A (too) quiet tale from WWII

Rating: 6/10 (7 August 2017)

To cut to the chase, this movie is entirely forgettable. I feel that there's a huge bias towards loving Nolan's films among critics, as he's deemed the best of the best, and as such, reviewers will, subconsciously maybe, adapt their opinions to suit this fact. It has happened before: Which movie was best, The Dark knight, or the Dark knight Rises? Correct, The Dark Knight. Yet, when TDKR arrived, it was so hyped that an explosion of unfounded positive reviews spewed everywhere. It was definitely a good movie. But it was also NOT near as good as The Dark knight, a fact most have come to realize in the following years.
I have loved basically all of Nolan's movies. This time though, a yawn too many escaped my mouth, and not from a lack of sleep. The movie has great acting, although it is quite simple to be fair. Not a lot of emotion or character development is present, so it would be hard to judge talent based on performances of this film. The thing that keeps the movie fairly enjoyable is it's awesome visuals and musical scores. You are not in doubt you are watching a Nolan film; the editing, lighting, and audio track is an art in itself.
Unfortunately, these positive aspects are not able to compensate for the almost complete lack of storytelling and excitement throughout the movie. The brief scenes of suspense and action are quickly watered out by long sections of mundane actions by the characters. There is no palpable red line throughout, keeping the baseline interest in the movie at quite a low level. No real story is told, it's more of a depiction of a historical event.
I believe the creation of this movie is an attempt to show how young, inexperienced, and human the soldiers of WWII really were. It wants to portray bravery and weakness of civilians and soldiers alike. It does succeed, but if only the movie was not so dull in doing so. Most of Nolan's movies I've watched at least two times, but I don't think I will revisit this one.
People have compared this film to Saving Private Ryan and other WWII all-time greats, which in my mind is utter crazy talk. Watch Dunkirk and Saving Private Ryan back to back, and if you still hold the same opinion, I promise you we will never agree on anything. This movie's IMDb score, along with the Dark Knight Rises', are, in my opinion, inflated to proportions that do not match their quality.