Warfare

Warfare is an unflinching look at one platoon's experience that frustrated me immensely.

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Scott's Self-Indulgent Movie Podcast · Episode 991: Warfare

One of the biggest conflicts you'll see between filmmakers and audiences, including reviewers, is the conflict between the movie the audience wanted vs. the movie they got. In my opinion, it all comes down to expectations. If you come into a movie having heard it's the best movie in years, it's hard for any film to match that. And sometimes the frustration stems from creative choices like the cinematography, the actors, or the tone. Now for the second time is as many years, a film from filmmaker Alex Garland has frustrated me not with what's on screen, but with what's been left out.

The Setup

The film takes place in Iraqi in 2006 in the aftermath of the Battle of Ramdi. Following a Navy SEAL platoon that Mendonza served with, the film follows an Alpha One operation from start to finish in real time as they aim to provide sniper cover for a Marines operation. But the simple observation operation quickly turns hellish as the platoon goes from providing support to needing medical attention and rescue.

I'm going to have to talk about this movie in two stages, the why of which will become readily apparent. Because in term of its obvious/stated goal, to portray a small group's experience in the Iraq war through the lens of a single conflict, Warfare does a superb job.

Something a lot of movies about the United States' recent wars in the Middle East have failed to capture is what the average soldier's experience is like. Almost all of the emphasis tends to be on pitched firefights that all look and feel bigger than the actual conflict may have been. So to see a movie that stews in tension and near-silence for over a third of the movie as this team tries to track potential threats, make a light joke her or there, or just write down and convey information certainly stands out.

It also makes the eventual break in that silence stand out as the conflict literally and figuratively explodes. 

Once it does, the film does a great job of capturing the chaotic nature of war, especially in an urban setting, as the platoon is under siege and begins taking fire, and the soldiers do their best to tend to their wounded who are, suitably upsettingly, in utter agony from non-lethal but still horrific wounds.

The goal is the make the audience feel like they are in combat. Hence why we don't have a score. Hence why there aren't sweeping moments of heroism. And that is why our soldiers and the audience basically don't see the people they're shooting at. Every "good" moment is a soldier suppoting another soldier to gather equipment or to get them into cover or fudging orders to ensure that their rescued before they bleed out.

All of which takes place in and around a single house that's been occupied by this platoon, which both keeps the budget and scope down so we can a feel for the personalities and see how they handle this life or death situation. 

The end result is a movie that has been singled out by Iraq war veterans as being one of the most accurate portrayals of the war, at least the from American soldier's perspective. So if you come out of the film with a greater appreciation for anyone who's been wounded in action or served the military in combat and want to provide emotional, financial and medical support to men and women like these moving forward, or want to avoid throwing brave men like these into conflicts without a good reason I think that's admirable.

What I find frustrating is everything this movie seems to take for granted or isn't interested in interrogating. 

One thing I've personally observed is that the men and women who serve in the United States armed forces tend to leave the service with one of two outlooks. The first are people who develop a strong bond and connection to the United States military and usually take defensive stances towards U.S. military actions. The scond are those that leave the service disenchanted, either with the military, the conflict they served in, or simply being a soldier.

And based on this film and his previous filmmaking experience, Alex Garland's co-writer and director Ray Mendonza falls into the first category. Because while Mendonza doesn't have an extensive film background he's served primarily as...a military consultant for feature films including Garland's own Civil War last year and at least two movies about the war in Afghanistan (neither of which are anti-war or anti-military).

Which begs the question? How does this appear on film? In the assumptions it wants the audience to make and/or not question by focusing solely on the soldier's experience.

The movie's early third is a very good example. After a brief moment of our soldiers bonding watching a music video we cut to the soldiers taking a house to serve as their lookout position. Where a family lives. The family is clearly terrified, but the soldiers insist that they aren't there to hurt them via translators. Keep them in mind.

