Greyhound

How many naval war movies did you watch or can name ? Yep me the same.  “Pearl Harbour” which was mostly harbour based not sea, “Dunkirk” again beach based. Couple of movies about U-boots and that would be it. 

Now war movies that happen on a ground ? Trenches and that kind of jazz. Loads.  Do you know why ? Because they are not boring. Yes I know, bad me, slagging war movie. It’s a opposite. Just because it’s boring doesn’t mean it’s not worth to be watched. 

Ever heard of Battle of Atlantic ? Do you know how long it lasted ? 6 years . Ta dah. Longest naval operation in history. Longest, dullest and most boring battle that ever took place. Painfully slow cat  and mouse game. 

Tom Hank’s is a accidental commander of a war ship, titular Greyhound that guards  transports of food/ammunition/people form USA to UK. We see him celebrating his “promotion” with Aged Elisabeth  Shue. He asks her to marry him before he goes off. She turns him down, he goes to war with a weirdest non engagement present, pair of slippers. Moving on we are at sea, there are some U-boots, torpedos, black cook who dies only to be replaced by another black cook, American flags, lots of praying and a “sea” of coordinates being fired from all directions. Hanks is Hanks. Playing good guy, leading boys to battle, being a good shepherd that takes care of his flock. Stephen Graham is there as well. With a doggy American accent. He has got interesting role thou. I think this is the best part of movie, the strategic planning, careful positioning, predictions of next moves. 

Movie is good, boringly good. We don’t see a single German in the movie. We see U-boots but nothing else. Story is told and shown from one angle. There are no showdowns, they sail, encounter few German under water monsters, fire few torpedos and that is really it . 

It would be much better to see it in the cinema rather than on the telly but if you got big screen you will be ok. Watch it to remember those that were swallowed by the sea of war In their tin coffins. Just don’t watch it on the phone.