War Flowers (2010)

               “War Flowers” is a straight to DVD feature that is currently playing on Netflix.  It was written and directed by Serge Rodnunsky.  He is a prolific director of straight to DVDs.  Somehow his low budget managed to pay for some recognizable stars.  Unfortunately, he didn’t hire a good screenwriter.

                The movie is set in the Civil War in North Carolina in 1863. It leads off with a montage of reenactors participating in a skirmish featuring cannons that do not recoil.  There’s the obligatory slo-mo and several explosions that launch stunt men off trampolines.  It’s not bad action for a low budget movie.  The movie is not about the fighting however.  It is the tale of a mother and her daughter and their trials as they wait for the husband to return from the army.  Sarabeth (Christina Ricci!) and her daughter Melody (Gabrielle Popa) are starving.  The other arc involves a Union officer named Louis (Jason Gedrick) whose father Gen. McIntire (Tom Berenger!) wants him out of combat.  Guess who ends up getting wounded in Sarabeth’s yard?  She and Melody nurse him in their basement.  Sarabeth’s home is now in no man’s land and is being threatened by the Union advance, but they are under more immediate threat from a local sinister creep.

                The familiar faces and the reenactors move the film up the ladder a bit, but it is still at a low wrung.  The acting is poor by the no-names, with the exception of Popa who is good as Melody.  Ricci, Gedrick, and Berenger class things up and Ricci seems sincerely into the project.  The characters are stereotypes and the plot is predictable, with the exception of a nifty twist ending.  The romance feels rushed.  The movie has the vibe of a Christian film, but the spirituality is underplayed and not pushed.  The movie is very micro and you get no idea of the big picture.  It also does not have anything to say about slavery other than having some positive slave characters.  The film does not take sides on the war.   It is more of a drama set in a war.

                The best I can say for “War Flowers” is it is sincere.  And you better sincerely be hard up for entertainment to watch it.  Don’t get Netflix just to see it.  What is it about the Civil War that it is so hard to set good movies in it?  

GRADE  =  D