Directed by Sam Mendes

Written by Sam Mendes and Krysty Wilson-Cairns

Starring Dean-Charles Chapman, George MacKay

1917 might be the most conflicting movie going experience for me since Ready Player One. For a lot of it I was uninterested, almost 100% of the time I was aware I was watching a movie (not a good thing). Its prowess at convincing the audience that the whole thing is shot in one single (almost) unbroken shot is the movie’s greatest technical achievement, is also its greatest weakness, and also its greatest failure. Like The Revenant, the filmmakers are so busy showing us how great they can shoot a movie, that they almost forget to tell a compelling one. I’ll try to explain the almost part of that by the end of this. Forget being taken out of a movie, I’m not sure I was ever even IN this one (till later on anyway).

From the opening shot the movie moves slow, far too slow, and bores as it follows two men on quick and urgent orders to deliver a message. They must cross the German front on foot, and tell the commanding officer leading 1600 to call off an attack that they have now been informed will be an ambush by the Germans. I realized immediately what kind of movie I was getting, and though I was not mad I could not be less invested. There’s a lot of tracking camera movements following our two British protagonists through the trenches. In the trenches. Out the trenches. And in some tunnels and fields. It’s not great cinema, despite the GOD Deakin’s lighting and heavy hitter Sam Mendes directing. I think they washed out the colors too, gave it an undersaturated look like Saving Private Ryan. The white dusky faces in some scenes appear ghostly. This was probably the point.

The two men are Blake and Schofield. Blake’s brother is among the 1600 men who will be sent into the German’s trap if they don’t get there in time. He has a stake in this. So there is a time crunch, but with the movie’s pacing you wouldn’t know it. This could have been done with the one shot take movie, but not here. It goes on and on, and you start to wonder if they don’t have all week to get where they’re going. This is the first half. I was ready to call it a day, I was sure I didn’t like this movie at all and was ready to condemn any and all who recommended it. But you know, there’s a twist that happens before the second half hits. And I dunno, even with the poor pacing I thought wow I didn’t see that coming. It would be an ingenious stroke to save any movie, although at this moment it did not save this one.

So what am I yammering on about being conflicted then? It’ll come at the point of an exchange of gunshots, then a hard cut to black. Then some water drops. Soon, a building on fire. The movie has decided on a definitive stopping point of the one take before it resets. From here on out the flaws are still there but the movie works a lot better. A neat chase, with a sudden leap and crash into water. Again, all these technical moments of filmmaking would be great in a better film. The journey and lighting and movement do all improve, and finally I did care a little about the outcome. The one take shots are smoother and much more effective towards the very end, and yes, the elements that took for fucking ever to be established early on do pay off. The reappearance of blossoms, oh my fucking god what was a moment so fucking powerful doing in this boring mess? A hint of why they found milk earlier. And, without spoiling anything, the discovery that has to do with a song. I’m in awe, it was magical, in THIS FUCKING MOVIE I ALMOST GAVE UP ON.

Here is yet another movie people might walk out on. I had a dozen others in my screening, 4 left at one of the best scenes in the whole film. I don’t know what you should take away from that, except maybe that if you don’t make it past the halfway point you will probably want to leave. It’s just not as compelling as it should be for so long. Dunkirk was also a movie about a time crunch to save a group of people (albeit a larger group), but ran at 90 minutes and with Hans Zimmer’s score losing its mind and the creative editing I was on the edge of my seat. It was the best movie I saw in all of 2017. People drew comparisons to that from 1917, maybe because Dunkirk is the more recent great war film we have gotten. 1917, I regret to say does mostly miss the mark.

But those moments! Those few and fleeting scenes and moments that wowed me, even as I was bored to tears. I don’t fucking understand anymore. The two leads, Dean Charles Chapman OH MY GOD HE WAS TOMMEN BARATHEON woighefoghfdjhggdsfgdfgsdfgjln

and George MacKay might have been cast mostly as everymans. Two actors who haven’t been known in a lot yet can convey two ordinary guys stuck somewhere they want to get out of. Except I think the are too ordinary. It’s not their fault, but nothing about them sparks a knockout performance. They do well with what they have, but like the camera, the attention to itself backfires. Andrew Scott (who was Moriarty in Sherlock) shows up early on, and is to the point and effective in what he does. There are a couple A list cameos? I guess I would have to call them that are great because not much is made of them. That is one of the only parts this movie is subtle about.

The music in the first half makes no sense. It’s there, and then it isn’t. It pretends to heighten boring and safe blocking choices with feigned musical cues. It failed at even trying to replicate Hans Zimmer. But later on in the movie it formed a sense of itself, and actually did underscore some of the better moments. Finally it did get memorable.

I don’t know what to tell you about 1917. I can’t tell you to go see it, because most will give up before that halfway point (rightfully so). I can’t tell you to avoid it, on the off chance the whole experience pays off for you, like it kinda maybe did for me a little bit. I don’t hate this movie, but I don’t love it either. I’m bored to hell by it, but also wowed by how it peaks. Others will appreciate its authenticity and recreation of its time period. Before the halfway mark I would have destroyed it, but it’s ending is its redemption. I don’t regret seeing it but I wish more emphasis would have been paid to its pacing. I wish the urgency in its end was present all along. The movie itself almost seems bored at needing to get where it has to go. Like what the fuck?