[Movie] Dunkirk

[ramjb]

Hi all,

I was lucky enough to win an advance screening of Dunkirk.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it sucks.

For those going in expecting a war epic, an action movie, or The Dark Knight, it's not. It's an art movie. The film is extremely disjointed, splitting between multiple narratives and with a nonlinear use of time, e.g. repeating the same event from different perspectives at different points in the movie. The movie is not focused on telling a story but giving "impressions", but really all it does is strain the patience of the viewer.

Yes I know Dunkirk has 95 on Metacritic right now. But that 95 is the snobby score of film school graduate critics who can't stop swooning over arthouse flicks.

If you read behind the lines, you'll see from the reviews that this movie is not for the general public in the way that classics like Saving Private Ryan, Black Hawk Down or Band of Brothers were. This movie is more comparable to a (mercifully) shorter Thin Red Line.

Just look at the IGN review. Sure, IGN gave it a 9.5, but read the actual review. Lots of empty screentime. When there is actual dialogue, it is bad. Zero character development.

"Dunkirk is an unconventional war movie ... events are seen from three perspectives – land, sea, and air – each one unfolding at a different rate – one week, one day, and one hour, respectively. Occasionally, this unusual structure creates moments of passing confusion. A couple of times I wasn’t sure if I was witnessing a new event or a familiar one from a different angle. ... There can’t be more than a handful of pages of dialogue scattered within its 106-minute runtime. It’s a bold decision, ... In fact, the smattering of exposition results in the movie’s clumsiest scene, in which two soldiers overhear officers outlining their dire predicament. But compared to most movies, there’s almost nothing – Nolan instead focuses on the immediacy of their plight. Similarly, characters never regale their peers with tales of back home or rouse them with perfectly measured speeches; they’re terrified young men, not much older than boys, trying to survive. That’s all you get, and all I really needed to know. "

EDIT/UPDATE: This youtube review (by one of the main youtube reviewers out there: 1.3M subs Jeremy Jahns sums up my views pretty accurately)

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Rather than saying it's bad just because it's doesn't meet mass audience expectations, you could just say that the film has a niche audience. Is the Avengers bad simply because it's a cheap, self indulgent party?

[Nystromia]

Knowing the true story of Dunkirk from the 1940's fits into accounts of others from the land, sea and air in this epic tale of just how lucky these 400,000 bastards were from being annihilated on the beach. Thank Hitler for this.

[Scooby Dooby Doo]

Can't be worse than the retarded love triangle in pearl harbor.

[yetgdhfgh]

I think this film will flop but the Nolan effect maybe will help it break even.

I aint saying this on the basis of what OP said iam basing this on who is the film targeted to?

Iam British and i must admit this wasnt our finest hour that actually came a few months after Dunkirk at the Battle of Britain so i cant see many Brits rushing out to see this. Then we have the main audience which is the USA and is Americans really gonna rush to the theatres to watch a British centred war flick? Also how will this play out to foreign audiences? I doubt the Chinese will rush out to see it.

[Medusa Cascade]

I, for one, am looking forward to seeing it.

[Deleted]

Knowing the true story of Dunkirk from the 1940's fits into accounts of others from the land, sea and air in this epic tale of just how lucky these 400,000 bastards were from being annihilated on the beach. Thank Hitler for this.

Sorry?
What did Hitler have to do with it?

[ramjb]

Well...you know what they say about opinions. You every right to your own, but at the moment you stand a bit alone-ish.

But I won't take your word and see for myself if I like it or not. Nolan has yet to let me down (although I am not blown away by his movies, but I liked them so far)

For comparison, the only other movies with as high a metascore as Dunkirk right now are Moonlight and Boyhood. Just remember, critics review movies for the gimmicks, to brown noise and earn brownie points among each other. They have no clue what a good movie is.

e.g. I think Fury (2014, the tank movie with Brad Pitt) was way better than Dunkirk. with better acting, story and action setpieces, but Fury only has a 64% on Metacritic.

[draynay]

For those going in expecting a war epic, an action movie, or The Dark Knight

Why on earth would anyone go to Dunkirk expecting that?

[ramjb]

Well, that's the thing, somebody will always claim to know what a good movie is and how others have no clue. This is why I don't really go by Metacritic or Rottentomatoe - but for example by Empire Magazine, a UK cinema magazine that I have been reading since 1990 ish and have found over the many years where we agree and where not. In your case, it would be better put into perspective if I knew how you liked films like Saving Private Ryan, The thin red Line, Deer Hunter, Apocalypse now, Hamburger Hill, Full Metal Jacket and so on and so on.

I would not presume to tell you if you know what a good movie is or not, but rather know if we have a similar taste

The interesting thing is that the trailer of Dunkirk alone probably would make go and see it.

