By Katie Walsh,

History is rife with horrific events that somehow manage to reveal true humanity and heroism. Many of these events are underreported, underrepresented and misunderstood, such as the Armenian genocide — the extermination of 1.5 million Armenians and other ethnic and religious minorities by the Ottoman Empire, starting in 1915.

Knowledge of this genocide isn’t universal, and Turkey, the successor nation of the Ottoman Empire, still refuses to acknowledge it. The epic melodrama “The Promise,” based on these events, seeks to remedy popular understanding of the horror. It’s a noble undertaking that only partially succeeds.

Written by Robin Swicord and director Terry George, “The Promise” has all the trappings of a romantic epic — movie stars, love triangles, exotic destinations. It boasts Oscar Isaac, Christian Bale and gorgeous European locations, plus experienced talent behind the camera, so it’s confounding then that “The Promise” falls so flat.

The film is a color-by-numbers wartime drama. Isaac plays Mikael, a young medical student from a small Armenian village, pursuing his fortune in Constantinople. There he befriends a young Turk (Marwan Kenzari) and an American reporter (Bale) and falls in love with a worldly and well-traveled Armenian woman, Ana (Charlotte Le Bon), though he’s promised to a young woman back home. When the Ottomans enter World War I, the group is torn apart by hatred, racism and violence.

At least, that’s what we can glean from the events depicted onscreen. Throughout its two-hour plus running time, there is nary an explanation of the political machinations behind the persecution of the Armenians. There’s a bit of chit-chat and singing with some German soldiers, a mean Turkish father, and then suddenly everyone’s being executed and shipped off to labor camps while villages burn.

The lack of exposition could be intended to align us with Mikael’s naive perspective. But you’ll definitely leave “The Promise” with far more questions than you started. Perhaps we can never really answer why one group commits genocide against another, but it feels slightly irresponsible to make a film ostensibly shedding light on this atrocity and then not attempt to explain it in the least.

Instead, “The Promise” is mostly concerned with the love triangle between Ana, Mikael and Chris, the reporter. And even the love triangle itself is a disappointment, as these men never seem too concerned that the other is romancing his girl.

The usually charismatic Isaac is saddled with a dud of a character. Mikael spends most of the film buffeted by forces beyond his control and deferring to the desires of others, such as the army and his mother (Shohreh Aghdashloo). It’s not until the third act that he starts to make his own decisions. The swaggering heroics are left to Bale as the Hemingway-esque American foreign correspondent.

With seemingly all the right pieces, it’s a disappointment that “The Promise” lacks the energy and originality needed to sustain itself. It might be fresh material, but the approach is decidedly stale.

Katie Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.

‘The Promise’

Running time: 2 hours 12 minutes

Rating: PG-13, for thematic material including war atrocities, violence and disturbing images, and for some sexuality

Playing: In general release

Source: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-promise-review-20170420-story.html

By Noah Bierman contact the reporter

White House officials have decided that President Obama will not use the word “genocide” to describe the killings of more than 1 million Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turks when he commemorates the deaths Friday, the 100th anniversary of the massacres.

The decision, revealed Tuesday in a meeting with Armenian American groups, backs down from a previous Obama pledge.

“As president I will recognize the Armenian Genocide,” Obama said while running for president in 2008. Report LATime

His decision not to do so now sparked anger from activists.

“The president’s surrender represents a national disgrace,” said Aram S. Hamparian, executive director of the Washington-based Armenian National Committee of America. “It is a betrayal of the truth, and it is a betrayal of trust.”

White House officials defended the decision as necessary to preserve the chance of cooperation with Turkey, a NATO ally, on Middle Eastern conflicts.

The Turkish Embassy, which has spent millions lobbying Congress on the issue, did not respond to a request for comment. the Turkish government has said that the mass killings do not meet the legal definition of genocide and that it would be a mistake for the U.S. to use the term. Some members of Congress have also warned that a shift in official U.S. references could hurt American foreign policy.

California has the country’s largest population of people of Armenian descent, with more than 200,000 living in Los Angeles County, according to U.S. Census data.

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank), who has led efforts in Congress to recognize the genocide, said he was “deeply disappointed” by the decision.

“How long must the victims and their families wait before our nation has the courage to confront Turkey with the truth about the murderous past of the Ottoman Empire? If not this president, who spoke so eloquently and passionately about recognition in the past, whom? If not after 100 years, when?” he said in a statement.

After the meeting with Armenian American groups, White House officials released a statement that did not use the word “genocide.” The statement from National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said the U.S. would use the anniversary of the onset of the massacres to “urge a full, frank and just acknowledgment of the facts that we believe is in the interest of all parties.”

A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity to comment on a diplomatically delicate issue, said the White House expects Obama to mark “the historical significance” of the Meds Yeghern, as the massacres are known in Armenian.

“We know and respect that there are some who are hoping to hear different language this year. We understand their perspective,” the official said.

But, the official added, “the approach we have taken in previous years remains the right one, both for acknowledging the past, and for our ability to work with regional partners to save lives in the present,” a reference to U.S. hope for cooperation from Turkey, particularly in the civil war in Syria.
White House national security advisor Susan Rice met Tuesday afternoon with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and urged him “to take concrete steps to improve relations with Armenia and to facilitate an open and frank dialogue in Turkey about the atrocities of 1915,” the White House said in a statement.

Hamparian said he and other Armenian American leaders learned the news at their White House meeting, which was attended by Denis McDonough, Obama’s chief of staff, and Ben Rhodes, deputy national security advisor.

During the meeting, which lasted just short of an hour, Hamparian said, the group was told that the U.S. would send a delegation to Armenia this week, led by Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew.

La times Review: ‘The Promise,’ an epic melodrama set during the Armenian genocide, falls frustratingly flat

Armenian hopes crushed as Obama decides not to use the word ‘genocide’