Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)

[transmogrifier]

[transmogrifier]

64/100

Pros: Interesting structure, lean and direct, tense set pieces, great aerial photography, I liked the lack of backstory and typical character beats.

Cons: incessant fucking score that just won't shut up, raggedy editing in parts, last five minutes seems to be transported in from a Tom Hooper version of this story, cross-cutting starts to become a crutch, extending simple situations far longer than they need to be (e.g. escaping the plane), the last act when the three parts of the story combine is quite awkwardly constructed (did we really need to see the same ship sink three times?)

In sum: good but flawed. Basically every Nolan film except Memento (all good) and Batman Begins (all flaws). One of the best war films ever made? Come on now.

Ranking:

1. Memento (80)
2. Inception (69)
3. Dunkirk (64)
4. The Dark Knight Rises (64)
5. Insomnia (63)
6. The Prestige (63)
7. Interstellar (57)
8. The Dark Knight (55)
9. Batman Begins (51)

[TGM]

I'm gonna be the contrarian and say that seeing this in a large screen format isn't exactly a necessity. If anything, if you absolutely must see this in IMAX, then do so for the sound design and the score, two of Nolan's trademarks that are on full throttle in this film. In addition to those, the editing is certainly a Nolan trait that really signifies this as one of his films, and yeah, it's pretty good. I wouldn't go so far as to call it the "best war film ever", as I'm seeing people claim it to be. And my biggest issues with it pertained to "The Mole" portion of the story, mostly in regards to the fact that every single character looks exactly the same as one another, so I never knew who I was watching on screen the majority of the time in this section. It's not helped at all by the fact that anyone barely has any opportunity to have much character to at least call attention to them and make them stand apart from one another, so yeah, for that reason, those sections grew to be the most tedious to get through, particularly as we got closer to the end and they blended together more and more.

Similarly tedious as the film progressed was the editing decisions, particularly as the three sections started to intertwine more and more near the end. I had a similar feeling when this was happening as I did during Memento the first time around, where it felt like gimmicky editing for the sake of it. I would presume the idea here is to give the audience a similar sense of disorientation as the characters on screen, but it honestly just killed some of the tension for me. Not a huge issue, but an issue nontheless that persisted as mildly distracting.

The other two segments were spectacular, however, and any character issues I might've had with that third segment are totally a non-factor in these. The aerial sections in particular were probably the strongest parts to this thing, simply breathtaking at times.

All in all, I would say that this is probably middle-road Nolan. Not great, but far from anything I'd consider bad, so nowhere close to Dark Knight Rises territory.

[Pop Trash]

The Dark Knight Rises (64)
The Dark Knight (55)

lol wut?

[TGM]

Interstellar
The Dark Knight
Inception
The Prestige
Batman Begins
Memento
Dunkirk
Following
Insomnia
The Dark Knight Rises

(Memento and Dunkirk are currently a bit of a toss-up for me. I'd have to give Dunkirk more time to settle to be certain, really.)

[transmogrifier]

lol wut?

The Dark Knight is tedious, especially the last act. The Dark Knight Rises is a messy grab-bag of interesting ideas so you don't know what is coming next. I prefer the latter.

[Pop Trash]

The Dark Knight is tedious, especially the last act. The Dark Knight Rises is a messy grab-bag of interesting ideas so you don't know what is coming next. I prefer the latter.

That's a big opinion.

[transmogrifier]

That's a big opinion.

I've made my peace with not seeing The Dark Knight as some type of staggering masterpiece as some other claim; to me it's kinda stolid, square, dull, and inelegant in its technical details. Acting is good, and the plot is fine, except for the terrible use of Two-Face.

[Pop Trash]

I've made my peace with not seeing The Dark Knight as some type of staggering masterpiece as some other claim; to me it's kinda stolid, square, dull, and inelegant in its technical details. Acting is good, and the plot is fine, except for the terrible use of Two-Face.

For you.

[Scar]

I'm with trans in rating Rises higher. Of course, I :heart: Bane.


