The Iron Claw

[VoR]

One of the notable Oscar snub movies this season, although it was well reviewed and made good money.



I thought it was good, but I found myself strangely un-moved. I think the choice to have it so much through Zac Efron's character's perspective robbed some of the scenes of a little bit of power. The deaths of all the brothers felt strangely underpowered. It's a properly tragic story, but somehow none of it really hit me. I fully know nothing of the world it depicts, which probably doesn't help, but I did notice the audience I was in felt restless and there were a fair few midway walkouts.

Speaking of Efron, the physical transformation is really shocking. It's one thing to beef up for a role, but he looks like an actual ogre!

 

[rhythmbandit]

100% agree with everything you said. It was relentlessly bleak at times and reading up on their life stories beforehand was rather sad. The scene at the end in the field with all the dead brothers reunited was quite moving, though.

 

[Rowan Tree 🌳]

I know the story well enough but don't think I need to see this version of it. It is horribly bleak.

 

[Finn]

Goodness me at this. That POOR FAMILY!

I thought this was very well done and it kept me throughout, but I think it really helped that I didn't know a thing about the story before hand, as otherwise it may have felt like just ticking off the tragedies. Like VoR I didn't feel especially moved, but that changed in the final few minutes - I found the brothers reunited scene, and the final scene with the two young sons, really quite moving. I also found the relationship between the brothers, especially early on, really sweet.

I thought everyone was v good. Zac Efron looked SO DIFFERENT and ODD that my brain just registered him as CGI throughout the whole thing, like hulk in the marvel films.

Wikipedia tells me there was a whole other brother in real life who killed himself? Christ