Review: 'Defiance' Denies Story Emotion

'Defiance' (R)(out of four)

"Defiance" takes a wholly original story -- a little-known chapter of the Holocaust that is fresh and new -- but then proceeds to drown the tale in standard action film testosterone.

Part of the problem stems from the film's claustrophobic point of view, denying audiences any wider perspective that might provide a sense of context. But another problem is a script that's big on drama but light on the sort of vulnerabilities that make characters come to life. These men talk and act like Hollywood archetypes.

For a movie about real human beings racing to save themselves, "Defiance" feels like a stretch. Not that the chapter of history isn't profound. At the height of the Holocaust, a band of Jews in Belarus refused to follow the orders of Nazis and instead fled into the forest. At first a slim group, the collective grew and grew as fervent, frightened comrades heard about their outpost. Reaching a population of around 1,200 members, only 50 or so would die over the span of two years. For some 24 months -- that's 730 days -- more than 1,000 Jews hid from, and fought back against, their pursuers.

The group was led by two brothers -- Tuvia Bielski (Daniel Craig) and Zus Bielski (Liev Schreiber) -- who pursued a campaign of defiance in wildly different ways. Tuvia was content in fleeing the concentration camps and forming a new society, in viewing victory as nothing more than staying alive. Zus, however, was more determined to fight back -- to fight fire with fire, judging success by the Nazi body count. From the outset, as we see these two men flee into the woods for the first time together, their differing strategies lead to violent arguments.

As their disagreements grow more extreme, Zus abandons the colony and sides with Soviet troops in the area, deciding that the enemy of his enemy is his friend -- even if they prove to be anti-Semites as well.

Tuvia, meanwhile, decides to build a utopian society in the woods -- but he too suffers from a misguided idealism. As the seasons change, and the Nazis crack down on civilians who are supplying Tuvia and his crew with rations of food, we witness the way that food shortages, disease and exposure to the elements make their life a living hell.

Just because all of Tuvia's citizens are Jewish does not mean that this remote population is peaceful. The camp grows increasingly dangerous as Tuvia falls ill and the food supplies run low. When he grabs a sidearm in one scene and levels it at a mutinying comrade, the future of this collective seems grim. Given the length of time these real-world heroes spent in the wild and the sheer number of survivors involved, it's easy to understand why "Defiance" feels scattered.

Director Edward Zwick must attempt a daunting juggling act, beginning the story in the civilized world, then witnessing the emergence of a new society in the forest, all before following the storylines of both the violent Zus and the political Tuvia. But as the point of view keeps jumping, between battle lines and brothers, it becomes hard to zero in on the larger point of it all: Is this a story about fighting back against the Nazis, about the challenges of running an unsupplied collective, about a Jewish community struggling to find its footing, or about the individual stories of those who the Bielskis provided for?

There's really no way to capture all these various stories in a single narrative and "Defiance" stumbles because its sheer intensity obliterates any sense of tension.

Out in the surrounding communities, we see Tuvia and company hiding from German patrols. In the woods, we see Tuvia brought to tears as he realizes that there is no longer any food for his citizens to eat. As Zus arms himself with the Russians, we witness one bloody counterattack after another. The tempo of this film is fast, the action ferocious, and as all this action swirls around us, it becomes overwhelming.

While we leave "Defiance" in utter awe of what these souls accomplished, we still can't quite feel what they're feeling; it's an act of education, not empathy.

It's little surprise, then, that the performances are adequate, but hardly memorable. Craig exudes a steely confidence, with a tendency to go cool when he needs to make the hard decisions as the de facto leader of this crew. For those who love his crisp depiction of a shrewder, less charismatic James Bond, they will see much more of the same here.

And Schreiber does much the same, internalizing Zus' rage, depicting a man who keeps his emotions in check even as he plans how to get revenge. Depicting the Bielski brothers as men of unwavering conviction, these two actors easily command the screen, but the screenplay by Zwick and Clayton Frohman's doesn't offer them the texture or emotional range to create fallible, three-dimensional characters.

Then again, "Defiance" isn't a movie that seems to be made in a bid to tug on heartstrings. It's an action film that wants to celebrate those Jewish fighters who defied the status quo and fought back, and although this celebratory framework reduces the drama to a one-dimensional affair, audiences will still get the larger point -- that this is a chapter in history worth remembering and passing down.