1917

I happened to catch this movie on opening day.  Off hand, I can't recall having ever seen a movie on opening day.

This film, opened on limited release just a few weeks ago and already subject to wide acclaim, is an English film that's expected to have a wide theater run in the U.S., making it one of a series of war pictures produced in the UK recently that have done well or are expected to do well in the U.S.  This would suggest that the widely held belief that Americans won't watch movies that aren't about themselves, or at least war pictures that aren't about Americans, is obsolete.  The recent films Dunkirk, The Darkest Hour and the documentary They Shall Not Grow Old have all done well in US releases.

This film, as its name indicates, takes place in 1917.  More specifically, the film takes place in April 1917, at which time the British were engaging in an offensive, and it is focused on two British soldiers who are dispatch runners.  In the movie's opening scenes the two young Lance Corporals (a single stripe in the English Army) are assigned the task of running an order from a General to a Major whose unit that is advancing rapidly in order to order that Major to halt his men before they are committed to an assault which areal reconnaissance has revealed will be a trap.

Running just under two hours long, this scenario sets up a tense journey for the men that I'll forgo detailing, as it would involve discussing elements of the plot that would constitute spoilers. And that's not really the purpose of our reviews here in any event. We will note that the film develops its plot very well, including doing an excellent job of character development in a fairly short period of time.

Indeed, we'll go so far as to say that this is the best World War One movie since Paths Of Glory, the epic 1957 film focusing on a real event in the French Army.  The two films are directly comparable other than that the trench scenes in both and the trench fighting scenes are remarkably well done.

If this film, this is aided by the technique of using one long shot, something rarely attempted in film but something that makes this movie uniquely personal.  As the film is a two hour long, single shot, the viewer is uniquely participating with the characters and never departs from the singular focus of the major protagonist, which is of course how people actual experience any significant events themselves.

The film is unique for a World War One film in that its not sympathetic with the Germans at all, which has tended to be the post 1950 view of the Great War.  Because it is a long shot, and because the film is focused directly on the protagonist, there wouldn't be an opportunity to do otherwise, but the film makes no attempt to do so.  Because of this, the movie has received some criticism from those who want to suggest its unduly patriotic or that it approaches the Great War too unilaterally.  That criticism fails to take into account the cinematography but frankly it also fails to take into account that the Germans in World War One were already exhibiting some of the conduct that they're uniformly criticized for in the Second World War and that such comments given World War One Germany a lot more credit than it deserves.

Concerning material details, this film is remarkably excellent.  Details of British uniforms are exact.  Trenches are, I'm informed, correctly done.  It's an amazing effort.  Particularly notable is the correct depiction of the use and nature of the British SMLE rifle of the time.  Also notable, however, may  be the correct depiction of the really slow nature of period aircraft, which is rarely accurately depicted.  A bit of a shock, from an American prospective, is the depiction of an army of the period which incorporated English blacks, as during this period the American military was strictly segregated.

We can criticize a few details and so we'll do so here.  On a large scale tactical level, during this period there would have been an effort to inform an advance element of a change of orders by air.  That isn't shown here, but it probably should have been addressed.  For those familiar with battlefield movements of the Great War of this period that sticks out.  It could have been explained easily enough as such efforts were frequently ineffective.

On another matter, in at least one scene one of the messenger soldiers turns into a sniper to engage him and in another the soldiers clear a farmstead.  Those familiar with actual message running will find this to be surprising as the delivery of the message is always paramount and messengers avoid engagement if at all possible.  In both instances the encounters seem unnecessary to the mission (a similar thing is done in Saving Private Ryan), although in the instance of the sniper it can be explained if the path is the only immediate one available.  If that's assumed, the soldiers action in engagement and the method of engagement is correct.

All in all, this is an excellent movie.