Fury is one of those movies where horrible people to horrible things to even more horrible people. It’s grim and humourless and gory.

You will see someones head get crushed by tank tracks. And another guy who catches on fire and then graphically shoots himself in the head before he burns to death. That kind of thing.

Fury would not make for a good date night, is what I am trying to say.

On the plus side, I saw it after a pretty crappy day at work, and left feeling grateful that while my job can suck sometimes, at least I am not a tank driver in World War II, because that would be the worst.

I would recommend watching Fury if you are a piano removalist, or work night shifts at a baby sleep clinic, because it will help you appreciate how good you have it.

Fury is set in the dying days of the war, when the Nazis were giving machine guns to kids and sending them out to fight. The war had already been won and lost, but plenty more people needed to die before it was done. Our tank crew loses a guy and has him replaced by a typist, played by Logan Lerman, and the movie is about Brad Pitt trying to turn him into a killer.

There is some troubling stuff in this movie, and this crew do things which are either arguably or clearly war crimes.

Ordinarily I hate when a movie depicts something and people get confused and think it is endorsing it. This usually leads to pearl-clutching hysterical newspaper articles that I furiously read and then rant about on the internet until people tell me to shut up. (It last happened with Zero Dark Thirty.)

This time, though, I am genuinely confused about what writer/director David Ayer thinks about his fictional characters and their actions. I left pretty troubled by some of what the movie depicts and what it seemed to be saying.

That said, there is a lot to like here. I loved the intensity of the film and the real tangible bond among this crew. Pitt is very good, though a special shout out has the go to Shia LaBeouf who is completely amazing. This will turn your perception of him on its head. There are some great sequences and a hell of a climax, even if it is totally ludicrous.

All in all, I had very mixed feelings. It’s ugly, long, and morally questionable – but it’s also a really well-executed brutal war film that achieves everything it sets out to do. If that sounds like your kind of thing, give Fury a look.

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