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[Skitch]

They're about even for me.

[Dukefrukem]

It's hard to argue against the Dark Knight's flaws towards the third act. The stuff with the boat and Dent feels so cluttered (and Goyer) that it takes away the beats of the previews two acts. For me, it's not enough to ruin the movie. But I can see for others how it's hard to jump on board.

[Ezee E]

I'm glad I stayed away from reviews on this as I'm loving the way this story was told with the three different timelines. Even with the titles, it took me a moment to figure that out.

I should probably raise my score, but looking forward to hearing what others think about it on here.

A little overbearing on the score, but a straightforward approach to the approach kept me on edge through the whole movie. It may also be the best use of aerial dogfighting that I can even think of. If anything, some of the tense scenes were a bit repetitive with three different scenes of near-drowning, and bullets coming through thew wall or steel.

Saw this on TRUE IMAX, 70 MM. Awesome.

[transmogrifier]

I'm glad I stayed away from reviews on this as I'm loving the way this story was told with the three different timelines. Even with the titles, it took me a moment to figure that out.

I should probably raise my score, but looking forward to hearing what others think about it on here.

A little overbearing on the score, but a straightforward approach to the approach kept me on edge through the whole movie. It may also be the best use of aerial dogfighting that I can even think of. If anything, some of the tense scenes were a bit repetitive with three different scenes of near-drowning, and bullets coming through thew wall or steel.

Saw this on TRUE IMAX, 70 MM. Awesome.

My two biggest problems with the structure are [

Show Spoiler

(1) the Mole section never feels like a week - it misses out on that unique mix of danger and boredom by compressing everything so it feels like two days at most, and (2) the section from when the ship is refloated until Rylance starts taking on survivors (which is designed as the climax) is a mess, with the same ship showing getting bombed three times for no real reason except to add artificial incoherence.

]

[Weems]

There's no story. I don't know what the point of this movie is. 1/10

[Peng]

Nolan at his most precise, with a story perfectly calibrated to his strengths and another ambitious structural gambit. I need to see it again though to see if the emotions, already built into this survival tale, will register more along with the awe. Will just say now that I seem to prefer Nolan when he tackles something with ambition almost, or a bit, out of his reach, so that he inevitably needs to wring more naked, productively messy emotions more out of his premise (ending Batman's legacy on a big-scale scope in TDKR; finding deep-rooted emotions in Inception's multiple layers; throwing himself fully into sentimentality to ground the vastness of Interstellar).

Still a great flip side of Saving Private Ryan's opening scene; whereas SPR throws viewers right in the middle of a concentrated, bloody, chaotic war zone, Dunkirk's time-lapse structure puts us in the temporally disoriented minds of those waiting and struggling for ways out of battle. High-alert intensity seem to make events bleed into one another. Days pass by in what seem like minutes, and vice versa. New faces gone instantly, or familiar, can't-quite-place-it ones bob into view. And we are able to register the events more than in one or two instincts -- with questions about legacy and one's moral self -- only afterwards. 8.5/10

[Peng]

Ranking (TDKR and The Prestige do need a rewatch though):

1. The Dark Knight
2. Memento
3. Interstellar
4. The Dark Knight Rises
5. Inception
6. Dunkirk
7. Batman Begins
8. Insomnia
9. The Prestige
10. Following

[Weems]

For me:

1. The Dark Knight
2. Interstellar
3. The Prestige / Inception
5. Insomnia
6. Batman Begins
7. Memento
8. The Dark Knight Rises / Dunkirk

[Ivan Drago]

This was so incredibly captivating in every aspect of its visuals and score that I forgot it had a non-linear structure until halfway through. It's a little challenging to follow for that reason, and the sound mixing has the same issues as it did in Interstellar, primarily when the film follows Tom Hardy's character up in the air. But despite that, Christopher Nolan improved himself as a director with this film by telling the story of the Dunkirk evacuation in World War II through the visual performances of his actors, career-best cinematography from Hoyte van Hoytema, and a tense score that accompanies the film from beginning to end. It also stands out in the war genre through its lack of gore, visual storytelling and portraying just enough of every horror of war without getting too preachy. Overall, Dunkirk is a film that’s certainly worth talking about in the awards conversation, is without question the most visually breathtaking film of the year so far, and one that needs to be seen on the biggest screen possible.

