By Emilio Frenk.
Director: Christopher Nolan
Cast: Fionn Whitehead, Damien Bonnard, James Bloor, Barry Keoghan, Mark Rylance, Jack Lowden, Tom Hardy, James D´Arcy, Kenneth Branagh and Cillian Murphy.
Rating: Excellent.
Christopher Nolan, one of the most talented contemporary filmmakers brings “Dunkirk” and again he delivers.
Set in World War II, the movie takes place in the island of Dunkirk in France and tells the story of 400,000 allied soldiers from The British Empire, France and Belgium that are surrounded by the German Army.
This is the story of how the soldiers survived the battle, how they suffered to evacuate the island and went back to their respective countries.
One of the things that made “Dunkirk” a very interesting movie was the fact that the whole movie was told by the Alliance (British Army, France and Belgium) Point of View.
Nolan was very smart on illustrating that point of view and we don´t see the German army in this film. In most of this type of movies we always see the Germans and this time I felt that Nolan made the right choice on not doing so, making "Dunkirk" a unique film.
On the other hand this might be Nolan´s most weakest movie in terms of storytelling but still delivered crafted a brilliant screenplay that went straight to the facts and showed you the suffering of the soldiers and what they were going through when they were in Dunkirk.
Other elements that made this movie special was the fact that it didn´t had the classical cheezy moments that this type of movies had of the soldiers want to go home and celebrate Christmas with their families. This has been a tendency in war movies lately and here it was not the case. Again the only thing you see and feel is for the soldiers figuring out how to survive.
Nolan brought again with “Dunkirk” an impressive and brilliant visual experience. Besides being a filmmaker who cares about production value, Nolan also cares about story and he is considered not only one of the best directors but screenwriters as well.
The cinematography by Hoyt Van Hothema, who worked with Nolan in 2014´s "Interstellar" captured a brilliant film with his cinematography and played with the contrasts of the characters in a brilliant way.
Once again Hanz Zimmer´s score is magnificent and with his music knew how to create tension in most of the scenes and at the end of the film as well.
Like I mentioned before, this might be not his strongest screenplay but still it´s straight forward, the characters he created are brilliant, real and the performances he got from the cast were top of the nudge.
I believe that “Dunkirk” is a serious contender for next awards season and I believe that is a movie that will represent a landmark in cinema.
Every time I see a Christopher Nolan film I learn something new and is a blessing seeing one of his films in the big screen and with “Dunkirk” my expectations were totally fulfilled.
“Dunkirk” is one the year´s best films and I highly recommend it. If you like Christopher Nolan´s work you are not going to be disappointed with this film which I consider a masterpiece and hopefully you´ll feel the same way.