Fury (15)

Director: David Ayer

Starring: Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Michael Peña, Jon Bernthal

"IDEALS are peaceful. History is violent."

Brad Pitt somehow has a knack of summing up the mood and message behind a film in a succinct sound bite and Fury is no exception.

In David Ayer's Second World War film, he plays Don 'Wardaddy' Collier, a battle-hardened sergeant who commands a Sherman tank in Nazi Germany in the final grim stage of the conflict.

Fury portrays those dark, bitter and twisted days when Hitler was on the brink of defeat.

He declares 'total war' with even children summoned to defend the homeland and there is desperation on both sides for the war to end.

There have been many films made about the atrocities of the Second World War. Too many, some might say.

But what makes Ayer's Fury stand out is that there is no redemption or poetry here. The message is clear – war is hell.

Pitt's 'Wardaddy' commands a crew of five who he has kept alive by being as harsh and merciless with them as he is fighting the enemy. But privately he longs for home and is facing the same inner turmoil as the rest of them.

Outnumbered and outgunned, his men are assigned to strike at the heart of Nazi Germany one town at a time, risking ambush, counter attacks and superior German tanks.

One of startling elements of the film is the transformation of Logan Lerman's character, Norman Ellison.

The army clerk is more at home behind a typewriter than inside a tank but he slowly becomes desensitized to the violence around him as he grapples with his conscience, survival instinct and feelings about the enemy.

It is an exceptional performance so expect to see much more from Lerman in the years to come.

The other members of the crew are played by Shia LaBeouf (Transformers), Jon Bernthal (The Walking Dead) and Michael Peña (Ayer's End of Watch).

Each character has his own demons and has been hopelessly distorted by the war.

In different circumstances they probably would not be able to stand each other but together in that claustrophobic tank – in life and death situations – they are an incredibly efficient team.

The film speaks volumes about brotherhood.

As with all war films, Fury also makes for some tense, emotionally wrought viewing.

Bodies are ploughed into ditches as if it was nothing, soldiers burn in agony while clambering from the wreckage of tanks.

But what might stay with you is the image of wide-eyed children in Nazi uniforms, drawn into a world of death and despair that they cannot possibly comprehend.

And, although brutal, the scenes are never gratuitous as they are in keeping with the film's theme on the impact of the war on those that fight it.

A haunting portrayal of some of the darkest days of Europe's modern history, Fury proves that war films still have the power to move us almost 70 years after the conflict ended.

DAVID MORGAN