The battle scenes were excellent, until...(spoiler)

Yeh Pashendale as a whole isn't a great movie but the battle scene is well done up until that point. I always show my friends the final battle scene to give them an idea of what World War 1 was like but I make sure I pause and turn it off before that lame part. What were they thinking?

Scott the Gent said: "obviously it was meant to be about more than that. throughout the film there was a clear message of the horrors of artillery and then the crucifixion of a Canadian soldier to a barn door by the Germans was mentioned a fair few times! This was just taking what artillery could do to a man to the extreme. Although a little more imagination was required i don't think it took anything away from the film. The whole carrying the cross is a pretty simple image of this guys love and sacrifice for another. Not seen that image before?"

The critics of that scene don't necessarily lack imagination, and it's not that we didn't get the point/symbollism. But it was so contrived as to be awkward. Symbollism is fine and can work really well. But it has to be done with very careful strokes, because if it's too heavy-handed it becomes cringe-worthy (as this was).

My biggest problem with the scene was that the kid was unlikeable through the entire film and then at the end he was such an idiot, and inexplicably ran into the Germans' trench, and he got someone else killed. I hate it when a character becomes too stupid to live and takes someone else down instead. It would have been different if the kid had a reason for running into the trench, like if he had brought a weapon or something.