National Post (National Edition)
War without character
EFFECTIVE AND MEMORABLE, YET DUNKIRK FAILS TO SATISFY
Mrs. Miniver, the first movie depicting the evacuation of Dunkirk, appeared in 1942, a bit less than two years after the historic event itself. A sentimental story about a brave woman facing the trials of wartime in Britain, it was not at all like Christopher Nolan sharply focused account of Dunkirk now appearing in theatres. Dunkirk in Mrs. Miniver was only an incident, though a major one.
Mrs. Miniver capitalized on the wave of pro-British feeling in the U.S. that followed America’s entry into the war. It became the film of the year, a lavish money-maker for MGM, winning six Academy Awards, including best picture, best female star (Greer Garson) and best director (William Wyler). In Canada, which had soldiers of its own at Dunkirk, it also stirred interest because another star, Walter Pidgeon, came from Saint John, N.B.
Pidgeon played Clem Miniver, husband of the title character, a leader among the 700 brave private owners of “little ships” who were summoned from their beds to help bring back more than 300,000 soldiers marooned on a French beach by Hitler’s sudden advance. I saw the film at the age of 10 and have remembered it ever since.
Those who see the new version written and directed by Nolan will also remember it for a long time. It makes a powerful impression. Nolan marshals actors, photographers and film editors to depict the horror and terror in detail. For two hours we watch trapped soldiers drowning in the hull of ships, German bombers showering death from above and the growth of fear in men as they begin to think they’ll never see home again. We understand what it was like to stand in those lineups on the beach, hour after hour.
For this effectiveness, Nolan sacrifices a great deal. In most cases he avoids telling us anything about his characters that we can’t see for ourselves. Many remain nameless. A great actor, Mark Rylance, gives a stirring performance as Mr. Dawson, one of the boat owners. We learn that a son of his was killed in RAF service — but we learn little else about him.
Consciously avoiding the usual pattern of war movies, Nolan banishes the backstories of his characters, stripping away the narrative baggage that provides colour, meaning and changes of pace in most war films. It’s an interesting experiment but I doubt it will be repeated. The result is a sense of unrelenting bleakness. It seems likely that future filmmakers will revert to the traditional strategy of imbedding a war into more capacious stories involving personal feelings and social attitudes.
In 1941 Howard Hawks made Sergeant York, about Alvin York, a draftee from Tennessee who became a much-decorated hero of the First World War. Hawks depicted trench warfare but concentrated much of the movie on York’s initial reluctance to fight; a Christian, York took literally the religious injunction against killing and had to be persuaded. Gary Cooper’s touching performance left audiences convinced. In 1957, Stanley Kubrick’s classic, Paths of Glory, also about First World War trench warfare, portrays the blind cruelty of the military mind. French soldiers, unfairly accused of cowardice in the face of the enemy, go on trial for their lives. They are defended by their commanding officer (Kirk Douglas), whose humane logic fails to convince the court martial. One judge (Adolphe Menjou) remarks that executions of soldiers usually improve morale.
Patton (1970), Franklin J. Schaffner’s film about Gen. George S. Patton says a great deal about his spontaneous ability as a tank general but even more about his egotistic callousness — as displayed in George C. Scott’s rich performance. In The Deer Hunter (1978) we can learn something about the Vietnam War but Michael Cimino seems more interested in the way it affects people in an industrial town in Pennsylvania, where some of the teenaged boys are waiting anxiously to get into the fight. These and many others demonstrate why war is a rich subject of films when combined with another theme.
Christopher Nolan’s expertise as a director of summer blockbusters drives this Dunkirk forward but never in a way that humanizes the story. The score by Hans Zimmer continues banging overwrought chords into the ears of the audience and by the end feels like a drag on the film rather than the intended source of drama. Dunkirk, the new film, contains a plenitude of great shots and vivid scenes. Sadly, they never manage to turn into a satisfying film.