1917 – an Unflinching Depiction of War

Following Nolan’s Dunkirk, it’s hard to imagine that another war movie would be able to draw you in as close and capture the horrors of war with equal tension. With 1917, however, Sam Mendes has not only rivalled Dunkirk as a splendid war movie – he has made the best movie of 2020, so far.

We follow the soldiers Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman) and Schofield (George MacKay) as they’re given the mission to traverse a war-ravaged France to deliver a message that could spell life or death for 1,600 men, including Blake’s big brother.

Whereas Dunkirk focused on a few characters at different places, 1917 zooms in on Blake and Schofield, and it’s shown through one lens, literally. Shot by the legendary cinematographer Roger Deakins (a frequent collaborator of Mendes, Denis Villeneuve and Alejandro Iñárritu), the movie is made to look like it was filmed in one take. As viewers, we’re there every step of the way and it works magnificently. There are so many shots that you want to frame and hang on your wall.

Cinematographer Roger Deakins with George MacKay.

With the one-take nature of the movie, it’s hard not to draw comparisons to Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s Birdman (shot by Emmanuel Lubezki), but I feel like it’s more akin to The Revenant (with the same cinematographer and director) in its camerawork, favouring natural lighting and carefully framed shots.

Like Birdman, 1917 was only made to look like one take, but there are no discernible cuts. This is more than a gimmick – it makes the movie and gives it a kind of presence that would not have been possible, had it been edited in the usual way. You know the tension in that one-take in Children of Men (another Iñárritu movie with Lubezki as the DP)? That’s how you feel in 1917. Death is behind every door, and you’re with these soldiers – expertly played by Chapman and MacKay – every step of the way.

The casting is excellent, reserving the big names only for a few minor parts. Chapman and MacKay will no doubt be stars after this, and rightly so. They imbue their characters with courage, doubt, fear and tenderness, making the senseless loss of war so very palpable.

However, a movie can’t be all tension. Luckily, Mendes knows when to rein it in after a big set piece, making 1917 a movie with excellent pacing. Writers Sam Mendes and Krysty Wilson-Cairns (whose previous writing credits include the series Penny Dreadful) have peppered the script with just enough exposition to pique our curiosity, while not revealing too much.

It’s a film that portrays both the brutality and the beauty of human nature, and that’s an accomplishment in itself.