1917

I love how personal this film feels. It feels fresh in comparison to some of the other war films I've seen, which can often be immense in scale. This personal nature is earned primarily through the film's presentation as two continuous scenes. It can't be understated how brilliantly this is done, with beautiful cinematography and seamless camera work throughout. Most of all though, this allows (and forces) the film to stay with its primary characters throughout. As the events of the film unfold, we never cut away to another perspective. Just as the characters are, we're never allowed to briefly escape this thankless journey. When they experience great trauma, we're made to sit with them and steep in the raw emotions of those moments. Despite the lack of cuts throughout the film, each moment feels distinct and manages to simply wash over you. These transitions are communicated through subtle camerawork and beautiful score which captures changing emotion from moment to moment. As the events of the story unfold in this fashion, it has the effect of putting the viewer in an almost dreamlike trance, perfectly aligning with the experience of the characters themselves. The narrative itself is fairly straightforward. So straightforward that in another film, the events of this story might take place between a single cut. But instead we live through every second of the terrifying and grounded realities of the situation these soldiers find themselves in.