Well the Empire review states: little ground action, only good action is the spitfire dogfight.

It could be argued the characters are too thin, but at least there’s none of the melodrama of, say, Titanic or Pearl Harbor, two other epics based on real-life disasters. If anything, Dunkirk hews towards the arthouse, with the melancholy, spume-flecked tableaux it lingers on beautifully photographed by Interstellar DP Hoyte Van Hoytema. Where it does deliver on action is in the sky. Today’s audiences have spent decades watching digital dogfights in Star Wars movies, themselves originally inspired by World War II movies such as Twelve O'Clock High. Nolan gets the wow factor back by stripping away the pixels, shooting real Spitfires on real sorties above the real English Channel.

Ugh, arthouse. PTSD flashbacks of having to go to film festival flicks with my ex-gf. Welp,

The whole portrayal of Dunkirk is wrong. The British soldiers are portrayed as wet noodles and the whole movie tries to emphasise how scary war is. You see it in the reviews: they're only boys!

Whereas everyone knows the British soldier, when facing incredible odds, will calmly put the kettle on, plonk rapid-fire headshots down range with his enfield rifle, and only surrender when completely surrounded and out of ammunition. In the real Dunkirk, we had British soldiers killing Nazis with longbows and inflicting huge casualties on the Waffen SS. But no, does the movie focus on the only ever wartime longbow kill in modern times?

[Izalla]

It's not an action "war" movie? You just made me actually interested in seeing it, thanks.

[Symphonic]

I'm even more excited to see it. Nolan hasn't made a bad movie.

[ramjb]

It's not an action "war" movie? You just made me actually interested in seeing it, thanks.

Well have fun watching vistas of the beach with smoke in the background, while a clock ticks very loudly (Hans Zimmer's "score").

[jackofwind]

Well have fun watching vistas of the beach with smoke in the background, while a clock ticks very loudly (Hans Zimmer's "score").

Sorry you didn't get the mindless explosion and war-pornfest you wanted. I guess Apocalypse Now is also worse than, say, Rambo II?

Sucks when you have to consider a movie as a piece of art instead of just a self-gratifying jerkoff session

[XDurionX]

After that steady cam shot in "Atonement" i don't need to see anything dunkirk ever again.

[Izalla]

Well have fun watching vistas of the beach with smoke in the background, while a clock ticks very loudly (Hans Zimmer's "score").

I will, thank you, sounds more up my alley than war films usually are.

- - - Updated - - -

After that steady cam shot in "Atonement" i don't need to see anything dunkirk ever again.

I loved that movie. But despite being someone who rewatches things all the time it's not one I'm generally inclined to rewatch. It's just so sad.

[Tiwack]

Hi all,
For those going in expecting a war epic, an action movie, or The Dark Knight...

wtf lol
Dude did you ever look in a history book about the battles of WWII to get an idea what to expect from a movie with that title? If you knew about Dunkirk you wouldn't expect nonstop action or freaking batman holyshit.

[Bathory]

Hi all,

I was lucky enough to win an advance screening of Dunkirk.

I saw this pop up on my screenings account and figured, yeah sure I'll go. I gotta agree with ya OP. While I don't think it sucks, I don't think it was very good either. I see what Nolan was trying to do with it, but I don't think the execution worked. As an art piece, as a retelling, I appreciate it. But as a movie, I left feeling a little unsatisfied.

I gave it a 5/10 on my write up.

[Skulltaker]

Sorry?
What did Hitler have to do with it?

When the British expedition force and what remained of the french army was trapped in Dunkirk, Hermann Göring, commander of the Luftwaffe, promised Hitler that his Luftwaffe alone would be more than capable of decimating the british troops and prevent evacuation, and that General Guderian, who was in command of the german Army in the northern France offensive, would just have to mop up and destroy routed and broken British and french troops. Hitler, being the military genius he was, ordered Guderian to halt his movement forward. While the german army would have suffered losses vs the entrenched and dug in british at dunkirk, they would have obliterated basically any ground forces the british and french had remaining after their failed counter-offensive, which would have meant that Britain would have been much more vulnerable to invasion. Britain still lost most of their tanks, artillery and support vehicles, aswell as 150 airplanes and several destroyers in the evacuation, but 300 000 soldiers were able to fight on. Could have been a lot worse. Might even have changed the outcome of it all.

[Izalla]

wtf lol
Dude did you ever look in a history book about the battles of WWII to get an idea what to expect from a movie with that title? If you knew about Dunkirk you wouldn't expect nonstop action or freaking batman holyshit.

Are you saying that an event involving an evacuation to escape an approaching army would not end up being a movie full of battle scenes? That's nonsense.