War

War is a state of armed conflict between societies. It is generally characterized by extreme collective aggression, destruction, and usually high mortality. The set of techniques and actions used to conduct war is known as warfare. An absence of war is usually called "peace". Total war is warfare that is not restricted to purely legitimate military targets, and can result in massive civilian or other non-combatant casualties.

While some scholars see war as a universal and ancestral aspect of human nature, others argue that it is only a result of specific socio-cultural or ecological circumstances.

In 2013 war resulted in 31,000 deaths down from 72,000 deaths in 1990. The deadliest war in history, in terms of the cumulative number of deaths since its start, is the Second World War, from 1939 to 1945, with 60–85 million deaths, followed by the Mongol conquests which was greater than 41 million. Proportionally speaking, the most destructive war in modern history is the War of the Triple Alliance, which took the lives of over 60% of Paraguay's population, according to Steven Pinker. In 2003, Richard Smalley identified war as the sixth (of ten) biggest problem facing humanity for the next fifty years. War usually results in significant deterioration of infrastructure and the ecosystem, a decrease in social spending, famine, large-scale emigration from the war zone, and often the mistreatment of prisoners of war or civilians. Another byproduct of some wars is the prevalence of propaganda by some or all parties in the conflict, and increased revenues by weapons manufacturers.

A War

A War (Danish: Krigen) is a 2015 Danish film directed by Tobias Lindholm, starring Pilou Asbæk and Søren Malling. It tells the story of a Danish military company in Afghanistan that is fighting the Taliban while trying to protect the civilians, and how the commander is accused of having committed a war crime. The film was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 88th Academy Awards.

Plot

Company commander Claus M. Pedersen and his men are stationed in the Helmand province. Meanwhile back in Denmark Claus' wife Maria is trying to hold everyday life together, with a husband at war and three children missing their father. During a routine mission, the soldiers are caught in heavy crossfire and in order to save his men, Claus makes a decision that has grave consequences for him – and his family back home.

Cast

Pilou Asbæk

Johan Philip "Pilou" Asbæk (Danish pronunciation: [pʰiˈluː ˈæːsb̥ɛɡ̊]; born 2 March 1982) is a Danish actor. He is best known for his role as troubled spin doctor Kasper Juul in the Danish TV political drama Borgen.

Early life

Asbæk was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, the son of gallery owners Maria Patricia (née Tonn) and Jacob A. Asbæk, who run Galerie Asbæk in Copenhagen. His mother was born in Casablanca, Morocco, to a Danish father and a French mother. His father is from Hammel, Denmark. He has two older brothers, Thomas Asbæk, an art consultant at Asbæk Art Consulting, and Martin Asbæk, a gallery owner at Martin Asbæk Gallery.

Asbæk went to boarding school at Herlufsholm School where he was active in drama productions. He graduated from Denmark's Danish National School of Theatre (Danish: Statens Teaterskole) in summer 2008.

Career

Television

In 2009, Asbæk played soldier David Grüner in an episode of the second season of another Danish TV series, The Killing (Danish: Forbrydelsen).

Tobias Lindholm

Tobias Lindholm (born 1977) is a Danish screenwriter and film director best known for gritty moral dramas. Lindholm first received attention for his work as a television writer on the popular Danish political TV-series Borgen, credited on all 20 episodes of the series first two seasons, either as an episode writer or storyline contributor. Then, in 2011, Lindholm was awarded a special Bodil Award for having two feature films Submarino (as co-writer) and R (as director and writer) in competition for that year's Best Danish Film, which the later movie also won. His hostage drama A Hijacking (2012) premiered at the 2012 Venice Film Festival in the Orizzonti section.

He is also a frequent collaborator with film director Thomas Vinterberg, with whom he has written the screenplays for feature films Submarino (2010) and The Hunt (2012).

Lindholm directed the 2015 drama A War (Danish: Krigen) about a Danish military company in Afghanistan that is captured by the Taliban, and the commander is accused of war crimes. The film was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 88th Academy Awards.

World War II

World War II (WWII or WW2), also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. In a state of "total war", the major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, erasing the distinction between civilian and military resources. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust (in which approximately 11 million people were killed) and the strategic bombing of industrial and population centres (in which approximately one million were killed, and which included the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki), it resulted in an estimated 50 million to 85 million fatalities. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history.