Some are fun and entertaining – if not to Crouchback, to the novel readers and film audience, such as Brigadier Ritchie-Hook. Robert Pugh plays the seemingly fearless veteran Army officer with pugnacity equal to the character. Guy Henry plays the scornful and scary Ludovic superbly. He is a sardonic and mentally disturbed character. Richard Coyle is excellent as Trimmer McTavish. He is the perfect foil to Guy's image of what an honorable officer and gentleman should be. This is made more ironic by the ruse of Trimmer's heroism and rise to high rank and honor from the lowly civilian occupation of a hairdresser. Great satire, indeed. Other actors lend panache, pathos, humility or humor to their roles as appropriate to each character. One other aspect that sets this film apart is its unusual portrayal of the wartime love or romance component. Guy's estranged wife, Angela, is a party girl, carouser, and playmate who lives for pleasure, with no sense of responsibility or respectability. Selina Cadell plays the role superbly. The title of the film comes from a little known factual story that Waugh relates in the third novel. It describes the circumstances of the Sword of Stalingrad. King George VI ordered a special long sword to be decorated with jewels and presented from the British people to the Soviets who defended the city in the battle that turned the war against Germany on the eastern front. Prime Minister Winston Churchill presented the sword to Joseph Stalin on Nov. 29, 1943, at the Tehran Conference, in the company of President Franklin Roosevelt. The movie does not include this historical situation, but the screenplay deftly covers much of the trilogy in its 3½-hour time. Toward the end, Crouchback's faith and honor rise above all the experiences he has had. He marries his former wife a second time so that her child by McTavish won't be born out of wedlock. And, after Angela is killed in a bombing raid over London, Crouchback returns at the end of the war to embrace the innocent son he has brought into the world honorably. This is not an exciting film to watch. But it is interesting and enjoyable. It's an honest account of a different picture of wartime service, especially in Britain. It's a picture that's not at all flattering about the military or culture of the time. And, it's a fine example of a lengthy literary work being expertly put on film.

rboysdad I was unaware of this film adaptation of Waugh's trilogy until today's showing on British freeview TV, and missing the first half hour, also missed the chance to record it to DVD. Drat. Until I saw it. Very pretty production by Channel 4 TV and Talkback, made some 8 years back, before Daniel Craig became a superstar.I've read and reread a lot of Waugh but believed Sword of Honour to be an inexplicably stolid, inaccessibly unreadable work, so big, so long, so dull. Brideshead was the beginning of the end, the trilogy was the end writ large.Until I found the BBC radio adaptation from 1974, over 11 hours rather than this film's 4. After a few hours I began to see the early Waugh wrapped inside the less obviously satirical wrappings, his humour and gravity. The genius, in short.They don't make them like Waugh any more, nor do they make the people; the 1974 recording was made in time to catch many authentic sounding voices from the era, and some very fine acting. A gem which I recommend to any Waugh fans.This film seems to be, probably, a rather adroit shot at a script which condenses a huge tome to a few hours, but the vowels are comprehensive school, Craig is hopelessly wrong, and there are but a few flashes of sharp observation and very little wit. But the audio version is available on the internet, and of course the pictures are better.

grhmb This is a splendid effort by all concerned, especially given the time constraint of about 200 minutes. As well as men and women are still marching off to war to save Western civilization, the movie has a contemporary message. The brevity of the movie, given that it tells a story, originally told in three novels goes against it. So much plot and many characters have been left out seriously compromising Waugh's comic vision. Waugh's original novels contain very amusing dialogue and much of the novels are just dialogue, the writer creating character out of what people say. Although the script used snippets of Waugh's dialogue,there is lots and lots unused. However, the script writers and all the people involved in the production did a masterful job of salvaging something of Waugh's original story. The other major flaw is in the casting of Daniel Craig as Guy Crouchback. Craig does not have the aristocratic presence to play Guy. His features, stature,and movement suggest a working class hero; he is great for contemporary characters where class is not an issue. But Waugh's works are all about class and Daniel Craigdoes not look the part of an aristocrat. He would be fine as a Lawrencian hero, Birket in Women in Love, for example. The rest of the casting is more or less spot on with some splendid choices of actors for Guy's father, Virginia, Ivor Claire, Ritchie-Hook,and Trimmer and everybody else. The book is both so much more outrageously funny and profound about life than the movie. Read the book but enjoy the movie,too; the chaps who made the film have obviously put on a good show in difficult circumstances. I am now going to reread the book for the umpteenth time. The movie inspires that.