Dunkirk: Review

I will admit, I’ve been quite a big critic of Christopher Nolan for the past five or so years after being vehemently disappointed by his two most recent outings in The Dark Knight Rises and Interstellar. When it came to Dunkirk, I found myself both excited and cautious to embrace it, especially given that I found none of the trailers or spots to be particularly engrossing. However, it brings me great pleasure to say that I quite liked Dunkirk, and maybe even loved it.

It’s no secret that Nolan and co. have been really pushing and endorsing the wide 70mm release of this film and I was fortunate enough to experience it in such a format and I can say with great confidence that it is the definitive way to experience this. It’s a cinematic experience that feels very fresh and very very intense. Every frame makes you feel stuck and terrified right alongside every soldier. Nolan employs the terrifying mindset of the event onto the audience and it's nearly impossible to shake for the entirety of the films 107-minute runtime. The emotions flow from the screen, the feeling of impending doom, the frantic desire to escape, and the willingness to go into harm’s way and sacrifice everything to save others. It’s a vital narrative to this day and age and even though the film doesn’t shy away from forcing it into the audience’s faces, I still appreciated it.

The film is a technical masterwork; it's shot, acted, directed, and scored to perfection. However, I couldn’t help but feel myself becoming distracted and frustrated by the editing of the film. While I understand that the point of its editing style was to keep the pace tight, it in no way really worked for me. It constantly cuts back and forth between the different sub plots but I never felt that Nolan was really letting me absorb what was happening on screen when I sorely felt like I needed to.

Problems aside, Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk is his best movie since Inception. It’s a relentless event-driven power house that thrusts its audience into the brutal heart of one of the darkest hours of WW2. It packs a valiant punch and is one of the most heart-racing and fresh cinematic experiences I’ve had this year. I applaud Nolan for managing to experiment and build something unique for a War film. I won’t say it’s one of the greatest but it’s a fucking brilliant nerve-shredding spectacle of a film. (8/10)