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In the winter of 1862, during the Civil War, the US
Army sends a volunteer company to patrol the uncharted western territories. Minervini had the set built in Montana, then let the actors live there for two months. The dialogue and ideas presented are those that the actors came up with while living in the wilderness, imagining themselves as Civil War soldiers.
All lack military experience, They share knowledge and skills are transferred
The Damned: In the winter of 1862, a volunteer unit of Union soldiers is sent to defend a mountainous region, we are not told where it is, we do not even learn the names of the soldiers. The regular troops are set off, and they are under the command of a John Brown-style patriarch with a bushy beard, and his teenage son has also enlisted. The troops are a mixed bag, some middle-aged, even old, most in their thirties.
We witness mobile guards, distant horsemen
Buffalo being shot and slaughtered, the bleak landscape, hills, mountain meadows, drifting snow, cold rations running low add to the developing existential despair. The battle is on, we don’t see the enemy, we see the casualties of the unit. War is hell, especially when you no longer know why you’re there.
Some of it is welcome
A very much Ken Loach-style film, with no dialogue day after day and many ordinary people acting, amateurs like the soldiers. This improvisation leads to philosophical, religious and political discussions around the campfire. But it’s a minor distraction from this brutal portrayal of men at war.