[Morris Schæffer]

30 min. To go. Biggest imax in Europe. I'm ready!

[Skitch]

1/10

In a world where The Asylum exists, this seems excessive.

[Morris Schæffer]

The sensory overload was almost too much at times with my seat literally vibrating during explosive moments. That said, I think this is a remarkable experience, not a flawless one, but as remarkable as one could ever hope to experience during any movie summer. I'm not sure I applaud its decision to shy away from the true horrors of war, instead opting to make water the true enemy here. It's a little odd speaking of the miracle of Dunkirk since I didn't feel it was as tense or soaked in desperation as I had expected. Hardy shoots down a few planes and that's basically it, Stukas sound terrifying when they swoop down, but do not seem to dole out quite as much pain and suffering. But I suppose the real heroes here are the regular joes who get in their pleasure yachts and come to the rescue. It's no coincidence that the biggest death in the movie [

Show Spoiler

is the kid who tags along with Rylance and his son

] although his demise is kinda odd. I wonder if that's really how it went down. Still, they're responsible for the miracle of Dunkirk I guess and the tagline makes this quite obvious when it states that 'home came for them.'

There's one tracking shot at the end of Farrier's Spitfire flying along the Dunkirk coast that is breathtaking, just stunningly beautiful. Perhaps I wouldn't have minded a slightly more epic runtime with a bit more meat on its bones either although I understand Nolan went for a sort of almost real-time countdown movie. It seems a bunch of movies inspired him to make Dunkirk and two of them are Speed and Tony Scott's Unstoppable.

[Morris Schæffer]

This was so incredibly captivating in every aspect of its visuals and score that I forgot it had a non-linear structure until halfway through. It's a little challenging to follow for that reason, and the sound mixing has the same issues as it did in Interstellar, primarily when the film follows Tom Hardy's character up in the air. But despite that, Christopher Nolan improved himself as a director with this film by telling the story of the Dunkirk evacuation in World War II through the visual performances of his actors, career-best cinematography from Hoyte van Hoytema, and a tense score that accompanies the film from beginning to end. It also stands out in the war genre through its lack of gore, visual storytelling and portraying just enough of every horror of war without getting too preachy. Overall, Dunkirk is a film that’s certainly worth talking about in the awards conversation, is without question the most visually breathtaking film of the year so far, and one that needs to be seen on the biggest screen possible.

What this guy says is kinda what I felt also, the noise levels were way the fuck up there.

In the cinema where I watched writer/director Christopher Nolan’s breathtakingly intense new film, the WWII action-drama Dunkirk, the sound was loud. I mean, loud. Utterly, staggeringly, face-meltingly loud. At one point, as Nolan whooshed planes above his characters’ heads for the nth-hundredth time, I wondered whether it might be unrealistically noisy: that is, whether war in real life was actually significantly quieter than the bone-perforating clamour blasting out of the speakers.

[Wryan]

Wasn't deafening at my IMAX; felt appropriately tuned.

This was quite tense--a solid, stately movie. I don't think the chopped stories benefited the movie that much except in the case where the pilot "waves" from his downed plane and we later realize why. That was a nice touch. Having seen the movie, I'm glad it wasn't longer, actually. It tells a nicely contained series of beats about a difficult moment. Had something of Fury Road to it in its headlong rush of narrative, minimal dialogue and pounding score. I'm pretty sure I only caught about 80% of the mumbly accented dialogue, tho.

Thought it was quite worth seeing in IMAX. Some of those enormous aerial vistas were breathtaking.

[Ezee E]

My IMAX sound can be blamed on the theater and not the movie. When they showed the preview for mother!, I couldn't even hear a word.