50/32
In the winter of 1862, during the Civil War, the U.S. Army sends a volunteer company to patrol the uncharted western territories. Minervini had the set built in Montana and had the actor live there for two months. The dialogue and ideas are those that the actors came up with while living in the wilderness and imagining themselves as soldiers in the Civil War. The Damned: In the winter of 1862, a volunteer unit of Union soldiers is sent to defend a mountainous region, we are not told where it is, and we are not given the names of the soldiers. After the main troops leave, they are commanded by a John Brown-style patriarch with a bushy beard and his teenage sons as recruits. The soldiers are a mixed bunch, some middle-aged, even old, mostly in their thirties. Not all have military experience, but knowledge is shared and skills are transferable. We witness mobile guards, shots fired at distant horsemen. Buffalo are shot and killed. The bleak landscape, the hills, the mountain meadows, the blown snow, the low altitude all contribute to the development of a sense of existential despair. The battle is going on, we don’t see the enemy, we see the losses of the units. War is hell, especially when you no longer know why you are there. A Ken Loach-style film, with no daily dialogue and many ordinary people acting amateurishly as soldiers. This improvisation leads to philosophical, religious and political discussions around the campfires. Some of them are welcome. But it is a small distraction from this brutal depiction of men at war. Written and directed by Roberto Minervini, 10.8.