Fury movie examines trauma of soldiers says Brad Pitt

The movie, which has its European premiere on Sunday at the close of the London Film Festival, follows a tank crew as it pushes behind enemy lines in the dying days of the war in Germany in 1945.

“It was not a film about sides,” Pitt told reporters. “For me it was a film about that accumulative psychic trauma that every soldier carries to some extent.”

Brad Pitt poses before the Sherman tank inside which he spent most of his time during the shoot of Fury

He added: “This film is about the soldiers’ exhaustion from the cold, hunger and the accumulative effect on a daily basis. We took that to heart.

“I hope the soldiers will walk away from this and feel they are recognised.”

Pitt, along with a number of other actors in the film, gave his support to last month’s international Invictus Games for injured veterans, which took place in London.

“I learnt a lot from this film,” the 50-year-old, who plays a hard-bitten sergeant in command of a Sherman tank crew played by Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Michael Pena and Jon Bernthal, said, adding that his role as battle-hardened army sergeant Wardaddy was “a real study in leadership”.

“Because of this, I am now a better father,” said Pitt, who has six children with actress Angelina Jolie.

He also admitted he became rather attached to the Sherman tank in which he and his team spent much of the film.

“There’s nothing ergonomic about a tank. But we were forced to familiarise ourselves with the tank and find our comfort spots,” he said, adding: “I became quite proprietorial.”

The film’s director, David Ayer, said Pitt spent a lot of time in the tank on set.

“It was like his eagle’s nest where he would look down on us,” he said, to which the actor quipped: “It was the best view.”

Gruesome fare

At one point during Fury a tank commander’s head is blown off while he’s hunched outside his vehicle during a fiery battle with a combatant. Ayer insists he didn’t include the surprise decapitation simply to shock moviegoers.

“That was a very common thing that happened,” said Ayer. “There’s countless stories of crews being inside tanks and then all of a sudden their commander’s headless body drops into the tank and sprays blood everywhere. That was the hazard of being a tank commander, and that’s why these guys were so brave.”

Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Jon Bernthal, Brad Pitt, Michael Pena and director David Ayer at the Paris promotion of Fury

Unlike many films about World War II, which have painted a patriotic portrait of the six-year conflict, the R-rated Fury instead offers an unapologetically gruesome look at one long day of battle in 1945, just weeks before the Nazis’ final surrender.

From inside an M4 Sherman tank nicknamed Fury, Pitt’s Don ‘Wardaddy’ Collier leads a five-man crew deep into enemy territory where they experience — and participate in — hellish acts of war.

“This is like the PG-13 version of what real war is like,” said actor Michael Pena, who plays tank driver Trini ‘Gordo’ Garcia. “Real war is not pretty. You can validate almost everything you see on screen. The pictures that we saw were horrendous. This is just a little bit of it.”

Ayer, a former U.S. Navy submariner who wrote the police dramas Training Day and End of Watch, loaded up on a barrage of research before going into the production on the Sony Pictures film in England, including interviewing veterans, enlisting military experts and studying real-world war footage.

While the film isn’t based entirely on reality, he didn’t want Fury to stray too far from the truth — more Saving Private Ryan, less Inglourious Basterds.

“In my investigation of the war, I wanted to find circumstances that would help create the world and tell the story of what these five guys faced,” said Ayer. “I wasn’t cherry picking horrible things just to be gratuitous. I wanted to know what this family could experience together that puts us in their shoes and tells us about that war.”

Despite the film’s 69-year-old subject matter, Ayer noted the conflicts that the U.S. military confronted in WWII mirror today’s clashes in the Middle East.

“They’re fighting a fanatical enemy that’s thrown the rulebook out,” said Ayer.

“There are women and children in the combat zone. It’s an enemy that had zero regard for human rights. These soldiers had to deal with that, make decisions and fight in that environment. The same difficulties they faced, our soldiers are facing today overseas in the Middle East.”