{"id":14842,"date":"2020-01-09T00:42:03","date_gmt":"2020-01-09T05:42:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=14842"},"modified":"2020-01-18T10:17:50","modified_gmt":"2020-01-18T15:17:50","slug":"1917","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2020\/01\/09\/1917\/","title":{"rendered":"\u20181917\u2019\u2014A World War I Mission Impossible To Save A Battalion From A Trap"},"content":{"rendered":"

The First World War film \u201c1917\u201d<\/a>\u2014which took home Golden Globe Awards for best dramatic picture and best director on Jan. 5\u2014jumps off when a British general summons a couple of men into his trench bunker to send them on a mission impossible: to deliver a message to the commander of 2nd Devons Battalion \u201ccalling off tomorrow morning\u2019s attack.\u201d It\u2019s April 6, 1917, in France. Aerial reconnaissance, he says, has revealed that the Germans have made a strategic retreat to Siegfriedstellung\u2014the Hindenburg Line\u2014where they have quietly spend six months setting up deadly trenches and artillery.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re walking into a trap,\u201d General Erinmore (Colin Firth) tells them. \u201c\u2026If you fail it will be a massacre. \u2026 If you don\u2019t get there in time, we will lose 1,600 men, your brother among them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The British had 20,000 men killed on one day during 1916\u2019s First Battle of the Somme. Perhaps the film’s biggest test of credibility is that a First World War officer would consider the loss of 1,600 men something more than a rounding error.<\/p>\n

But to get to the 2nd Battalion, the two men\u2014Lance Corporals Schofield (George MacKay) and Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman) from the 8th Battalion\u2014have to cross the haunted no-man\u2019s land and the (hopefully) former German front lines. MacKay and Chapman lead an excellent cast in this masterfully crafted thriller full of suspense, horror and heartbreak. It\u2019s riveting if\u2014you know\u2014you\u2019re fascinated by war.<\/p>\n