A big, skilfully constructed yet curiously passionless World War One romance featuring Chris O'Donnell as the 18-year-old writer Ernest Hemingway, and Sandra Bullock as the Red Cross nurse in her mid 20s who proves to be the great love of his life. War scenes are well handled, but the central romance obstinately refuses to spark to life: O'Donnell seems to have more of a crush on Bullock than a grand passion, while she seems driven more by desire to look after him than fall into his arms - impressions that seem to be dictated by their personalities more than anything else. The episodic story has its touching moments and some impressive ones too, but overall you may feel that Hemingway himself related the history of this romance to rather greater effect in his own novel A Farewell to Arms.

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