Gotta Watch This One More Than Once

Rating: 9/10 (4 February 2018)

I remember the first time I watched this movie. It was confusing, played very loudly in the theater and I could barely remember the characters after the credits rolled. I did enjoy the scenes with the spitfires, including the second to last shot of Hardy in front of his burning plane. So overall I was pleased with the aesthetic of the movie but I was not interested in the narrative and I felt there was a void where I wanted there to be connection to the characters. Those were my original thoughts on the movie.
And then I watched it again on Blu-Ray.
Completely different experience watching Dunkirk for the second time. What was confusing upon my first viewing materialized into a harmonious narrative. The way Nolan weaves the three different timelines in the movie can be confusing on your first viewing and I don't think I figured out what was going on until halfway through the movie. Upon the second viewing I already knew what was going on and I was able to make a lot more sense out of the structure and I have decided it is absolutely genius. The way that the three narratives cross each others paths is so seamless. The way that music swelled and ebbed was epic. Not only was I mind-blown by the editing of the film but the second viewing revealed the connection to the characters that I had missed the first time.
There is no hero in this movie. There are many heroes and several people who make mistakes under the pressure. Because you don't follow the progression of just one character, the importance of the sacrifices and decisions made by each character are multiplied. By viewing this a second time I found it easier to follow the pathways of each character and reflect on their character arcs. The genius of this film lies in its ability to tell many stories at once.. If you watch this film and pay attention to a single character and watch their every move, you will see what I am talking about. Every character had an equal part in telling the story (not the extras obviously).
This approach to telling a war story is entirely unique as far as I know and it genuinely made me feel as though I had just witnessed the evacuation of Dunkirk from a birds eye point of view. The movie gives you a mixed bag of emotions because some of the sacrifices made by the characters are hard to wrap your head around. Usually in a war movie every character dies in a cinematic way fighting evil until their last breath but in Dunkirk, sometimes characters die in a way no one would be proud of. I think this is a more realistic view on the story than I have come to expect from this genre and it is very thought provoking. The side of war that is often left out of war movies is the indecisive nature of it. No one in this movie had "plot armor" and Nolan used that uncertainty to give me an authentic experience.
To anyone disappointed upon their first viewing, watch it again and pay attention.
To anyone who has not seen this movie, watch it two times.