Testament of Youth

Somehow, Vikander sells it all, not with braying and big gestures, but with vulnerability, sincerity and the sort of ethereal realness that can't be quantified. More, please, more.

Though the movie at times feels oddly unfinished (you wonder what Miranda Richardson, in a tiny role as an Oxford professor, is there for), it's artful and moving.

As a story, it evokes a word that no battlefield nurse would ever apply to her experiences: sterile.

In what is a well-acted but fairly typical prestige period drama, it's Vikander's nuanced performance as the resolute but still-vulnerable Vera who gives the film its depth.

This is Vikander's film and she is very good here.

Early sections waste energy on the protagonist's Austen-lite flirtation with fianc Roland (Kit Harington), a non-starter despite scenes of awkward chivalry amidst wilting petals and linens fluttering in the breeze.

Though it’s a story based around war, there isn’t much carnage for audiences to digest or be reminded of. Instead, we are prompted to remember the loss through love.

This beautifully crafted and hearbreaking tale about a woman and the impact of war delivers lessons we should have learned long ago.

Both an excellent drama and a feminist call to arms, Testament of Youth is absolutely unmissable.

A handsome and well-acted World War I biopic, but less affecting than it could have been...