The movie “Fury” written and directed by David Ayer, is a brilliant and eye opening movie that is a good representation of some of the aspects in World War II. Although this movie may have a few flaws, it is still one of my favorites to date. With lifelike war, romance and action scenes, this movie is an eye catcher that is well divided to complete a whole, and keeps you on your toes throughout the whole experience. Overall, this film accurately depicts certain events in wartime during the time that the movie is supposed to take place. With this being a Hollywood film, there are instances where the war is extremely over-dramatized, but as a whole, the movie follows very closely with real events that could have taken place in World War II. World War II was a tragic time in History claiming many lives that will never be forgotten, caused by different countries seeking control for living space, resources, and many other factors.
In the movie “Fury”, it portrays the gruesome and horrifying experiences of the final days of World War II in the Nazi Germany. The movie exhibits the new technology that was arising around this time, while focusing on the armored tanks that changed the war indefinitely, particularly in Europe when the United States was fighting the Nazis in the western portion of Germany . The tanks in the Second World War were constantly changing and being updated to be at the advantage over the opponent. The Sherman tank named “Fury” in the movie was a very popular tank in this period of time. An article about American tanks talks about the Sherman being the American armored hero of World War II .
The story of the movie tells about the adventure of a Sherman tank crew that is enduring the final days of World War II in the battlefield. The people seen in the movie are of all ages, which is in fact similar to variety of all ages of young men and women that took place in the real War. The young boy Norman, seen in the movie begins as an inexperienced, adolescent, frightened young boy who did not know what exactly was going on in the concept of the war, and not fond of the site of death. In this period of the war the focus wasn’t about what was morally right or wrong, it was life or death .
As Norman begins his journey with the Sherman tank crew, he does not speak up when he sees younger German children running in the trees next to them. Norman’s unwillingness to speak up resulted in one of the Tanks being blown up and men killed. This was something that puts into real life perspective of how violent the war was at this time. Even German kids during this period of the war were trained with the killing mind of a soldier. The experienced crew leader then forces Norman to take the life of a German soldier wearing an American Uniform, as Norman refuses, he eventually learns that killing the enemy is the only way to get out of the war .
Although the movie follows closely to the timeline to the actual war, it does not follow the storyline in complete accuracy of the last days. The tolls taken on the casualties of Germans and American lives were both very substantial. In the film Fury, the Americans are shown to win almost every battle with little difficulty, as this was not true given it was a bloody fight for both sides.
Another sense of the war was the new technology that was progressing at the time. The tanks in the Second World War were constantly changing and being updated to be at the advantage over the opponent. The Sherman tank named “Fury” in the movie was a very popular tank in this period of time.
Like many American-made war time movies, the characters and events that take place in this film are glorified as heroes and the movie is full of acts of valor and patriotism. Some movies exaggerate the actual heroic acts of the American soldiers and do not show some of the things that they had to do that would be maybe unfathomable to see, like the group having to retaliate against Nazi children, children that were raised to be that way and had no control over their actions. So, the film does show many downsides and personal dilemmas of the individual characters, it also makes not only the characters in the movie but also the audiences question their ideas of humanity, race, and morality . Many movies and TV shows perceive the events in World War II as the United States being the “good guys” and the Germans being the “bad guys” and show that the U.S. could do no wrong, but this film shows the truth about our military and how sometimes they had to do things that we would consider immoral. Things that helped us win the war and helped our country tremendously during this time sometimes came at the expense of innocent people and children and this film accurately depicts that. The director and writers don’t illustrate the United States Army as doing no wrong and they tell the truth about the role we played in the history of that time. For example, there was a scene where a German battalion was headed towards the heavily outnumbered Fury tank. The Sherman tank crew knew they were going to have to come up with a clever strategy. They then took the body of a dead German soldier and poured gasoline on his body while lighting him into flames. Last, they propped his body up on the tank to show the extreme grimness that sometimes had to be taken into account during this period of War while later attacking with everything they had. Many authors and philosophers try to justify the rightness and wrongness of the war while considering heavy casualties and brutality, but what is morally right and what is morally wrong during times of war are to be decided upon us as the human race. We as Americans want to win a war and don’t want the opponent to defeat our country, but we feel as we have don’t have a choice but to retaliate as they are inflicting harm on our people. This scene about the burning of the body shows the brutality and extremes that sometimes have to be taken in a situation of life or death.
Ultimately this movie does a fantastic job of allowing viewers to visualize a very important part in our American History that shapes how we function as a society today. Still to this very day, our people and our government are still challenged with acts of war and faced with moral dilemmas and also problems such as seeking control for living space, resources, and many other factors. No act of war can necessarily be justifiable but when the lives of Americans could potentially be at stake, but sometimes we have to do things that are not morally right. This movie describes that in a way that can help people better understand that sometimes what may seem patriotic and heroic is in fact at the expense of innocent lives.
