Review of Dunkirk (2017) by V H — 11 Sep 2017

It's 1940 and WWII is raging. The Germans have forced thousands of French and British troops into the port city of Dunkirk, France, with nowhere left to run but the sea. The white cliffs of Dover are right across the Channel, so close and yet so far. The men queue up on the beaches hoping to be rescued, all the while being strafed by German warplanes.

"Dunkirk" is told from three different vantage points. One story focuses on a young British soldier who's the sole survivor of his platoon and is trying his darndest to go home. The second is about British fighter pilots trying to shoot down German planes while avoiding getting shot down by the German fighter pilots. The third is about an old British guy sailing his yacht to Dunkirk to help rescue people along with his son and some other kid.

There's precious little dialog in this movie, especially in the fighter pilot scenes where there's little more than an occasional radio transmission asking how much fuel someone has left. Spoiler alert: not enough. I found these scenes to be really monotonous, sort of a cross between Snoopy pretending his doghouse is the Sopwith Camel and the Chicago Air Show.

The yacht story isn't all that interesting either, but at least there's a little more talking. Unfortunately, it's mostly along the lines of "Look, Dad! Planes!".

The story about the young soldier at least gives us someone to root for. The soldier (if he had a name, I never caught it) and the rest of his young cohorts spend most of the movie actively trying not to die as they frantically swim hither and yon trying to escape vessels that have been or are in the process of being bombed, torpedoed, or shot at.

The most popular way to almost die in Dunkirk is by almost drowning. There are at least three different scenes with men trapped under water trying desperately to escape. I am probably not alone here, but my fear of being trapped in a water-filled car is so strong that for years I carried a box-cutter in the glove compartment, lest I drive off a bridge and the car sinks before I can manage to push open the ragtop. Which is to say, my feelings about scenes of men trapped under water trying desperately to escape are definitely NOT the more the merrier.

When not almost drowning, the most popular leisure-time activity is drinking cups of tea, which is often accompanied by open-faced jelly sandwiches served by smiling women. Tea and jelly sandwiches apparently help the men keep up their strength for their next near-death experience, which is always right around the corner.

I'll admit that I'm not a huge fan of war movies to begin with, but some of them at least manage to tell a compelling story, rather than just blasting you with explosions and plane crashes and men leaping off sinking ships and thrashing thru flaming waters in search of a nice soothing cup of tea. I get that war is hell and the evacuation of Dunkirk was a real event, but that unnamed solder had to have been either the luckiest guy or the unluckiest guy alive for all of his narrow escapes.

If you're a fan of insistent soundtracks, special effects, and watching people hold their breath for a really long time, you'll probably enjoy this movie. As you might have guessed, it was not my cup of tea.