Caught up in the perfect storm of awards season, the action drama “Devotion,” with its uplifting true story, war movie tropes, and uneven storytelling, ultimately collapses under the weight of self-imposed high expectations and shoddy execution.
Brevity Loses
Based on the Adam Makos book “Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice,” the screenplay by the relatively unknown writers Jake Crane and Jonathan A. Stewart is all over the proverbial map. What should have run no more than 100 or so minutes is easily a half-hour too long and is padded with nonessential, thoroughly unrelated fluff and finger-wagging admonishment.
The story opens with the arrival of Captain Tom Hudner (Glen Powell), a perpetually grinning, affable pilot at a Rhode Island naval station in 1950. Ironically, Powell appeared in “Maverick” as a grinning, full-of-himself pilot. He also provided his voice to the animated “Apollo 10 ½” earlier this year, and played John Glenn in “Hidden Figures.” Powell is evidently a great fit in aeronautical-themed movies.
This is where Hudner first meets Ensign Jesse Brown (Jonathan Majors), the first African-American U.S. Navy aviator, who is anything but affable. Sullen, silent, and antisocial, Brown takes an immediate dislike to Hudner and the other (white) pilots (one of whom is portrayed by a charismatic Joe Jonas) for reasons never evidenced.
The Sore Thumb
In the movie’s oddest and most disquieting passage, Brown looks directly into the camera (serving as a mirror) and screams racial epithets at himself while sobbing. It is terribly out of place in a mainstream film that is ostensibly trying to provide uplift and inspiration while breaking down racial barriers.
At home with his wife Daisy (a wonderfully understated Christina Jackson) and infant daughter, Brown is a completely different man. He’s gregarious, loving, affectionate, and doting: the model family patriarch.
In far too short order, Brown and Hudner become inseparable best friends, a bond that deepens after they’re paired together as wingmen by their commanding officer (Thomas Sadoski).
More Shades of ‘Maverick’
Save for a single scene set in (or rather, above) Rhode Island, all of the flight scenes take place in the second half of the film and singlehandedly save “Devotion” from drifting into unrecommended territory. If you catch yourself comparing what you see here to the in-the-cloud content of “Maverick,” that would be because Kevin LaRosa II was the aerial coordinator on both movies. It’s really the only reason any interested parties should see this movie on the biggest screen possible.To go into detail about what transpires in the final half-hour would result in major spoilers, but a few facts can be revealed. For their service in the Korean War (shamefully regarded by some as “The Forgotten War”), Brown received the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Purple Heart while Hudner was awarded the Medal of Honor, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star, and two Air Medals.
The pre-closing credits are preceded by epilogues regarding what took place after the war ended all the way up to the present day between the Brown and Hudner families and will certainly leave you with gooseflesh.
If intent were the sole qualifier for a movie’s quality, “Devotion” would get a solid five-star rating, but it is not. It’s all in the writing and execution and, on those levels, the film misses the mark by a wide margin.
