Savior review

After his wife (Kinski) and son are killed in a terrorist attack, Joshua (Quaid) commits an act of brutal vengeance and then joins the French Foreign Legion to escape imprisonment. Years later, he winds up as a mercenary fighting for the Serbs in Bosnia, where he witnesses the death of his best friend (Stellan Skarsgård). However, an orphaned baby presents Joshua with the chance to rebuild his own humanity and become the eponymous 'saviour'.

Co-produced by Oliver Stone, Savior is the latest attempt to dramatise the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. Unfortunately, it never recovers from its garbled first half-hour, which sees the removal of both Kinski and Skarsgård. Serbian director Antonijevic depicts, with a degree of bloodthirstiness, the atrocities being perpetrated on both sides. Yet, as an anti-war film, it fails to match the audacity and complexity of the recently released Pretty Village, Pretty Flame.