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Beaufort Movie Review

Beaufort is a 2007 Israeli war film directed by Joseph Cedar and starring Oshri Cohen. It’s a surprisingly solid anti-war film.

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“I won’t be afraid to grow,

to sink or swim, to live or die“

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It tells the story of a group of Israeli soldiers stationed in an outpost in Lebanon prior to the withdrawal of forces of 2000. First off, I’d expected a propaganda movie going into it judging by the premise, but what I actually witnessed was the exact opposite and I was thankful for that. The movie was nominated for an Oscar for a reason, though it’s not a great film by any means.

The highlight here is its pacifist messaging. It depicts these Israeli soldiers who are basically lost on this outpost and are there for no reason at all, but for the unreasonable and selfish political decisions by their own government. The movie is also all about retreat and how sometimes that is the only legitimate scenario in a war. It is very much against unnecessary wars and is very humanizing in its depictions of these soldiers and their plight on this land.

But the main issue was the lack of strong characterization that was necessary to pull off a story like this. None of the characters were properly developed and they were all slim and boring. The acting performances are also just serviceable and not one actor managed to stand out from the rest.

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Beaufort is also not terribly interesting visually speaking. The movie has a very dark exterior. It was basically shot at nighttime almost throughout its runtime, which gave it a very ugly look in my eyes. The score, production design and directing are also quite pedestrian, though the castle setting was intriguing and somewhat well utilized. The movie is also terribly slow in pace, preventing me from being immersed in it more.