Dunkirk

[eddie]

Originally Posted by Jimbuna

I rated it up there with the likes of Hacksaw Ridge but couldn't help but laugh at the flack (no pun intended) it attracted around PC.

For the record: My father was there and I still remember many of the stories of his real life experiences.

Must have been some real interesting stories to listen to Jim!

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by eddie

Must have been some real interesting stories to listen to Jim!

They sure were Eddie but nothing like his experiences at Normandy on D-Day.

[Eichhörnchen]

Churchill famously asserted at the time that no war was ever won by evacuation... but he couldn't see ahead to the Bomber Command/US 8th Air Force campaign and subsequent Allied invasion. So would anyone disagree if I say that he got that wrong?

[Aktungbby]

Well of course he couldn't see ahead to the D day invasion...he was still suffering from Post Gallipoli Traumatic Stress: British Empire:
160,790 battle casualties
3,778+ died of disease
90,000 evacuated sick French Empire:
27,169 battle casualties
deaths from disease: unknown
20,000 evacuated sick

Political repercussions in Britain had begun during the battle, Fisher resigned in May after bitter conflict with Churchill. The crisis that followed after the Conservatives learned that Churchill would be staying, forced the Prime Minister H. H. Asquith to end his Liberal Government and form a Coalition Government with the Conservative Party. The Asquith government responded to the disappointment and outrage over Gallipoli and Kut by establishing commissions of inquiry into both episodes, which had done much to "destroy its faltering reputation for competence"..The Dardanelles Commission was set up to investigate the failure of the expedition, the first report being issued in 1917, with the final report published in 1919.Following the failure of the Dardanelles expedition, Sir Ian Hamilton, commander of the MEF, was recalled to London in October 1915, ending his military career.... Churchill was demoted from First Lord of the Admiralty as a condition of Conservative entry to the coalition but remained in the Cabinet in the sinecure of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.Churchill resigned in November 1915 and left London for the Western Front, where he commanded an infantry battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers...

"young Winston"; demoted to Lt Col 6th Service Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers His service went some way to restoring his reputation...and his watercolor painting: Churchill's Departing for the Front set to sell at auction for £250,000 !! And at the front:

[Vietnameserabbe]

Saw it recently. Awesome film, but not just perfect. Really like the air combat scenes, they seems real.

[Aktungbby]

Vietnameserabbe!

[fireftr18]

Just got back from seeing the the movie in Imax. For those not familiar with Imax, it's a much larger screen than regular theater screens. The cinematography was great. The sound was awesome. I could really notice the whine of the Stukas. Skybird, I noticed the ticking watch also. I liked how they took the stories of the one Spitfire pilot, the civilian rescue boat, and the one soldier and tied them together in the end.

[eddie]

Originally Posted by Jimbuna

They sure were Eddie but nothing like his experiences at Normandy on D-Day.

I bet, must have really been something!

[blackswan40]

saw film at local cinema in Darlington being a fan of the Dunkirk black and white epic with john mills wanted to see this one although the new Dunkirk film does not show the retreat to Dunkirk it still keeps you on edge of your seat and catches the right vibe when the squaddies get back home to dear old Blighty they have a sence of shame but to there amazement they are greeted back as hero's and righty so before Dunkirk there was Squadies Brown Jobs Pongo's and Civi's as in Civilians after Dunkirk there was just People you must go and see this film its a gud'un
the Britsh in World war II were as Resolute and as stout as a lion but perhaps
Winston Spencer Churchill gave the Lion its Roar

[Eichhörnchen]

I like what you said there, blackswan40, about after Dunkirk there being "just People". It is indeed the case that this is usually how the British would want to remember that war... as one whole population "in it together" (to use another phrase of the time).

[blackswan40]

you just might have something there Eichhörnchendon't quote me on it but I think we are leaving Europe once again
Onkel Trumps Guna give us a Cracking trade deal on spam & powdered eggs ho happy days everythings tickety-boo and we will be sitting spiffy once the deal is done

[Skybird]

Saw it today on Blueray, they had in Saturn stores, apparently seven days early.

Strange. It left me completely cold. I had other, higher expectationsa, something more intense on the emotional level. This movie to me was almost lifeless, and desinterested in its own content. I had read good reviews, I wonder where they come from. The air combat scenes are nicely filmed, but then: nothing spectacular, just beautiful in a calm way: the colours of sea and sky, the flow of the air. The actors left me completely unconnected to them. The pressure these British osldiers should have felt, was not transported at all by the movie, the threat by the invisible Germans tightenign their grip around Dunkirk was nowhere to be felt as well. The only moment the film connected to me, were the first 120 seconds: the group of men exploring that street and then coming under fire, and I thought Hoppla! After these initial 2 minutes, the movie waved me goodbye for the remaining 140 minutes.

Emotionally completely unimpressed, and disappointed, I must admit. I rate it a "D" (4: ausreichend). The by far worst movie I have seen by Nolan so far. The most overhyped movie of this season, imo. Its an empty hull.

Interstellar and Batman are a completely different league of movie-making.

P.S. And a very major flaw, imo: the movie nowhere lets you get the impression of even close to 400 thousand men desperately hunkering down and waiting at Dunkirk. The "mass scenes" of the waiting men in long columns at the beach gave me the feeling of a theatre stage scene with a very limited cast. There might have been more actors on scene, but this is what the scene felt like: like a theatre stage play with a very small cast. Something went terribly wrong with the mise-en-scene there, imo. Nolan succeeded with the very questionable "trick" of letting maybe a thousand people appear as if they were only a dozen or so. And that is a flaw by the director then.

If this really would have been what happened at Dunkirk, then I would rate it as a very minor episode in the war. And that it certainly was not. Nolan missed the objective there. Completely.

P.P.S.
Another flawed concept that got a lot of writin g about it, the mixing of three different time scales: one week from the perspective of those on the beach, one day from the perpsetcive of those on the small boats, one hour from the perspective of the pilot. It simply does not ignite, the fuse does not work. It all feels like one dull day on the beach, narrated in a 1,5 hour film. That Nolan thought the 7 days-1 day-1 hour thing must even be mentioned in writing at the beginning of the film maybe illustrates how helpless he was, after having gotten the idea, in implementing it properly.

[bertieck476]

I agree with you, I watched dunkirk recently and although the cinematography is superb I was left feeling completely unmoved by it. The sense of scale of the whole massive operation is completely missing.
I sail on the east coast and often see dunkirk little ships still going strong, the film does not do justice to what they help achieve.
This review puts how I felt much better.

https://www.theguardian.com/film/fil...k-left-me-cold