An ominous melody plays and the words “Unbroken” followed by “a true story” appear on the black screen. These words are followed by a transition to a pan of a pale blue sky filled with clouds, then war planes firing missiles come into view. The movie flies right into the action.

Unbroken, directed by Angelina Jolie, is a biography of Olympic athlete and prisoner of war Louis “Louie” Zamperini.  Although, the movie follows a bit of his troubled childhood, the main focus is Zamperini’s fight to survive in the Japanese camps.

The movie depicts Zamparini, played by Jack O’Connell, as a problem child, smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol under the bleachers, and getting into fights with local kids. Things turn around for him, however, when his brother Pete, played by Alex Russell, encourages him to join the tack team.There, he learns discipline, determination, and self will. These characteristics help him survive a plane crash, 47 days lost at sea, and two years of being a POW.

Overall, the mechanics of the movie are very applaudable. The special effects seem to come out of a high quality video game and the picture is beautiful. Even the simple things like the backdrops of the clouds and trees is vivid and very high-quality and the motion in the running scenes and the way the camera follows the feet on the track is expertly filmed.

Although, there did not seem to be enough character development. The movie did not show enough of Zamperini’s upbringing, which is an important part of the man he became, or the strong bond he made with fellow POWs. Granted, there is only so much of ones life story that can be condensed into 2 hours and 30 minutes. Plus, Universal studios cut the film, editing it because they felt it was too “arthouse” and “dark at times”, according NY Post. This may be why it seemed like there wasn’t enough development.

The acting in the beginning sequences of the film are a little iffy, but O’Connell’s performance, especially, becomes stronger as the movie goes on and was very believable. One small pet peeve of mine, though, was that some of the soldiers were played by foreign actors, O’Connell himself is British, so the accent came through sometimes and it made me wonder how American these American soldiers actually were. But aside from that, the movie did an excellent job of illustrating Zamperini’s extraordinary story.

One of the best scenes of the movie is when Zamparini is heading off to go to the 1936 Olympics. He shares a very sentimental goodbye with his older brother Pete before leaving for Germany and for him the moment seems bitter-sweet. As he turns his back, Pete tells him, “A moment of pain is worth a lifetime of glory.” These are actual words that Peter Zamparini told his young brother, words that seemed to set the tone for the movie and for his life.