Having just watched 2000 Meters to Andriivka, another ant’s-eye battle movie, I think The World at War’s final episode really crystallized what I disliked about Warfare, an antiwar movie that presupposes simply showing people 90 minutes of gore acts as a prophylactic. In actuality, we are drawn to horror as we’re drawn to war as a spectacle. There are the men — as The World at War explains — who simply like to hear the tinkle of shattered glass. But there are the rest of us who feel entranced by the enormity of warfare, of cross-continental violence and machines built to shape the earth on grand scales and take more life than you can conceptualize existing. At over 26 hours of footage and context, The World at War uses its scope to introduce the barest beginnings of the humanity behind the victims of war. It’s not real; it’s not actually dangerous. But it’s a start.

Having just watched 2000 Meters to Andriivka, another ant’s-eye battle movie, I think The World at War’s final episode really crystallized what I disliked about Warfare, an antiwar movie that presupposes simply showing people 90 minutes of gore acts as a prophylactic. In actuality, we are drawn to horror as we’re drawn to war as a spectacle. There are the men — as The World at War explains — who simply like to hear the tinkle of shattered glass. But there are the rest of us who feel entranced by the enormity of warfare, of cross-continental violence and machines built to shape the earth on grand scales and take more life than you can conceptualize existing. At over 26 hours of footage and context, The World at War uses its scope to introduce the barest beginnings of the humanity behind the victims of war. It’s not real; it’s not actually dangerous. But it’s a start.

Having just watched 2000 Meters to Andriivka, another ant’s-eye battle movie, I think The World at War’s final episode really crystallized what I disliked about Warfare, an antiwar movie that presupposes simply showing people 90 minutes of gore acts as a prophylactic. In actuality, we are drawn to horror as we’re drawn to war as a spectacle. There are the men — as The World at War explains — who simply like to hear the tinkle of shattered glass. But there are the rest of us who feel entranced by the enormity of warfare, of cross-continental violence and machines built to shape the earth on grand scales and take more life than you can conceptualize existing. At over 26 hours of footage and context, The World at War uses its scope to introduce the barest beginnings of the humanity behind the victims of war. It’s not real; it’s not actually dangerous. But it’s a start.

Having just watched 2000 Meters to Andriivka, another ant’s-eye battle movie, I think The World at War’s final episode really crystallized what I disliked about Warfare, an antiwar movie that presupposes simply showing people 90 minutes of gore acts as a prophylactic. In actuality, we are drawn to horror as we’re drawn to war as a spectacle. There are the men — as The World at War explains — who simply like to hear the tinkle of shattered glass. But there are the rest of us who feel entranced by the enormity of warfare, of cross-continental violence and machines built to shape the earth on grand scales and take more life than you can conceptualize existing. At over 26 hours of footage and context, The World at War uses its scope to introduce the barest beginnings of the humanity behind the victims of war. It’s not real; it’s not actually dangerous. But it’s a start.