Deathwatch (DVD)

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Liked it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Satisfactory
Special Effects	Good
How does it compare to similar films?	Good

Advantages:	Spooky, gross and generally not nice in places .
Disadvantages:	Thin characters .

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Those more interested in the product than the writer, feel free to skip the following two paragraphs. Thank you.

Okay, so I gather that people are wondering what’s been going on all this time with me, yeah? I’ll put minds at ease and just say that it’s only my laptop that’s ill and not my good self; the screen keeps turning itself off, quite of its own accord and it doesn’t enthuse me to take the ‘top on the train with me to get some serious writing done, hence no writing at all has been done, serious or otherwise.

Thanks for ShoppingGirl whose swift kick up the Khyber has forced me to lock myself in what Tommy and I mysteriously refer to as “the other room” and actually get something down and up to you guys and girls of Ciao. I’ve been keeping busy what with work and courses, this and that, but they’re all other opinions, and I should really start talking about my chosen specialised subject…

Last week, I borrowed a DVD off of Clive, a colleague who sits opposite me at work. The box told me that the film would “blow the horror genre to bits.” I was intrigued and at approximately 11pm, Tommy and I settled down to watch, with a view of a relatively early night.

The film is set in the First World War, and I mean right in the middle of it… It begins with our main cast going over the top and a clever little shell-shock effect where our hero (Jamie Bell of Billy Elliot and Nicholas Nickleby) doesn’t really want to be in the middle of so much killing and is generally disoriented, dazed and itching to dance. It was reminiscent of the scene in Blackadder Goes Forth, that poignant final episode where the true reality of war totally outstripped the comedy and none of us were laughing any more. Saving Private Ryan is a good comparison for this first establishing segment, but being a British movie with British actors and, shall we say, a British budget, not nearly so spectacular or, for a 15-rated movie, as gory. (Hang on, Saving… was a 15 too, so perhaps they were saving the gore for later.)

After this scene, we find ourselves in a thick fog, soldiers stumbling their way across sodden earth, with their gasmasks on during the day and as they travel, they happen upon a trench with a few Germans still remaining. They occupy the trench and kill all but one German, who Charles Shakespeare (Billy Idiot) feels inexplicably sorry for. They take him captive and try to speak to him, but they don’t speak German and the prisoner doesn’t speak English, so he and Billy communicate through the language of tap – er, French, sorry.

Billy, or Charles Shakespeare is the youngest of the group and was, as it turns out, too young to sign up but wanted to join the army anyway. He seems so timid and has the face of a stunned rodent through much of the film and it is quite unbelievable that someone of his disposition actually volunteered to go to war when he could just as easily stayed at home, studying tap and jazz for a couple of extra years, by which time the war would have been over. It’s not gone into, either, but everyone treats him like their little son, which is kind of endearing, I suppose.

The other soldiers have very thin personalities that only seem to embody one particular characteristic – and that’s if they’re lucky – except for Charles because he’s the clear hero. It’s obvious from quite early on that if everyone’s going to die, then he’ll walk away unscathed; you’re not really interested in anyone else because there’s just not enough to them to want to care. I wanted the soldier who was played by the guy who played Nick in My Family to have a good character, but all he did was chew on a bullet and have half a wank before meeting an untimely end at the hands of a barbed-wire-ensconced corpse.

Another character is a vastly belligerent, definitely-got-it-coming-to-him, continuously Greg Rusedski-ing his way to a particularly painful-looking death. I can’t remember anyone’s name from the film, other than Charles Shakespeare, and this goes some way to show that they weren’t hugely padded out characters.

Briefly, there’s also the Christian that loses his faith, the up-himself ranking officer who loses his cool and the poor wounded but hopeful soldier who loses his legs and then, moments later, the contents of his skull.

War buffs will enjoy this film as doubtless every detail has been researched to the nth degree and I found myself admiring this aspect of the film. Although this story takes place a little to the side of the war, the theme remains ubiquitous in every shot. There is mud everywhere, barbed wire clings to every surface and the trench in which the film is set seems very threatening, more like a dank, dangerous prison than anything else.

I found Deathwatch to have something of an identity crisis that didn’t necessarily detract from its effectiveness as a horror movie. It wasn’t sure whether it was a psychological, white-knuckle, tense creeper or a total gut spilling grossfest and flicked between the two, from the very moment a foot went through the chest cavity of an ageing corpse to the quasi-imaginary noises of warfare that built and built to a crescendo, the climax of which was yet another death.

It made us jump a few times and it was creepy, it was gross in parts and I would recommend getting all food out of the way before you begin to watch. Keep the tortillas and salsa until after. On the evening we watched the DVD, a thunderstorm hung in the air and provided with extra audio-visual elements and though the days of hiding behind the sofa are long gone for most of us (because, let’s face it, we’ve all been desensitised to it all), I would go so far as saying that it was the spookiest evening I’d had in a few years. I know that for you to get what we got for free, you may need to go to some expense to hire Rolf Harris, his wobbleboard and a guy with an industrial torch, but if you do know there’s bad weather a-brewin’ then I found this a good way to get the willies put up you.

Whilst I don’t think I’ll ever write anything like that last sentence ever again, I think I’ll leave it in.

I am happy to admit that by the end of the film, I had stopped thinking that Jamie Bell was going to pirouette through the mud. Go on, feed your morbid fascination and rent the film.
It’s a far cry from Rowan Atkinson with pencils up his nose and undies on his head, but it didn’t, as the box had promised, blow the horror genre to bits, or for that matter, blow anything to bits. There was no blowing whatsoever. Not even a light breeze, it wasn’t even in the Beaufort scale, to be honest, it stuck to its genre like that for which there is no Stain Devil, but I enjoyed it and that’s what’s important.

For your information, the storm grew louder and forked lightning streaked across the sky and, as I lay awake wondering what war would be like and thinking how lucky I am not having ever been put through anything like that, I had visions of people with gangrenous legs being eaten away by rats. I dipped in and out of consciousness in 25ºc heat of our bedroom until finally, I drifted off. The last time I looked at the clock on Tommy’s side of the bed, it was 04.30.