Fury

One of the difficulties in war films is its portrayal of violence and how to find a balance between being realistic and being just glorified action. Director David Ayer has depicted both sides over the years, but Fury is his most realistically brutal film to date. It’s definitely not for the faint of heart.

It’s nearing the end of World War II and many of the Allied forces are making their final stands deep within the heart of Germany. Staff Sergeant Don Collier (Brad Pitt) has done a good job at keeping his tank crew alive up until this point, but after a mishap leaves one of his team dead he’s in need of a new 2nd gunner. Private Norman (Logan Lerman) is not only new to the Fury squad, he’s new to war itself having arrived fresh from bootcamp. He’ll need to quickly catch on if he is to survive in this deadly environment.

Fury provides a gritty and brutal portrayal of war that shocks you with its opening scene in which Brad PItt gouges out a Nazi soldier’s eye with a knife and doesn’t hold back until the end credits begin to roll. What drives the film is the five-man crew of the tank, which has been nicknamed Fury. There’s the priestly Boyd (Shia LaBeouf), the hotheaded Grady (Jon Bernthal), and calm and collected Trini (Michael Peña) in addition to Private Norman and their leader Don.

While they appear to be your stereotypical character types we’ve seen time and time again, but the cast performances stand out as some of their best work. Fury gets up close and personal with everyone. The majority of the film you’re inside the tank looking out onto the battlefield through a tiny window as shots ring by and bombs explode mere feet away. It’s about as intense you can get in a war film and it never lets up.

Even when things are calm and they’re not in battle you can still feel the tension. One of the best scenes in the film involves the U.S. soldiers talking over a German town and Staff Sergeant Don and Private Norman end up taking refuge with two German women for a few moments of what seems like normalcy. It brings a humanity to the film and really stands out against the war and violence surrounding them.

Fury is one of those films that you can watch one time and be completely content with never seeing it again. There are some conventional themes we’ve seen plenty of times before with the war genre, but Ayer and the cast do a fantastic job at making them appear fresh and new.