Testament of Youth: Review

Testament of youth is a coming of age story set on the memoirs of Vera Brittain’s First World War experience. This adaptation of the classic book is directed by James Kent and written for screen by Juliette Towhidi.

The story covers a young Vera Brattain as she changes from innocent, if rebellious young girl. To a more grown up and changed character who is more world weary and broken morally inside thanks to the events that transpire within the film. The Character of Vera is played by Alicia Vikander who is well suited for the role, as she has a good knack for displaying a wide variety of emotions without having to speak. The other characters come across with varying degrees of success when it comes to their acting prowess. Another notable performance is that of Kit Harrington, despite not appearing in the film for all that long he delivers a strong a believable performance that complements well with Vera.

In many ways it would be hard for the film to go that horribly wrong, based on its foundations of a strong and much beloved book it would make it difficult to butcher it too bad. Thank fully this adaptation works well, director James Kent Cleverly switches between shots to help you immerse yourself within the story. The director uses a lot of Extreme close ups and over the shoulder shots and relies a lot on the characters, to convey emotion only using their face. Despite the overall proficiency of the actors I felt that some scenes were a little unbelievable, the Director did take a few liberties when it comes to the certain scenes he chose to convey. In a few of them there was very clear “Hero Syndrome” where despite the fact that any other character would have died from that situation one of the main characters would survive it based solely on the fact that they are indeed, one of the main cast.

In conclusion, this adaptation does a proficient job and lives up to the works of Vera Brattain, though in my opinion it didn’t do enough to cement itself as a quality film. It kept my attention for the run time but it was not an experience I would come back too in a heartbeat. I don’t believe I am the target audience for this film but it was well directed, if not risky enough in its aims.