Firstly, when you make a biopic about a poet whose most famous works centred around the First World War, you'd think you would show some of the war, you'd think we'd see Siegfried Sassoon in the trenches, especially as so much of the story focuses on the trauma he suffers as a result of the war, but there's nothing aside from some black and white footage and a brief scene in a hospital ward involving screaming men.
Instead we see a collage of moments throughout his life that never give us enough time to invest emotionally, apart from his brief friendship with Wilfred Owen. He had a relationship with Ivor Novello who is depicted as such a nasty piece of work you cannot understand why Sassoon would be remotely interested, let alone fall in love. It's unclear then what the nature of his subsequent friendship was with Novello's other ex lover. Then he's living with socialite Stephen Tennant. Are they flatmates or lovers? It seems the latter but when did that start? We saw them briefly at a party, while he was still with Novello, in a much earlier scene, but they barely spoke and now they're suddenly in a relationship with no context. And how much time has passed since breaking up with Novello? It could be a few months or a few years. It's very hard to tell. Sometimes the film is linear and sometimes it switches back and forth in time and it's hard to tell if you're watching a flashback or not.
There's also a rather pointless moment when he is introduced by Robbie Ross, his older friend (or teacher, or relative, who knows) to a wealthy older woman and stays in her house, and she offers herself him sex and he says no. We never see her again, so I don't see what the point of that was. And also what happens to Robbie Ross? His good friend whose storyline just ends without consequence.
We also frequently flit forward in time to an older Sassoon, played by Peter Capaldi, who speaks with a highly clipped accent not matched by Jack Lowden's younger Sassoon. And all you get from these flash forwards are long shots of a very sad and bitter old man with a fractious relationship with his son and a stale relationship with his wife, and no real idea as to why these relationships are like this, apart from the fact he is still traumatised by his experiences of the war that we never see. There's also a brief exchange with the older Stephen Tenant, which only leaves us more mystified as to what that relationship was
The nature of his relationship with his wife Hester is also vague. Sometimes it seems he genuinely had feelings for her. Often it doesn't. There's much evidence that Sassoon was bisexual, rather than gay, and I was interested to see how they explored that, but it very much suggests that he was gay and poor Hester entered into a passionless marriage.
A waste of an interesting life that was just trying to be too clever.
Instead we see a collage of moments throughout his life that never give us enough time to invest emotionally, apart from his brief friendship with Wilfred Owen. He had a relationship with Ivor Novello who is depicted as such a nasty piece of work you cannot understand why Sassoon would be remotely interested, let alone fall in love. It's unclear then what the nature of his subsequent friendship was with Novello's other ex lover. Then he's living with socialite Stephen Tennant. Are they flatmates or lovers? It seems the latter but when did that start? We saw them briefly at a party, while he was still with Novello, in a much earlier scene, but they barely spoke and now they're suddenly in a relationship with no context. And how much time has passed since breaking up with Novello? It could be a few months or a few years. It's very hard to tell. Sometimes the film is linear and sometimes it switches back and forth in time and it's hard to tell if you're watching a flashback or not.
There's also a rather pointless moment when he is introduced by Robbie Ross, his older friend (or teacher, or relative, who knows) to a wealthy older woman and stays in her house, and she offers herself him sex and he says no. We never see her again, so I don't see what the point of that was. And also what happens to Robbie Ross? His good friend whose storyline just ends without consequence.
We also frequently flit forward in time to an older Sassoon, played by Peter Capaldi, who speaks with a highly clipped accent not matched by Jack Lowden's younger Sassoon. And all you get from these flash forwards are long shots of a very sad and bitter old man with a fractious relationship with his son and a stale relationship with his wife, and no real idea as to why these relationships are like this, apart from the fact he is still traumatised by his experiences of the war that we never see. There's also a brief exchange with the older Stephen Tenant, which only leaves us more mystified as to what that relationship was
The nature of his relationship with his wife Hester is also vague. Sometimes it seems he genuinely had feelings for her. Often it doesn't. There's much evidence that Sassoon was bisexual, rather than gay, and I was interested to see how they explored that, but it very much suggests that he was gay and poor Hester entered into a passionless marriage.
A waste of an interesting life that was just trying to be too clever.
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