What Do We Learn From ‘Testament of Youth’? — Review

A disheveled and darkened Brittain is limping through ecstatically relieved crowds outside Buckingham Palace on Armistice Day. And we are just about to find out why.

The empowering and overpowering performances and elements from the film adaptation of poet Vera Brittain’s Testament Of Youth make it a strong-standing artistic endeavour, despite critical approaches. All from the perspective of Alicia Vikander as Vera Brittain, we are given a rare perspective of warfare through the eyes of a woman. The feminist call to arms hits the nail on the head with its emotion and artistic licence, yet maybe stands too structured. Yet, you cannot deny that the directing and writing styles of James Kent’s war-torn memoir are a punch in the gut. Romance, chivalry, honour, history, nature, poetry, life, and death encompass a two-hour time span.

The autobiography by Red Cross nurse and poet Vera Brittain sold 120,000 copies within six years of its release and is to date one of the most notable memoirs of the 20th Century. Brittain suffered the loss of (spoiler!) both her brother and fiancé in World War I, becoming a pacifist and remaining dedicated to her cause of peace. Thus, James Kent’s translation of the book was a heavy-duty task. But the cinematic picture of the heroine is shaped with heart and soul. It, of course, did not cover the grandeur that is Brittain’s original autobiographical experience of a First World War, but the relevant chapters embraced give us the essence of her experience in a visual.

The opening scene shows contrasting perspectives and reflects much of the film itself — a disheveled and darkened Brittain limping through ecstatically relieved crowds outside Buckingham Palace on Armistice Day. And we are just about to find out why. Vera Brittain is already introduced as the feminist icon that she is known as — rejecting any promise of marriage. Ten minutes into the film she snaps at her mothers commenting on her behaviour that ‘is no way to find a husband’, as she states, ‘I don’t want a husband. Not now, not ever.’ Yet as Roland Leighton magically appears following these words, her views are challenged when meeting another sweepingly Romantic poet.

Set before the Suffragette movement, Brittain was one of her own — director Kent showcasing this through her arguments against the classic expectation of matrimony & that a piano bought for her could pay for an entire year at her dream school — Oxford. In telling an originally female story from the point of view of such a powerful figure, director James Kent stated that what intrigued him on adapting Brittain’s story was ‘Its emotional intensity. I naturally gravitate towards women’s stories…because they’ve had greater obstacles to confront in the past, women often have some of the best stories. Also, there’s a massive female audience out there who aren’t being catered for.’

Critics have picked up on the fact that Kent’s adaptation of Brittain’s biography is in straight, chronological order and that this may have it faltering. And of course, we can say that had Kent chosen to add a jaggedness in the structure of the cinematic story, then it would reflect the nature of war. Yet this is an adaptation and one that stays true to the beloved memoir, rather than taking intense creative license.

Such pathos in a motion picture is conveyed exceedingly, scenes of a decrepit Brittain mourning her fiancé really show us as to why she became a pacifist, detesting the outcomes of warfare. Lying across a wooden table in a dimly lit room is Brittain’s fiancé’s (Roland Leighton) uniform that was sent back following his death. Kent so strongly conveys a sense of pure, incomprehensible grief — Vera shrieking over her fiancé’s uniform, as the poem and dried-up violets he had meant to send to her is read.

And Alicia Vikander may become a veteran actor one day, her enigmatic performances across the years soaring and earning her an Academy Award in 2015 (Best Supporting Actress in ‘The Danish Girl’). Yet this was one of her first English roles (Vikander comes from Gothenburg, Sweden). The sheer suffering and deeply felt pain that Vikander conveys truly cuts to the bone, with such potential to inspire. Her thunderstorm of emotion is told through her expression and the livid involvement of Brittain’s poetic licence. The beautifully brutal ballad on the futile nature of war to end the film marks Brittain’s contempt for what she had to witness, further executing her status as a pioneer for the role of women in war. And Vikander delivers with such theatrical power that we as an audience are swept away by Brittain’s modernity and strong-willed heart. Accompanying actors also hold a scene with great character representation, Game Of Thrones’ Kit Harington showcasing the romantic sensitivity of Roland Leighton & Taron Egerton displaying the gently naive nature of Edward Brittain.

Where most period dramas lean towards the pursuit of happiness in romance, director Kent does a good job of not purely focusing on this. Vera herself is seen as a student, nurse, writer, and sister, instead of only a fiancée. Her pure individuality is very much honoured, which in a film focusing on a woman in the early 20th Century is rarely seen or celebrated. The feminine value is in the emotionally sensitive and strengthened reactions of Brittain herself. Depicted it the important pacifist who was ahead of her time. Time and time again she really is challenged, by the utter taking away of her education, love, family and of all, youth. The futile nature of the pointless loss of youth. With all the great things in front of you, like an Oxford education and marriage, what must you sacrifice? It is the ability of Brittain’s story to be still reflective today that hits us in our soul.

Kent’s translation of Brittain’s life has him cleverly involving her actual work to show her progression as a writer, as well as the grand scale of emotions that she moves through. Brittain’s poetry is not mentioned in the film, yet utters similarities with the landscape and captures the feel of the cinematic experience. Mentioning beauty in nature lines up with the standstill pain of grief, as seen one of in Brittain’s most renowned poems — ‘Perhaps’. The linking of seasons and florals with the passing of time and simple pleasures against the backdrop of hollow bloodshed shows us the prevalence of nature amongst the chaos. As Vera’s poetry mentioned and accompanying scenes create such value, lines like ‘Along the meadow we walk’ and ‘All shone April in your eyes’ romanticising and softening such a treacherous moment in history. Romanticism itself was greatly challenged in the outbreak of World Wars.

The swirling and raw emotion are what define the brilliance of war films, Kent’s Testament of Youth utters this very meaning. These are the stories that we need that encompass grand emotion through performance and technique. Director James Kent making hints to preceding war films such as Gone With The Wind, as seen in the sweeping crane shot of a field of wounded. The futility of warfare and the pacifist movement sang early on with poets like Vera Brittain and Wilfred Owen, Testament Of Youth echoing the visuals of works like Dulce Et Decorum Est or Hospital Sanctuary. With a mix of an impassioned and differing female perspective on warfare, culture, literature, nature, romance, and family, there is not much room for more themes that reflect romanticism itself.

Stars Out Of Five: 4/5