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Title: Defiance (2008)
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| Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
| Daniel Craig | ... | Tuvia Bielski | |
| Liev Schreiber | ... | Zus Bielski | |
| Jamie Bell | ... | Asael Bielski | |
| Alexa Davalos | ... | Lilka Ticktin | |
| Allan Corduner | ... | Shimon Haretz | |
| Mark Feuerstein | ... | Isaac Malbin | |
| Tomas Arana | ... | Ben Zion Gulkowitz | |
| Jodhi May | ... | Tamara Skidelsky | |
 |
Kate Fahy | ... | Riva Reich |
| Iddo Goldberg | ... | Yitzhak Shulman | |
| Iben Hjejle | ... | Bella | |
| Martin Hancock | ... | Peretz Shorshaty | |
| Ravil Isyanov | ... | Viktor Panchenko | |
| Jacek Koman | ... | Konstanty 'Koscik' Kozlowski | |
| George MacKay | ... | Aron Bielski | |
On the run and hiding in the deep forests of the then German-occupied Poland and Belorussia (World War II), the four Bielski brothers find the impossible task of foraging for food and weapons for their survival. They live, not only with the fear of discovery, contending with neighboring Soviet partisans and knowing whom to trust but also take the responsibility of looking after a large mass of fleeing Polish Jews from the German war machine. Women, men, children, the elderly and the young alike are all hiding in makeshift homes in the dark, cold and unforgiving forests in the darkest times of German-occupied Eastern Europe. Written by Cinema_Fan
Although I'm not a religious type and know little of any details from the stories of the bible, the parallels this old-fashioned adventure story draws with Moses leading the chosen are unmistakable (although the events depicted here - based on fact, apparently - are on an undeniably smaller scale: instead of a parting of the Red Sea we get a wade through marshland).
Such lofty aspirations leave Ed Zwick's film open to questions about the wisdom of such a decision at best, and ridicule at worst. Needless to say, it's best to take the film's claims of authenticity with a pinch of salt and perhaps to overlook the pretentiousness at its core.
At the end of the day, Defiance is an old-fashioned war film that could easily have been made back in the forties or fifties. The story has been told a thousand times in a thousand different forms, and its' familiarity means the long running time becomes something of a chore. Daniel Craig and Liev Schreiber give a good account of themselves as the brothers who find themselves leading a band of Jewish refugees from the Nazis, but the complexities of their relationship are only touched upon, meaning that key moments such as Zus's decision to join the Russian partisans seem to come out of the blue, with no accumulation of incidents to justify his choice.
Most other characters, other than Jamie Bell as the youngest brother, are genre stereotypes: the Jewish teacher, the Jewish intellectual, the stern Russian commander, etc, which lends the entire thing a 'by the numbers' feel that means the audience is never as involved in the refugee's plight as they ought to be. The film has its moments, and often looks beautiful, but you'll watch the end credits with the feeling that you've seen it all before.