Max Manus (Joachim Rønning & Espen Sandberg, 2008)

The WWII resistance hero biopic, for all its worthiness, is a tired topic for cinema and any attempt really has to have a few aces up its sleeve to bring the events alive. The Norwegian side of the story Max Manus doesn't: as is par for the course, it makes all the protagonists a bit more photogenic than their real-life counterparts, jazzes up the action a notch to conform to modern action-flick viewer expectations, shuffles a few events and incidental characters for dramatic purposes and otherwise sticks reverentially to a remit of historical factuality. But it's the job of documentary to give us the facts: cinema is meant to wipe away the dust on the photos and documents and transport us to feel it all afresh. Its Danish equivalent of the same year, Flammen & Citronen, managed to introduce moral ambivalence and immediacy into the formula without taking too many liberties with veracity, and Max Manus suffers by comparison. It's neither jingoistic, nor dull if you're only seeing your first resistance film, just lacking in complexity.

5/10