Saints & Soldiers (2003)reviewed by Benn "Where's the Humanity?" Farrell
First time feature director Dan Little did a great job of framing this work. It is obvious he has many other short projects under his belt. This visual storytelling was strong, and his ability to create tension was good as well. The best and worse thing I can say about the picture is the fact it's very "by the book." Screenwriters are taught to stick to a beaten path when it comes to mapping out a movie and its structure. This picture did a near perfect job of that, including interesting character backstory, giving the movie a voice and so forth. However, the picture sticks to the beaten path SO much, than I ends up being done before. It's an interesting story, but the filmmakers were obviously not ready to RISK anything in material to make the picture unique. The music accompanies this approach to the picture. The film's composers were obviously told to "match" several known scores to other pictures like "Saving Private Ryan" and "Shawshank Redemption." Overall, I thought the picture was well made for being originally shot on digital video and having a low budget. The production did a good job to spend every dollar they good on location and costumes, making the film as authentic as possible. There, they succeeded, but in the story, they only reached "ho-hum" levels. I suggest seeing it for yourself if you can. Benn - Where's the Humanity?
This picture is marginally good for me. The performances were status quo, and I would have appreciated some subtitles when the German and French characters were chiming in, but for the most part "Saints & Sinners" was a pretty thoughtful picture.