“It sort of exploded out,” filmmaker David Ayer said about his latest film. “I wrote it for me.” Ayer’s kept largely inside the domain of police films thus far ("S.W.A.T.," "Street Kings," "End Of Watch"), but for his next trick, he’s taking on a WWII drama starring Brad Pitt. And if you think "so what? Pitt’s already done a WWII movie with Quentin Tarantino" (“Inglourious Basterds”), note that Ayer’s “Fury” sounds vastly different. What’s the film like? In a long feature in the New York Times recently, the movie was described as a “relentlessly authentic portrayal of the extremes endured, and inflicted, by Allied troops who entered Germany in the spring of 1945.” Intriguingly, the Times also say the movie “promises to be one of the most daring studio movies in an awards season.”
Here’s the official synopsis:
April 1945. As the Allies make their final push in the European Theater, a battle-hardened army sergeant named Wardaddy (Brad Pitt) commands a Sherman tank and her five-man crew on a deadly mission behind enemy lines. Outnumbered and outgunned, Wardaddy and his men face overwhelming odds in their heroic attempts to strike at the heart of Nazi Germany.
Aside from Brad Pitt, the movie also includes Shia LaBeouf, Michael Pena (costar of Ayer’s “End of Watch”), Logan Lerman (“Noah”), Jason Isaacs (“Green Zone”) and “The Walking Dead” star Jon Bernthal. The movie opens October 17th in North American and makes it international debut at the BFI London film festival the next day. Watch the trailer below.
Update: The New York Times says the film isn’t hitting the Film Festival circuit, so possibly it’s going to "premiere" in London and that’s it. We’ll see…Other films the paper says won’t hit the fall film festival circuit are mostly no brainers: Christopher Nolan’s “Interstellar” and Angelina Jolie’s “Unbroken.” They’ll be saving the latter one for the late-Oscar push because it comes out in December.