The Breath (2009)

i must have seen a different film!!

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

The Breath begins almost as a Turkish version of Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket. A drill instructor berates a group of young soldiers; telling them that they will all die; especially if they sleep. He says that their mothers will cry when their bodies are sent home for burial. He asks one of the boys if he has a girlfriend. When he answers yes, the commander says, not anymore, and while you are fighting for your country, she will find a new boyfriend.The platoon is sent to a dangerous mountain region at the Iraqi border to stop the radical Kurdistan Workers Party. The Turkish soldiers learn quickly that they are canon fodder for their government; a fairly universal theme everywhere. The battle scenes are well made and as military films go, The Breath is one of the better ones that I've seen. Director Levent Semerci make you really care what happens to the brave young men.

I was considering viewing this film UNTIL I read the reviews here!I am rating it a "5" because I learned little from these reviews, since I read at LEAST "5" that were written by the SAME PERSON and at least ONE was the SAME review with 2 different titles!I DID learn that many STUDENTS and NON-ACTORS were used in this film, and in my opinion, these people were the SAME ones that submitted MOST of these reviews, in order to skew the ratings & give the film an artificially high IMDb score!I could conclude this because of gross similarities in WRITING STYLE and CONTENT of the BULK of these reviews...THIS IS CHEATING! ...I REFUSE to watch a film that has been so artificially HYPED!I also am suspicious of all war films that show NOTHING of the OTHER side. Yes, some of these reviews admit that this is a PROPAGANDA film, and I feel there is little to learn from that type of film unless it is openly labeled as propaganda, such as Leni Reifenstal's "Triumph of the Will", not simply as a "work of art" or valid artistic expression...Where are the NON-Turkish reviews of this film? I would also like to see at least ONE Kurdish review, just for BALANCE! So I will not waste any more time on this film UNLESS I can find some OBJECTIVE OPINIONS!

The movie was really engaging in the first half and concentrated more on the psychology of the soldiers at the frontier outpost but quickly turned into a mess by feeding off on Turkish people's silly nationalist feelings about 'national pride', and 'love for the country ' and the rest of the classic 'ideals' nationalisms around the world love to live on. In other words the director decided to exploit Turkish people's low feelings of Turkish Nationalism and make some quick bucks. What's next a movie about how the Armenian genocide never happened? Turkish Nationalism reigns supreme in this horrible movie! By the way, this movie is WAY OVERRATED, a more fair rating would be 5-6 on IMDb but seems that someone is manipulating the ratings... I've noticed that several other Turkish movies are rated over 8.0 which is very high for IMDb standards. Considering Turksih movies are not really well known in English speaking countries the numbers are obviously manipulated.

This isn't a bad movie, really. At least for the first half. I have my biggest problems with this movie at the middle to the end.I don't like the scene with the girl on the table and I don't like the the way the commander is presented in the end.But aside the story, my biggest complain is the 8.5 on IMDb. This movie isn't near this rate. I watched it because of this high rate and I was surprised. Perhaps it is one of the best Turkish movies out there, but I did not watch many of them, so I can't compare this one to others.In other comments i've read, that it is propaganda, but that is a point I can't support.I would give 5-6 points for this but I only give 2 for the existing high rate. I enjoyed Universal Soldier 3 more then this movie, and this has something to say.