Search - Company K on DVD

Not The Usual War Film.

D. Edwards | Mc Kinleyville California United States | 08/27/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is a hard film to adjust to as it carries you through the war experence of a person who wrote a book from which this film is taken. Its not the typical story because of the excerps of individual members of Company K. It is slow moving compared to most war films and spends as much time on personel than on battle sequents. It's a moving story that is not for the faint of heart & brings out the worst of men under wars battle conditions. Even though the events took place in World War One, it holds true for our wars now. I would not recommend it to the average war buff because of it's pace and some of the events shown. All in all ,I enjoyed it. Don't expect it to leave you with a good feeling. It was well done and the acting was good with no big names. I was disappointed because there was not more battle footage, but to each his own."

Here's the "Straight Dope"

William D. Hickox | Syracuse, New York | 03/27/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This somber film is an earnest attempt to portray what it really felt like to be a U.S. Marine putting your life on the line in the closing days of the Great War. I would give "Company K" a B- mainly due to the obviously sincere effort by the production staff to create an original work, and not just another slavish Steven Spielberg homage like A&E's "Lost Battalion." This movie stayed true to the spirit of William March's novel, and the script is delightfully full of 1918 slang like "it's the straight dope." (Although a Marine would never say he's in "the army," as several do in the film!)

Unfortunately, it's quite obvious that the "jack" (money) wasn't plentiful: most of the actors look and sound like they were recruited from a community theater production of "South Pacific," and the battle scenes feature a couple dozen extras at the most. As a result, the filmed version of some of March's best scenes--religious imagery on the battlefield and a soldier who continues his narration after he's been killed--are likely to reduce the viewer to embarrassed chuckles. Overall, a fine effort but a missed opportunity: with a larger budget "Company K" could have been a modern classic."

One of the great anti-war films

John Lauritsen | Dorchester, MA United States | 09/24/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is one of the great anti-war films, along with All's Quiet On The Western Front and Die Bruecke (The Bridge -- which is still not available on DVD). It has great acting from dozens of actors, without a single star in the cast. This is a powerful and poetic film, with beautiful photography -- many of the screen compositions are worthy of the great masters, Eisenstein, Dreyer, Hitchcock....
Company K consists entirely of vignettes, some of which are very short ... and unforgettable. It is commendably devoid of sentimentality, sensationalism, propagandistic jingoism, and the usual war-movie cliches. Some of the episodes are tragic and shocking: American soldiers are ordered to kill defenceless prisoners of war. A sleep-deprived soldier murders his superior officer. A decent soldier, the narrator, kills a friendly German. A piggish sergeant executes a young soldier -- who was not insubordinate, but simply too frightened to move.
The senseless carnage of World War I. The message of this film, and the novel it is based on, is that these things must never happen again. But they did happen again, and are happening now."

An outstanding view of WWI...

Nachtjager | Baton Rouge, LA | 01/28/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"While this movie was obviously made on a budget, it's done remarkably well. The story consists of a series of quick looks at the soldiers in question and thus it's a bit different, but it's very well done. The uniforms and equipment are a lot better than I've seen in most big budget flicks - I suspect they used a lot of WWI reenactors that knew their stuff. HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS ONE!"