Benediction
This overly-long biopic is the exact opposite of the flashy ones dominating our screens these days, and while it is definitely indulgent, there’s also something very watchable about it too.
Benediction tells the story of famed war poet Siegfried Sassoon (Jack Lowden). Initially horrified by his experiences in war, yet famous for how he wrote about them, Siegfried is committed to a military hospital due to his objections to continued fighting. There he strikes up a relationship with a fellow inmate, and thus begins a long, tyrannical streak of seemingly ever-present professional decline, mixed with a motley assortment of toxic, hidden homosexual relationships. The film intersperses these reminiscences with a future Siegfried (Peter Capaldi) and his eventual wife - a marriage of convenience, given Sassoon’s sexual preferences - but ultimately speaks to his life lived; his passions, his artistry, and his loves.
This movie is about as far removed from the flashy biopic as could be. Director Terence Davies, who is known for these sorts of slow introspections, mixes historical footage of the period (even if not of Sassoon himself) with the dual timeline performative elements to create a comprehensive, if at times dull, portrait of the poet.
It is important to remember that Sassoon was a fantastic poet, because at times this 2 hour 17 minute film can digress into his personal life for long, interminable stretches. The level of enjoyment you get from that frankly depends on your toxicity tolerance from Siegfried’s partners - personally, we found Jeremy Irvine’s Ivor Novello a little too toxic for enjoyable viewing.
But when Davies digresses to give us glimpses of Sassoon the poet, Lowden delivers. Long slow pushes in on Sassoon reciting some of his work lend gravitas and weight to his words, and it transports you to a time when this work was the height of art. These moments tend to strike you, given their relative infrequency and the performance with which they are delivered, and in a cinema they are really powerful.
In the end, this isn’t a disinteresting film. It’s more so an example of our communal conditioning. While the piece has flaws, undoubtedly (and primarily those revolve around length, and a touch too much wallowing in one of Siegfried’s more troublesome relationships), it also has many highpoints. And while it gives us gorgeous, slow cinema, bucking the trend when it comes to flashy, mile a minute content, it also conforms to the trend of recent biopic cinema in not really elaborating on what made this famous person famous. For those unfamiliar with this poet, you may not know any handy trivia tidbits about him after the movie, but you’ll sure know a lot about his personal life.
