Meg Rosoff’s dark and intimate YA novel is transformed into a sweeping dystopian survival tale in Kevin Macdonald’s striking adaptation. Saoirse Ronan plays Daisy, a moody New York teen sent to stay with her English cousins. Upon arrival, her eye-rolling disdain is already accustomed to that which the viewer is not: constant military presence, news footage of bombings, an inescapable feeling of unease.
This grim realism is what Macdonald (The Last King Of Scotland, Touching The Void) excels at, but here he’s also blending it with teen romance. As Daisy’s icy exterior melts in the presence of Eddie (George McKay), the intensity of young love is hypnotically portrayed through hazy summer montages of fireflies and rivers. But love collides with life in one stunning moment after a bomb is dropped. As light is sucked from the frame and grey ash covers meadows like snow, the wildly romantic backdrop becomes silent and nightmarish.
It’s a striking transition from romance into graphic disaster movie, as the couple are torn apart and placed in labour camps. Keeping the politics enigmatic, the war backdrop is brilliantly handled on the modest budget, as plane wrecks and abandoned barracks hint at the tales untold, and meticulous soundscapes create constant tension. Ronan proves superb, moving effortlessly from infatuated teen to determined survivalist as she traverses landscapes filled with corpses, bombs and rapist soldiers to reunite with Eddie.
But as the action takes precedence, Daisy’s other relationships are left thinly drawn, making the heroine’s quest feel selfish, and her emotional arc one-note. As the danger intensifies, bleachy saturated fantasies of a topless Eddie feel increasingly ridiculous.
A striking, sophisticated and inconsistent tale filled with stunning technical work, disturbing merit and tonal chasms. But then; all is fair in love and war.