From there we hard cut to the morning where our sniper team are looking at a market where they track activity from MAMs or military aged males through a sniper scope. Is this an accurate portrayal of the soldier's mission? To look for and supress any potentially anti-US military activity in the midst of a larger conflcit? Yes it is.

Is it also supremely f***ed-up to dehumanize Iraqi men without names down to military aged males and essentially use the entire front end of the movie to increase and confirm these men's suspcions about these men? I'd argue yes. That's the issue with embracing a soldier's mindset whole heartedly. By function and sympathy, you also strip the people they are fighting of their humanity.

It's also not within this movie to critque the Iraq War even happening. Which again, I understand. One of the reasons American audiences flocked to the awful American Sniper versus any other more grounded or impactful Iraq or Afghanistan war movies is because Sniper (while being full of lies) gives the audience a clean good guy vs. bad guys setup within the Iraq war and makes the war, that most of the American public now agrees was a bad idea, feel like it had a purpose. It wasn't just a waste of lives and resources. We sent this hero to go kill bad men.

Warfare is a little bit better because the lion's share of the movie is this team being on the defensive and trying to get out with their lives. They take fire. Get some wounds and try to leave. Then they take on something worse and they've got to get more help to get their even more wounded soldiers and friends out alive. The goal isn't to kill the enemy. The goal is to survive. So whoever is shooting at them is keeping these guys from getting home safe.

The movie also doesn't show insurgent fighters dying en masse, if any of them do it is muted and away from camera, so it's doesn't seem to revel in the combat or in taking out the enemy like other military movies do.

The biggest example of this is when the operating leader asks nearby tanks to fire on the nearby buildings...including the one they're in....where the family we mentioned before lives.

Did you remember the family that lives in this house from a bit ago? Because the movie sure doesn't. While the movie sporadically checks in on the family that lives in this house, they are not equal partners in this experience. Because as soon as a soldier gets wounded and begins holwing in pain, we're sticking with him. Versus the young children more or less being held hostage by our military in their own home as gunfire and explosions go off around them.

This is actually the movie's most telling element to me because I don't think Mendonza or Garland are entirely unsympathetic to this family. Hell Mendonza met them (he's a character being portrayed in this film). But even with this family within feet of them, the primary focus for these soldiers is each other, not the civilians they were allegedly sent there to help. 

Which means they'll call in a "show of force" from American fighter jets to distract their enemy without thinking about what those jets can mean for the family or what housing American soldiers could mean for them in the future (regardless of whether it was by choice). 

Unintentionally, Warfare does a great job of demonstrating why "nation-building" through military force does not work. Because your efforts to get rid of the "bad guys" will inevitably destroy the homes, lives and minds of the people you're allegedly hoping to save. 

I want to make one thing abundantly clear. I have empathy and sympathy for everyone portrayed in this movie. War is always hell and being directly invovled in combat or having combat happen to you is always horrific. 

It is extremely telling to me that after making a movie many criticized for adbicating a prime opportunity for political commentary in Civil War, and after saying he was done making movies, Alex Garland made a movie embedded with the militiary and takes what the military outlook towards it at face value.

The problem with Warfare is that in it's efforts to portray combat "accurately" it automatically negates asking bigger questions like "why?" Why were these men sent to fight? Were their sacrifices worth it? What happened to the family that had war brought to their doorstep? What did everyone involved get back from all of this blood and treasure?

Right about now is usually when writer's like myself invokve the Trouffaut quote about war movies. About how all war-movies end up celebrating war in some way. But I actually don't think that applies here. Because my takeaway from all of this was...what a waste. However, I didn't get that from the movie. I got that from what I brought to the movie. In watching the lead-up to the Iraq war and its crushing aftermath both in Iraq, America and beyond. And that's where Warfare falls short for me. 

The one thought I kept thinking of, over and over again, as I watched Warfare was, we shouldn't be there. And apparently Mendonza and Garland didn't ask themselves that question.