Testament of Youth (2014)

Release date: 2015-01-16
Country: UK|Denmark
Language: English|German
Director: James Kent
Production Co: BBC Films, BFI Film Fund, Heyday Films
Genre: Biography, Drama, History, War
Rating: 7.3/10
Length: 2h 9min

Storyline

A long, long time ago, back in the spring of 1914, they were so happy together. There was Vera Brittain, an upper class girl with ideas of her own; and her bright brother Edward; and his group of friends among whom Roland Leighton, wonderful, handsome, sensitive Roland Vera had fallen for... Always having great times together talking, laughing, exchanging ideas, walking, eating, swimming together; all of them envisioning the glittering future they deserved: Vera, despite her father's opposition, would study at Oxford, marry Roland and be a famous writer; Roland, as for him, would be acclaimed as a great poet while Edward and his friends would each become a prominent figure in his respective field... But then came that fateful day on 4 August 1914 when Britain declared war on Germany. All those beautiful dreams were to be shattered one after the other. All except one: Vera wound up becoming a writer... A writer but a pacifist as well.

Plot Keywords

brother sister relationship, gay, loss of brother, nurse, 1910s, lake, underwater scene, flashback, year 1918, england, costume drama, literature, period piece, playing piano, death, christmas, soldier, voice over, newspaper, kiss

Short Review

Somehow, Vikander sells it all, not with braying and big gestures, but with vulnerability, sincerity and the sort of ethereal realness that can't be quantified. More, please, more.