36/19
In the winter of 1862, during the Civil War, the US Army sends a company of volunteers to patrol the uncharted territories of the West. Minervini had the set built in Montana and then let the cast live on it for two months. The dialogues and thoughts expressed are those that occurred to the actors as they lived in the wilderness imagining being soldiers in the Civil War. The Damned: The winter of 1862, a volunteer unit of Union soldiers has been sent to defend mountainous territory, we are not told where it is, we do not even find out the names of the soldiers. After the regular troops leave, they are under the command of a John Brown-esque patriarch with a flowing beard, his teenage sons have also enlisted. The troops are a mixed bunch, some middle-aged, even old, most in their thirties. All lacking military experience, they share knowledge and transfer skills to each other. We witness mobile sentries, random shots fired at distant horsemen. A buffalo is shot and quartered. The bleak landscape, the hills, the mountain meadows, the drifting snow, the cold rations running out, all contribute to a sense of existential despair. A battle rages, we don’t see the enemy, but we do see the unit’s casualties. War is hell, especially when you don’t know why you’re there anymore. A very Ken Loach-esque film, with no established dialogue day to day and lots of ordinary people acting like amateurs, like the soldiers. This improvisation leads to philosophical, religious and political debates around campfires. Some of which linger longer than they should, but it’s a minor distraction from this raw depiction of men at war. Written and directed by Roberto Minervini, 8/10.
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