The Water Diviner

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Russell Crowe/Starring: Russell Crowe, Olga Kurylenko, Yilmaz Erdogan, Cem Yilmaz, Jai Courtney and Dylan Georgiades

The Water Diviner is one of those films directed by a major star which purportedly tells a true story; one that should be fairly compelling but is only competently told. Of course I'm also thinking of Angelina Jolie's relatively recent Unbroken, another middling story attempting to address the horrors of war. One might have expected Russell Crowe's feature film debut to garner as much attention and advance notice but curiously, I never saw one trailer for the film nor is it currently playing in more than one local theater. It arrives almost stillborn and it's easy to see why Warner Brothers had little confidence in the film; a promising beginning gives way to flaccid storytelling. What should have been a visceral experience became an okay history lesson; one that might only hold a passing interest to viewers.

Based on the story of an Australian man named Joshua Connor, whose three sons died in the Gallipoli Peninsula during the British and Australian armies bloody clash with the Turks in WWI. The Water Diviner, based on a book of the same title by Andrew Anastasios and Meaghan Wilson-Anastasios, tells the story of his quest to find and return his son's remains to Australia.

When the film begins, we see Connor (Russell Crowe) using a divining rod in the arid Australian desert to locate a water for a well. Wielding it with great skill, Connor is able to pinpoint an underground source; calling on a mystical sense that proves to be crucial later in the story. Connor returns home to his wife, who still insists her husband read The Arabian Nights to the three empty beds his sons once occupied.

The story takes a tragic turn when Connor's wife Eliza (Jacqueline McKenzie), still tormented with grief four years after her son's deaths, takes her own. Bereaved, Connor decides to honor his wife's wish that her son's bodies be returned to Australian soil by traveling to Turkey.

Connor encounters many difficulties when he arrives. Not only must he contend with the exotic local culture, but Connor runs into a near impenetrable British and Australian military bureaucracy that forbids any civilian contact with the former battlefield. Fiercely determined to accomplish his mission, Connor is helped along by a family who runs the Istanbul hotel in which he lodges. A wife of a soldier who was reported lost in the battle, Ayshe (Olga Kurylenko), her young son Orhan (Dylan Georgiades) and her brother-in-law Omer (Steve Bastoni) play host to Connor while he tries to overcome the British army's restrictions. Ayshe is naturally averse to Connor's presence when she learns of his quest. But with the family's help, Connor is able to secure passage to the former battlefield, where Australian soldiers and two Turkish army officers lead the search for soldier's remains. The search proves to be an uneasy collaboration; foreign army presence and a battle that is still raw in Turkish memory complicate the effort. Though the Australian officer Lt. Col. Hughes (Jai Courtney) barely conceals his impatience with Connor's request to find his son's remains, the two Turkish officers, Major Hasan (Yilmaz Erdogan) and Cemal (Cem Yilmaz) are more sympathetic. As Major Hasan explains, "He is the only father who came to the battlefield." Hughes reluctantly allows Connor to assist in the search for his sons.

The wounds of war run deep for both sides as Major Hasan, a participant in the former battle, offers Hughes specific, geographic details about fighting itself.

As he wanders the battlefield, Connor's uncanny water-divining skills serve him well as he manages to locate the remains of two sons. Puzzled as to why his third son isn't among the remains, the search resumes.

While the exhumations continue, the Turkish officers receive word that the Greeks have attacked the Turkish coast, which triggers nationalistic fervor across the country and a renewed contempt for English and Australians alike.

With his unerring sixth sense, Connor determines his third son may be alive and though Major Hasan and Cemal initially refuse additional assistance, they eventually relent.

Meanwhile, Connor becomes embroiled in Ayshe's domestic troubles. Ayshe tries desperately to fend off Omer's aggressive efforts to marry; her objections stemming from her belief her husband could still be alive. Connor unwisely intervenes in a violent exchange between the two; inadvertently inviting an assault upon his person by Omer and his thuggish friends.

Connor eventually learns of the monastery where his son may be kept and with the help of Major Hasan and Cemal, he joins them and other soldiers on a battle-bound train, which results in a small disaster.

The end of Connor's search leads to what seems like a forgone conclusion though a twist of sorts provides some surprise. And-by-the-way subtitles about WWI casualties and those missing in battle precede the end credits but they seem unnecessary. Don't we know by now that WWI was the 20th century's first major meat grinder?

Why doesn't this story work? Where did Crowe fail? Alas, skilled actors rarely make good directors and though Crowe gives the old college try, he can't transmute material with great potential into dramatic gold. It isn't difficult to capture the Australian outback and Turkish landscape in breathtaking long shots or the inside of mosque, where Connor stares transfixed at a beautiful, blue cupola. More challenging is drawing strong, convincing performances from a cast, which he does reasonably well though Dylan Georgiades is little more than a cute kid.

The battle scenes, where we see two of Connor's sons meet their demise, should be horrific and yet they could be any WWI combat sequence from any war movie. Of course the film will evoke memories of Peter Weir's splendid Gallipoli; whose depiction of the battle was attended by a wrenching immediacy, which left the audience with a profound sense of loss and futility.

The Water Diviner belongs on television as a Showtime or HBO original, not as a theatrical release. It might be a very welcome presence on a small screen, where its modest narrative ambitions and sweeping visuals might beguile a late night audience. But on a multiplex screen, it makes for mediocre matinee fare.