As for the tech, the whole film is made in a format which looks like 1:1 with round corners and frayed sides. The pictures are crisp and the blacks are totally black. Audio was not that superb, it sounded like a wild mixture of mono and surround sound, somewhat artificial to me. Aesthetically it's the total opposite to the series "Babylon Berlin" which too plays around the time when Franz was little, but his parent's home has none of the glamour and the lightness and doesn't even have electricity yet.
The actors do a great job, especially Simon Morzé, who takes the introversion of his character to a level that it would be labelled as "social anxiety" nowadays: He totally keeps to himself, sits aside when others gather and is totally unable to express or explain himself when he would need to. This makes him the target not of teasing but of outright hostility. He more or less floats along with the story while the fox actively drives it, in one instance by approaching the protagonist and in another when it chases the chicken of the French woman Franz gets friends with.
As for the story, that's where the film lacks consistency. In the first (estimated) half hour nothing notable happens until a rich(er) farmer comes to take young Franz with him. Then there's a time lapse and Franz joins the army. Another year later, he's in the camp where he meets the fox, and so on. It kind of drags on and goes into a rush when the next time lapse is coming up. Humour is totally absent although I couldn't help but grin in the scene where the sick kid and the father have a chat because the whole scene was subtitled. Seems like the film makers deemed the Austrian in that part too heavy even for Austrians. I freely admit that I had to peek into the subtitles for »Selchkammer« (pantry) myself, too.
Who is this film for? I'm not sure to be honest. Someone called this a war movie, but I wouldn't recommend it to those who like "Saving Private Ryan". Sure, the whole story wouldn't have happened if it weren't for WWII, but that's merely a story framework and a loud background as Franz is at no point near the front. I'd rather call it a second-row war movie. If I needed to compare it with something, I'd choose "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" or "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas".
However, the final scenes compensate for the drag in a way.
The actors do a great job, especially Simon Morzé, who takes the introversion of his character to a level that it would be labelled as "social anxiety" nowadays: He totally keeps to himself, sits aside when others gather and is totally unable to express or explain himself when he would need to. This makes him the target not of teasing but of outright hostility. He more or less floats along with the story while the fox actively drives it, in one instance by approaching the protagonist and in another when it chases the chicken of the French woman Franz gets friends with.
As for the story, that's where the film lacks consistency. In the first (estimated) half hour nothing notable happens until a rich(er) farmer comes to take young Franz with him. Then there's a time lapse and Franz joins the army. Another year later, he's in the camp where he meets the fox, and so on. It kind of drags on and goes into a rush when the next time lapse is coming up. Humour is totally absent although I couldn't help but grin in the scene where the sick kid and the father have a chat because the whole scene was subtitled. Seems like the film makers deemed the Austrian in that part too heavy even for Austrians. I freely admit that I had to peek into the subtitles for »Selchkammer« (pantry) myself, too.
Who is this film for? I'm not sure to be honest. Someone called this a war movie, but I wouldn't recommend it to those who like "Saving Private Ryan". Sure, the whole story wouldn't have happened if it weren't for WWII, but that's merely a story framework and a loud background as Franz is at no point near the front. I'd rather call it a second-row war movie. If I needed to compare it with something, I'd choose "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" or "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas".
However, the final scenes compensate for the drag in a way.