Dunkirk is the new war film depicting the actual events during the WWII Dunkirk evacuation in 1940. The movie is both written and directed by the great Christopher Nolan. The film stars Tom Hardy, Mark Rylance, Fionn Whitehead, Harry Styles, Kenneth Branagh, and Cillian Murphy. This movie is getting glowing reviews so let’s begin.

Overall, I really liked Dunkirk. Is it the best war film ever made? Well no, but it’s still really good. One major complaint that I heard going into this movie was that people didn’t like the rating of PG-13. If you’re going to make a real war movie, how can it not be rated R? Well what I can tell you is that it didn’t bother me at all. There isn’t any blood or gore but there doesn’t need to be for this specific war story. Dunkirk explores what people do in a life or death situation and what they’ll do to get out of it.

There are few movies in which the movie director is the true star of the move and that’s the case here. Christopher Nolan is one of the best directors working today and he has his figure prints all on this movie. Whenever he takes on a project, Nolan puts everything he has into it. He creates a lot of tension in these war scenes and his use of practical effects is off the charts. When the action goes down, it’s real. I am not a hater on CGI at all, but there is something more tangible when you watch an actual war ship go down in the ocean. The movie is also beautifully shot, which is no surprise coming from Nolan.

But while this is a very good movie, there are some negatives that I want to get into. First off are the characters in the movie. Now the acting is the movie is great, but there isn’t a main character in the movie. This is true. It follows several characters in this movie as they try to get the hell out of this situation. You don’t know anything about their backstory or anything about them really. So here’s the issue, if you don’t lock on and care about these characters, do we feel bad for them when shit hits the fan? The other negative I had with the movie was the non-linear format. For those who don’t know what that means, that means that the movie is not in chronological order. Once again, I don’t hate the non-linear format, I mean look at Pulp Fiction. But if you are telling the story of a true event, then I don’t think the idea should be to tell that story out of order.

So in conclusion Dunkirk is another win for Christopher Nolan. It may not be the best war movie ever made, but it is one of the better ones. If you go check it out, go see it in IMAX. It’s worth the extra $5.

Rating: 87%/B+

Written By: Steven Santoro (SVS_1993)