User Reviews

I'm going to avoid the deepest spoilers, just try to describe the context, and cinematic proposal, which is quite dramatic. Basically, it is not an easy production to watch until the end, it is an absurdly sad story, full of tragedies, and told in an extremely dramatic way, approaching almost a soap opera.

I finished watching and was seriously in doubt whether I thought it was good or not. As I made it to the end, I can't say that it was bad, because when I don't like something, I usually stop watching before the end, but at the same time, it's hard to say that so much tragedy and sadness together is something good to watch. In addition to the horrors of the war itself, which are portrayed, the proposal is also to focus on personal and family suffering to the highest degree, with no room for a moment of joy or relaxation.

Despite being a movie, Netflix has made it available here in a miniseries format, divided into 3 episodes, each of which is an act of the movie. The first act is a little scattered and confusing, as it takes place over a long period of years (1939 to 1944) described in just under 1 hour of projection, which means that the periods shown are all very fast and poorly developed, at every 10 minutes of projection 1 or 2 years of history pass, leaving the plot a little confusing and not very elaborate. The second act is the highlight of the series, where the war really appears in all its cruelty and harshness, it's just extremely tragic. And the third act is where the soap opera comes at full power, with family dramas taking over the closing of the projection.

I rate it 6.5 out of 10, and would only recommend it to anyone in the mood for a watery war melodrama.

(Spoiler at the end)

It's difficult to sum up the experience of watching this film. It weaves suspense, devastation, love, hope, and the horrors of war together into a picture that will stay with me for a long time to come.

I was fortunate to watch this film at a showing with the director and some of the cast and crew. As the director remarked, while it is a war movie, the antagonist is not Germany or any other villain with a distinct face--the antagonist is war itself. This comes through in very powerful ways, enabling the film to capture the visceral *feeling* of war-not something dramatized or twisted into heroic narratives set to rousing music, but stripped back into raw slices of life stitched into a patchwork that carries you into the war, through it, and beyond it. It doesn't need fanfare to guide it because the moments truly speak for themselves, leaping through the screen to grab you and bring you along in the experience. I think if you enjoyed the movie Dunkirk and its style of storytelling, you'll like this.

After the showing, the director said something that really stuck with me and sums up the heartbreaking but deeply stirring core of this film: this is a story about what people do with what is left after their worlds are blown apart. How they make do with the broken pieces, how they build and rebuild in the remains--but are also haunted by what might have been.

I definitely recommend this film. However, please be aware that there are a few graphic moments depicting injuries and deaths that are not gratuitous at all (I think they were very appropriately done), but may nevertheless be disturbing to some viewers (they don't last long though).

Spoiler: The way you could feel the entire weight of the story in that last look between the two men, and then in the empty glasses on the table... like all of the journey was summed up in that moment. Everything there could never be enough words to say. Everything that words would always fail to tell, so they showed us instead. Utterly phenomenal.

There are a few good things about this Norwegian drama of the merchant marine during - and then after World War II.

• there are relatively few films on the very important role of the merchant marine in sustaining the allies with valuable supplies during the war.

The principal actors give good performances - especially during the last 2 episodes (there are 3).

• not so good

The first episode seemed all over the place and not unified. In fact, each of the three separate episodes was like a different story.

There was no overall theme - it varied from being lost at sea, desertion, missing your family, the war in Norway, post-traumatic stress from serving during the war and returning home to a completely new environment. The movie frequently jumped time periods. There was little cohesiveness in the overall film.

There were logic gaps - one of the main ones being how in heaven's name did one of the sailors manage to find his long lost partner in Singapore?? This just boggled as in - "Well maybe Freddie's in Singapore, I'll just go over and have a look see!"

Several reviewers have mentioned the final scene where the two 70-year-old sailors, after twenty years of separation, sit at a bare table, drinking, saying little, then saying nothing, sharing unspeakable memories in silence. You wait for words, but no words come, and you realize that you, the viewer, are being challenged to find the words. But what can one say? What can one say of two once proud, skilled and vigorous seamen, whom the trauma of war has reduced to spiritless shells, who, although they outlived the war, did not actually survive it. That we also find no words, that we look on in subdued silence, is testimony, perhaps, to the power of the experience we have just seen depicted in this extraordinary piece of cinema.

Am amazing saga this story of two friends within the challenges of world War II. A passionate tale of their destiny together and apart. The ravages of war and what it does to friends and families tells of the indelible mark on thier souls. Sadly the two friends struggle making a living at sea. The Norwegian merchants ships were tossed into the war as allies to the British. These two sailors survived and struggled and were lost at sea after the ship was torpedoed. They held onto oneanother for their lives. This film is well done as great cinematography. The actors are amazing talented souls who portrayed the characters with empathy and displayed love, compassion and forgiveness in a believable way. A lovely but sad tear jerker.