{"id":108292,"date":"2012-11-02T05:48:02","date_gmt":"2012-11-02T12:48:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/?p=108292"},"modified":"2012-11-01T17:49:53","modified_gmt":"2012-11-02T00:49:53","slug":"man-at-war-movie-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Man at War Movie Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

Title: Man at War<\/strong><\/p>\n

Director: Jacek Blawut<\/strong><\/p>\n

A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary “Man at War” locks its sights on a motley\u00a0international community of IL-2 Sturmovik aficionados, who engage in historically accurate aerial battles in an effort to relive World War II and in some cases try to even\u00a0rewrite its history. Lacking any sort of compelling entrance point into this insular world, or even much in the way of an examination of its subjects’ individual and collective tetherings to the world around them, this movies fumbles away any potentially interesting sub-cultural curiosity or cachet it might on the surface possess.<\/p>\n

Directed by Jacek Blawut, the film presents players from different walks of life and several countries, including the United States, Russia, Germany and Poland. On a nominal level, “Man at War” delves into their different reasons for attraction to the game. Some feel like they’re honoring familial veterans, others have a more broadly nationalist attachment (“It’s about respecting history, and the nation”). After ping-ponging back and forth a bit, the movie then alights on a virtual battle in which simultaneous footage of the player combatants is edited together, with\u00a0various mission successes and failures\u00a0giving rise to heated emotions.<\/p>\n

Some of the details are amusing — there’s a deacon who flies with Clark Gable’s face on his character’s avatar —\u00a0but Blawut’s editorial instincts are woefully undeveloped. There is no set-up or sense of the actual game, and how its missions and interactions are governed (when it’s revealed that you can actually land, then run and rescue downed pilots, it comes as a surprise), nor the financial costs involved — which would have to vary across\u00a0the settings\u00a0considering the different technology and equipment viewers see being used by different players. “Man at War” assumes a general knowledge and deep interest in its subject matter, but even then doesn’t deliver much.<\/p>\n

Mostly there’s just a lack of fun, or even cathartic charge, to “Man at War.” A few shared tidbits hint at more deeply sketched and conflicted characters (“After a thousand combats, mostly victorious, the thrill is not the same as in the beginning,” says one player, while another comes to tears pondering his grandfather’s complicity in some of the war crimes of World War II), but Blawut is an impassive\u00a0point-and-shoot chronicler, and nothing more. He seems afraid to follow his subjects away from their consoles, and try to plug into their feelings more deeply.<\/p>\n

