The Jewish James Bond

Edward Zwick directed a few good movies before he created Defiance. The Last Samurai and Blood Diamond both get good grades in my book. This one he uses a fairly new actor to our eyes, Daniel Craig. Of course you can argue Daniel is not that new, but considering he hasn't been known for as long as Tom Cruise and Leo, I'll consider him, new, fresh and only widely known for one role, the newest James Bond.

Now take a few good supporting actors such as Liev Schreiber and Jamie Bell and you are headed off with a nice cast. The three actors play three brothers in the film. The film is based off of a "true story", but we all know true stories are never 100% true in Hollywood. Regardless, the basis of the story is pretty good.

There is a problem though, we've seen a ton of movies about the Jewish struggle during the Nazis' bloody regime, so why make another? I would say this was stuck in my head all through out the movie. What makes this film different from the countless others, and how will it measure up against the big one (Schindler's List). It doesn't measure up quite the same. It tells a story just a bit differently than most of the films about that struggle, mostly because the great deal of the film has no Nazis in it.

Pretty much the film is about the band of brothers who survived their villiage being killed off by the Nazis invasion of Poland, and they hide in the woods in order to go undetected. However, the eventually run in and band together with other Polish Jews trying to survive. The group eventually becomes a large one and they create a "camp" for Jews to "live freely".

The dangers of course are being discovered by the Nazis who have guns and tanks and German sheppherds. There is also the danger of Polish non-Jews who are hunting down Jews for a cash reward. This is the overall suspense through out the film along with the dangers of the harsh cold winters, the lack of proper food, and illnesses that can kill without proper aid. It is literally a survival story with a twist. The twist is, that these Jews can fight, and they fight back. Making it very interesting to watch and is pretty much the only reason that this story is such a good one.

So the story is good, the cast is good, but what about the overall execution of the film. I'm going to have to say it was just okay. Emotions never ran wild for me, and the drama during the fighting is just average. To me the highlight of the film isn't even when Daniel Craig kills a Nazi...which yes, he does kill quite a few. I'm not going to say too much more, only that I say go see this movie if you love Daniel Craig, cause he does a great job, but if you are on a budget, I would wait to rent this one on DVD or get it on Netflix.

GRADE: B