Fury (2014)
- To accurately portray their role in Fury, Brad Pitt spent weeks conducting hands-on research and rehearsing directly with director David Ayer.
- Fury utilized mostly practical sets and locations to ground the story, a specific choice insisted upon by David Ayer.
Fury is a 2014 American war film written and directed by David Ayer, set during the final weeks of World War II in Europe. Brad Pitt stars as Sergeant Don "Wardaddy" Collier, the battle-hardened commander of a Sherman tank crew operating deep inside Nazi Germany in April 1945. When their assistant driver is killed, he is replaced by Norman Ellison, played by Logan Lerman, a young Army typist with no combat experience who must quickly adapt to the brutal realities of mechanized warfare.
The crew โ including Shia LaBeouf as the religious gunner "Bible," Michael Peรฑa as the driver "Gordo," and Jon Bernthal as the crude loader "Coon-Ass" โ forms a tightly bonded unit whose survival depends on absolute trust and willingness to commit terrible acts in service of victory. Fury distinguished itself from most World War II films through its unflinching depiction of tank warfare, a dimension of the conflict rarely explored in cinema. David Ayer researched extensively at tank museums and military archives, and the production secured the use of a real Tiger I tank โ the only operational example in the world, from the Bovington Tank Museum โ for the climactic confrontation sequence.
The tank battles were staged with practical vehicles wherever possible, giving the action sequences a weight and authenticity that CGI alone could not provide. The film's moral complexity โ particularly a controversial scene in a German apartment that forces the audience to confront the ethical compromises of wartime occupation โ elevated it beyond conventional action fare. Fury earned $211 million worldwide on a $68 million budget.
