Only the Brave
3 stars
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Stars: Josh Brolin, Miles Teller, Jeff Bridges
Duration: 134 mins
Class: 12
KRS Releasing Ltd

In June 2013, a crew of firefighters known as the Granite Mountain Hotshots battled one of the deadliest wildfires in US history – the Yarnell Hill Fire. Many members of the crew did not make it home, and Only the Brave dramatises the events leading up to that event by focusing on some of the firemen’s lives.

The ‘hotshots’ are top specialist firefighters who literally fight fire with fire. The term usually refers to special teams from the US Forest Service, but the Granite Mountain Hotshots were a crew of locals from Prescott, Arizona, led by Eric Marsh (played in the movie by Josh Brolin) who dreamed of gaining Hotshot status. It is a very difficult process that involves intensive training and evaluation, but they finally achieved that, resulting in the crew being called up to fight wildfire all across the US.

That’s all very well and, given the nature of their job, certainly a remarkable achievement. But the film devotes a little more time than is necessary detailing the crew’s attempts to obtain the hotshot status, with too much focus on the bureaucracy and inter-state rivalries they had to face. This is time which, quite frankly, would have been better spent on giving the main characters more depth.

There is little doubt that the real life heroics of the Hotshots deserve to be celebrated and commemorated. Yet, the movie, directed by Joseph Kosinski from a script by Ken Nolan and Eric Warren Singer, barely gets under the skin of the characters.

The film devotes a little more time than is necessary detailing the crew’s attempts to obtain the hotshot status

Oftentimes, genuine emotion gives way to heightened melodrama. Moreover, we are never given a true sense of what it is that attracted men to this extraordinary dangerous job – one that requires extreme mental and physical sacrifice as they risk their lives to save others.

As it is, the solid ensemble has very little meat to chew on. Surprising, given these are people who really existed with a truly heroic story to tell. But, so thinly-sketched are they that the audience has little motivation to truly invest emotionally in them.

That Josh Brolin’s fire chief Marsh is a man who is wholly dedicated to his job and cares for his crew is a given. So is the fact he clearly loves his wife Amanda (Jennifer Connelly). She, in turn, spends her days dealing with her beloved horses and worrying about him... even though she knew what she was getting into when she married him, as we are reminded constantly throughout the film.

But there is clearly a deeper issue between them as we glean from a tantalising titbit that is offered about their past lives and the basis of their relationship. However, this is glossed over – frustratingly so, given the chemistry between the actors that easily projects a couple that have been together for years.

Miles Teller is fine as a former drug addict desperate to get clean and sort his life, given the unexpected arrival of his daughter. But, his storyline follows a pretty predictable path while Jeff Bridges is at his best typical self – the paternal retired fire chief offering words of wisdom, with Andie MacDowell as his wife in a pretty thankless role.

As for the rest of the crew, all we get is a display of male bonding, raucous machismo, bravado, and quite frankly, a touch casual sexism as they trade tales of amorous conquests and other activities and little else.

On the plus side is the magnificent cinematography, offering sweeping vistas of the magnificent verdant landscapes depicted before, during and after some of the roaring fires that rage uncontrollably across them.

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