Technical: C-<\/strong><\/p>\n

Story: C-<\/strong><\/p>\n

Overall: D+<\/strong><\/p>\n

Written by: Brent Simon<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Man<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary “Man at War” locks its sights on a motley\u00a0international community of IL-2 Sturmovik aficionados, who engage in historically accurate aerial battles in an effort to relive World War II and in some cases […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":108326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"apple_news_api_created_at":"","apple_news_api_id":"","apple_news_api_modified_at":"","apple_news_api_revision":"","apple_news_api_share_url":"","apple_news_cover_media_provider":"image","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_cover_video_id":0,"apple_news_cover_video_url":"","apple_news_cover_embedwebvideo_url":"","apple_news_is_hidden":"","apple_news_is_paid":"","apple_news_is_preview":"","apple_news_is_sponsored":"","apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":[],"apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8,4],"tags":[354,28112,14276,28107,28106,821,6783],"class_list":["post-108292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movies","category-reviews","tag-documentary","tag-gaming","tag-hbo-films","tag-jacek-blawut","tag-man-at-war","tag-videogame","tag-world-war-ii"],"apple_news_notices":[],"yoast_head":"\nMan at War Movie Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary "Man\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Man at War Movie Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary "Man\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/shockyafans\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-11-02T12:48:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"316\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Brent Simon\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@SharedDarkness\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@shockya\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Brent Simon\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Brent Simon\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/bcd3a221bc6b5d67857ae53435fd9d6e\"},\"headline\":\"Man at War Movie Review\",\"datePublished\":\"2012-11-02T12:48:02+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\"},\"wordCount\":442,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"DOCUMENTARY\",\"GAMING\",\"HBO FILMS\",\"JACEK BLAWUT\",\"MAN AT WAR\",\"VIDEOGAME\",\"WORLD WAR II\"],\"articleSection\":[\"MOVIES\",\"REVIEWS\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\",\"name\":\"Man at War Movie Review\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2012-11-02T12:48:02+00:00\",\"description\":\"Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary \\\"Man\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg\",\"width\":\"600\",\"height\":\"316\",\"caption\":\"Man at War Movie\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Man at War Movie Review\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/\",\"name\":\"\",\"description\":\"REAL TALK\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Anakando Media Group\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/anakando.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/anakando.jpg\",\"width\":237,\"height\":213,\"caption\":\"Anakando Media Group\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/shockyafans\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/shockya\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/bcd3a221bc6b5d67857ae53435fd9d6e\",\"name\":\"Brent Simon\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/59e698f585a7af0e0b0c9f2b5e5a6bb247c7545b6a4ef2f177ca4bc4d87fc606?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/59e698f585a7af0e0b0c9f2b5e5a6bb247c7545b6a4ef2f177ca4bc4d87fc606?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Brent Simon\"},\"description\":\"A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Brent Simon is a three-term president of LAFCA, a contributor to Screen International, Newsweek Japan, Magill's Cinema Annual, and many other outlets. He cannot abide a world without U2 and tacos.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/x.com\/SharedDarkness\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/author\/bsimon\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Man at War Movie Review","description":"Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary \"Man","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Man at War Movie Review","og_description":"Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary \"Man","og_url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/shockyafans\/","article_published_time":"2012-11-02T12:48:02+00:00","og_image":[{"width":600,"height":316,"url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Brent Simon","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@SharedDarkness","twitter_site":"@shockya","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Brent Simon","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/"},"author":{"name":"Brent Simon","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/bcd3a221bc6b5d67857ae53435fd9d6e"},"headline":"Man at War Movie Review","datePublished":"2012-11-02T12:48:02+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/"},"wordCount":442,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg","keywords":["DOCUMENTARY","GAMING","HBO FILMS","JACEK BLAWUT","MAN AT WAR","VIDEOGAME","WORLD WAR II"],"articleSection":["MOVIES","REVIEWS"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/","name":"Man at War Movie Review","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg","datePublished":"2012-11-02T12:48:02+00:00","description":"Title: Man at War Director: Jacek Blawut A hopelessly myopic look at videogamers obsessed with a very specific computer flight simulator, documentary \"Man","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg","width":"600","height":"316","caption":"Man at War Movie"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/2012\/11\/02\/man-at-war-movie-review\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Man at War Movie Review"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/","name":"","description":"REAL TALK","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#organization","name":"Anakando Media Group","url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/anakando.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/anakando.jpg","width":237,"height":213,"caption":"Anakando Media Group"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/shockyafans\/","https:\/\/x.com\/shockya"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/bcd3a221bc6b5d67857ae53435fd9d6e","name":"Brent Simon","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/59e698f585a7af0e0b0c9f2b5e5a6bb247c7545b6a4ef2f177ca4bc4d87fc606?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/59e698f585a7af0e0b0c9f2b5e5a6bb247c7545b6a4ef2f177ca4bc4d87fc606?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Brent Simon"},"description":"A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Brent Simon is a three-term president of LAFCA, a contributor to Screen International, Newsweek Japan, Magill's Cinema Annual, and many other outlets. He cannot abide a world without U2 and tacos.","sameAs":["https:\/\/x.com\/SharedDarkness"],"url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/author\/bsimon\/"}]}},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/Man_at_War_movie.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pnMiA-saE","distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shockya.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}