The War Below (2021)

 

            On June 7, 1917, the Western Front was rocked by one of the largest nonnuclear explosions in history.  This is the subject of the British film “The War Below”.  This WWI movie was directed and co-written by J.P. Watts.  It is based on the true story of the mining of Messines Ridge before the British army attacked.

            In 1915, William Hawkins (Sam Hazeldine) and his son enlist in the British army.  Although Hawkins has a bad heart, he wants to do his bit.  The duo are miners, but they think they are just going to be regular tommies.  Little do they realize the army has bigger things in mind.  Gen. Haig is dealing with the aftermath of the Battle of the Somme.  His sheepish solution to the wholescale slaughter of British lions is more aggression!  The maverick Lt. Col. John Norton-Griffiths, otherwise known as  Hellfire Jack (Tom Goodman-Hill),  has an idea.  Why not dig tunnels under Messines Ridge to blast an opening in the German lines which the soldiers will then waltz through and its on to Berlin? Haig is skeptical of anything involving more finesse than a frontal attack, but he gives Hellfire Jack a reluctant green light.  This despite the pooh-poohing and harrumphing of Col. Fielding.  Fielding enlisted so he could be a cinematic ass hole.  He has a cartoonish sergeant who is his lackey.

            The original idea was for the Hawkins and other miners to train regular soldiers to dig mines.  However, the miners convince Hellfire Jack that they can do it better than trainees.  Plus, it will make for a better movie.  When their demonstration mine goes boom real good, they are thanked and given tickets home.  Would you believe they refuse to go?  They have a job to finish.  And this is the big one. The one that will win the war.  They have to deal with problems like sleep deprivation, cave-ins, poisonous air, and German countermining.

            “The War Below” is a low budget affair.  Some effort went into a small section of trench, no man’s land and the tunnel.  The no man’s land set comes in handy for a rescue mission and a trip to suicide after a Dear John letter.  A lot of money was saved on the cast.  The only actor I recognized was Goodman-Hill and that’s from some BBC roles.  Half the cast doesn’t even have Wikipedia pages.  Sincerity can make up for lack of actin oomph, but you better get bang for your buck.  Unfortunately, “The War Below” is a fizzle.  It does not explode.  The movie lacks suspense.  The crises are handled easily with little suspense.  Unless you find them deciding whether to stay to finish the job to be suspenseful.  If you stick around for the booming finale, you will probably be underwhelmed.

            You will learn a little about tunneling in WWI.  They did bring canaries down to alert them to a change in the quality of their air.  They did use stethoscopes to listen for enemy countermining.  It was a nice touch to include sleep deprivation as a problem.  We don’t see this hardly ever in war movies.  The basics of the story are accurate, but much too simplistic.  There was a Hellfire Jack, but the general who was inspired by his idea was a Brigadier General George Fawke.  The tunneling was done by companies of miners from England, Canada, and Australia.  The six mines under Messines Ridge were not dug by five miners that were pulled from the ranks.  The mining units were called Manchester Moles or Claykickers (in honor of the silent clay removal method championed by Hellfire Jack).  Because it was a silent digging technique, it would not have been detectable by the Germans, but then we wouldn’t have had a cool fight below.  And as far as the Brits tapping into a German tunnel to finish their job, that is clearly farcical.  Spoiler alert:  the titanic explosion did not win the war.          

            The first question you should ask is “did we need another Messines Ridge mining movie”?  The answer is no, because “Below Hill 60” has already dug this ground.  And much better. Once again, I question why make a movie is made about a subject that has already been done well.  Can’t you find something that hasn’t been done before?

 

GRADE  =  C