Why is the camera lens such an insistant presence in this film?

Rating: 10/10 (20 October 2019)

First of all, excellent camera work: impressive immersive long takes, and who knows how they managed to physically move the camera along with the action so cleanly? However, that effort and technical skill was undermined by the amount of lens flare and lens moisture. In river scenes there's water droplets on the camera lens catching the light, in snowing scenes there's specs of snow. At one point, a close up on Leo's breath fogs up the lens. And the lens used is some sort of fish eye lens, making many scenes look unnatural - like you're viewing the events through a camera. Every time this happened it took me out of the film. It made me aware that a camera was being used to capture actors acting. I could imagine a camera man scrabbling around in the snow and the water and the dirt waiting for the scene to end so that he could wipe the lens with his lens cleaning cloth. Maybe the lenses used were particularly good at capturing action, but the downside was the lens flare and walleye vision? Maybe the lens flare was a deliberate choice?
By the middle of the film I was engaged enough in the plot to forget about the camera, but in the last quarter I became aware of the camera/cameraman/film crew/acting again. So I must have enjoyed the middle bit.
Leo's character's surname is Glass and the camera lens is made of glass, and at the end Leo looks into the camera lens. Does that mean something? Is this irony? Are we all made of glass?