1917 – a war movie focused more on the heart than the violence

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A war movie is just not about large armies, heavy artilleries, gunfire, killing, violence etc. It’s also about pride, honor, respect, discipline, heroics, friendships, bondings and many more humane emotions and virtues. 1917 is one such war movie that focuses more on the later part and showcases a dreamy sequence amidst the war.

1917 is an ode by writer, director, producer Sam Mendes to his grandfather, Alfred Mendes who was a messenger for the British on the Western Front. It’s a story of two young soldiers William “Will” Schofield (George Mackay) and Thomas “Tom” Blake (Dean Charles Chapman) who have been given an important task to carry a message to the Second Battalion of the Devonshire Regiment, calling off a scheduled attack that would jeopardise the lives of 1600 men, including Tom’s brother.

It’s a movie of an extraordinary triumph of an ordinary human being against all the odds. You will give full marks to the writer Sam Mendes for this but the director Sam Mendes could have given the movie more heights for sure. Though you will find some bursts of brilliance time to time but mostly the direction seems a bit loose. A few parts are unnecessarily dragged and you tend to loose interest in the story. Many threads have not been tightened and hence do not come up as realistic and you start doubting the importance of luck and chance at many instances. Sometimes when you are the all in all of a movie it becomes difficult to see the shortcomings and the movie must not be judged on these parameters.

The movie must be praised with full hearts for its technical department, especially the team behind all the camera work deserves all the accolades. The cinematography and the visual effects are simply outstanding.

The entire sequence from the scene where Schofield gains consciousness, meets the french lady, runs from the soldiers, dives(what a dive it was!) into the river, drops down from a waterfall, floats in the river, finds himself amongst several dead bodies, follows a soulful sound, sits and listens to the song with several other soldiers, runs against all the obstacle to deliver the message to stop the war, finds Tom’s brother and passes the news of his demise and then feels relieved of the burden that he was carrying since so long and sits below a tree looking at the vast emptiness ahead of him is just Perfect. The entire movie crew must be on their toes to present such a perfect journey on the screen.

The performances in the movie is par excellence. It’s just not the main leads but the supporting actors have made their small presences even for a few lines count.

All in all, no doubt an enticing storytelling but still falls short of greatness. Why? Will be inappropriate to do the postmortem.