Christmas Truce (2015) Reviews

• Absurd and unrealistic but sappy enough for many to like

  recklessron2015-12-30

  This is a run-of-the-mill war / action story with a Christmas theme. Totally unrealistic and unbelievable but if you like sappy love stories and can ignore all the plot holes it can fill some of your spare holiday time. An example: The Germans have the drop on the good guys and are about to execute someone when they are suddenly overcome (by surprise). The good guys wrestle away several machine guns and a few have pistols (during the struggle none of the Germans fire a single shot). Then a car with a German officer arrives. Strange things happen. Then the officer pulls out his gun and tries to shoot someone - stopped by a local French woman. He then takes another shot at a good guy who punches him in the face when he misses. Then the officer turns and points his handgun at the main character and they discuss 'a Christmas truce' as the German reinforcements arrive. Why all the good guys with the machine guns didn't shoot him down the second he reached for his gun is totally beyond my imagination and IMHO no one will ever believe it could happen like that. But... if you don't care about realism and like a sappy love story that is entirely predictable then you might just like this.

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• Enjoyable and Touches Different Scenes

  dlstrayer2015-12-22

  I did not plan on watching this movie. I had just turned off my work laptop after dealing with over stress. I turned on the TV and ended up at the beginning of this movie and I am so glad I did. It had me forget everything else but the movie and for that alone I appreciate the movie. For me, the movie was perfect. A good story, good acting, good camera work. There may have been a detail or two that was historically incorrect but I did not notice and I didn't care. I highly recommend this movie if you want a good story and sit back and relax in the Christmas spirit. It will become one of my favorite Christmas movies right up there with 'A Christmas Carol' which also had an inaccuracy (cameraman in glass). Best enjoyable time out I have had all season.

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• Ridiculous, disrespectable disregard of history

  miller-902018-12-10

  This movie was so rife with historical inaccuracies that I just had to turn it off. The movie shows airmen outside a B-17, then shows them airborne in a C-47. The "medic" is a lieutenant. Of course, all combat medics were and still are enlisted men, not officers. One of the U.S. soldiers was African-American, while the others were white. African-Americans served in the US Army with great distinction in WWII, but there were no racially integrated units. The plane drew a great deal of flak, but flak batteries were not present in remote areas where this plane was dropping its soldiers. And flak was ineffective at night against a single plane. It required searchlights to ID large formations of attacking planes so that their altitude could be determined to properly set fuses on AAA shells. Then the fuselage was perforated at 8-inch intervals by machine-gun bullets while the plane is shown above the clouds. Of course ground fire could not do that at such an altitude, and there were no attacking enemy planes. After parachuting from the stricken plane, the medic attending his comrade with a broken leg, exclaims that they need to "find medical supplies," as if a combat medic would enter the battlefield without supplies. The group of soldiers is then given shelter in the heroine's barn. The temperatures during the Battle of the Bulge were the lowest in Europe in decades, but the soldiers are shown in the barn with the lights on (BEHIND GERMAN LINES at night) with their coats off and perfectly functional windows and doors wide open. The reason for the light is that the fool captain has a fountain pen and a bottle of ink working on the novel he's writing! OMG. Finally, the American captain is wearing bright, not subdued, rank insignia on his helmet and one epaulet but not the other. Of course, this display of rank would have drawn sniper fire directly to him, so only subdued insignia was worn in combat areas What finally made me turn the TV off was when the captain tells the girl that he attended "Texas A&M." However, that school was named AMC (Agricultural and Mining College) for almost TWENTY YEARS AFTER WWII. It was not renamed, Texas A&M until 1963! Believe it or not, I omitted much of the stupidity perpetrated by the producers, writers, and directors It's clear that none of the scores of people responsible for this movie had an IQ above 30. It was perhaps the worst attempt at a period piece I've ever seen in my life -- just pathetic. It is so bad that it would actually be offensive to anyone who served in the ETO.

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• Humanity is the overall theme

  casword-261482015-12-25

  A friend of mine, who is a romantic, recommended this movie. Luckily, ION showed it one more time, and I was totally engrossed. The theme of the story is humanity, even in time of war. The movie illustrates how love can come in many forms--romance, brotherhood, family, compassion, etc. I loved the quotes by famous writers, especially the one about tomorrow by John Wayne. When I googled the Duke, I discovered several of his quotes. Although I read that there were errors in the film, I easily overlooked them for the sake of the story. As a writer myself, I've sometimes used artistic license as needed. If this movie comes out in DVD, I'll definitely buy it!

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• Absurd, predictable, illogical, feel good nonsense.

  rps-22015-12-19

  Enjoyable enough if you can subdue your angry reaction to errors, stupidity and Canadian insecurity. The camera work is good.Thats about all that is. But the acting is pitiful, the effects artificial and the ending appallingly predictable. Christmas movies, with few exceptions, are hopelessly bad but this one must be in the top (bottom?)ten. So many errors... The US armed forces were not racially integrated at the time. Women did not walk around rural areas in occupied Belgium wearing designer clothing. And how, in the name of all reason and common sense could a 50 pound sack of Canadian Redpath sugar from Montreal, a rather blatant product placement, end up in a rural house in 1944 occupied Belgium? And once again our milquetoast Canadian filmmakers show their lack of backbone. This was a Canadian produced and Canadian tax subsidized film. Then WHY IN HELL is the story about American rather than Canadian soldiers????

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