Louis Zamperini survived a plane crash, a life raft ordeal, and years in Japanese prisoner-of-war camps during World War II. His story is remarkable. The movie about him is not.
“Unbroken,” directed by Angelina Jolie, compresses decades of hardship into two hours and twenty minutes. That compression is both the film’s strength and its weakness. The story moves fast, but it moves fast over familiar ground.
The film follows Zamperini from his days as a track star at UCLA to his service as a bombardier in the Pacific theater. He survives a crash landing, drifts on a raft for weeks, and eventually lands in Ofuna Prison Camp in Japan. The middle stretch, set on the raft, is the film’s best material. The rest drags.
Trailer, via Universal Pictures.
The Raft Is Where It Works
The life raft scenes carry real weight. Zamperini, played by Jack O’Connell, faces starvation, thirst, sharks, and a broken leg. The film leans on the natural setting — open water, sun, salt — to create tension without dialogue. It works because the stakes are immediate and the threat is constant.
The performances in these scenes are strong. O’Connell holds the screen through long stretches of physical hardship. The film also cuts between Zamperini’s memories of his athletic past and his present suffering, which helps keep the pacing varied.
But the raft sequence is a tight rope act. Once the film leaves the water and moves to the prison camp, the momentum stalls.
The Prison Camp Stretches Too Long
The second half of “Unbroken” focuses on Zamperini’s time as a prisoner of war. This section is where the film loses focus. It covers the brutality of the camps, the cruelty of the guards, and Zamperini’s refusal to break. All of it is true to history, but the film treats the material as exposition rather than drama.
Jolie directs with a steady hand, but she lacks the instinct for emotional peaks that define a great director. The scenes with the guards, led by Miyavi as Mutsuhiro Watanabe, are meant to be terrifying. They are, but they feel rehearsed rather than spontaneous.
The film also spends too much time on Zamperini’s fellow prisoners and their stories. These characters exist to fill space rather than drive the narrative. Their deaths are often presented as quick cuts, not as moments of weight.
O’Connell Carries It
Jack O’Connell is the reason “Unbroken” works at all. He plays Zamperini across three stages of his life — the young athlete, the soldier, and the survivor. The performance is physically demanding, and O’Connell delivers it with a quiet intensity that never tips into melodrama.
The supporting cast, including Laura Linney as Zamperini’s mother and John Goodman as his father, is competent but underwritten. Their roles are small, and the film doesn’t give them much room to develop beyond family archetypes.
Jolie’s Weakness As Director
Angelina Jolie has proven herself as an action director with “Salt” and “In the Land of Blood and Honey.” Here, she shows discipline but not invention. She knows how to stage a scene, but she doesn’t know how to make one linger.
The film’s tone is consistently grim. There’s little humor, little light, and little respite. That choice fits the story, but it also limits the audience’s investment. By the end, the film feels less like a portrait of survival and more like a catalog of horrors.
A Familiar Story Told Without Surprise
“Unbroken” is based on Laura Hillenbrand’s bestselling book. The film follows that text closely, which means it tells a story many readers already know. That’s not necessarily a flaw, but it does mean the film has to earn its place beside the book.
It doesn’t always. The film’s structure is episodic, jumping between Zamperini’s youth, his military service, and his captivity without much transition. The editing is sharp, but the logic behind the jumps isn’t always clear.
The film also relies heavily on voiceover narration, which breaks the visual storytelling. Zamperini speaks directly to the audience about his thoughts and feelings, and it’s a device that works better in books than in films.
The Final Word
“Unbroken” is a technically proficient film that fails to fully capture the scale of its subject. It’s a worthy entry in the war genre, but it doesn’t reach the heights of other films about survival.
The raft scenes are the film’s best work. The prison camp scenes are its weakest. The performances are strong, especially from O’Connell. And Jolie’s direction is competent but unremarkable.
“Unbroken” is a film that respects its subject but doesn’t fully understand it. It’s a solid, honorable effort, but it falls short of greatness.
Key Facts Box
– Title: Unbroken
– Director: Angelina Jolie
– Lead actor: Jack O’Connell
– Length: 2 hours and 20 minutes
– Published score: 5.9/10
The film’s score sits at 5.9 out of 10.
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