1917

One mission, two soldiers, barely any time. 1917 distills World War I down to a single task that can be explained in one sentence: The young British soldiers Blake and Schofield are tasked with delivering a message to another battalion to stop a planned attack. Otherwise, some 1,600 men could walk into a trap. Among them is Blake’s brother. For a moment, the war becomes manageable. Not winning, not understanding, not even acting particularly heroically. A message must get from one place to another. The problem is everything in between.

Blake and Schofield must leave their own position, cross no man’s land, and advance into an area from which the German troops appear to have withdrawn. Even these first steps change the scale of the film. What looks like a straight line on a map actually consists of trenches, mud, barbed wire, craters, and abandoned positions. Each section has its own obstacles, and it’s hard to tell what lies behind the next earthen embankment.

1917 stays with its two soldiers almost without interruption. The camera moves with them through the landscape, follows them through trenches and buildings, does not rush ahead, and rarely looks back. The long, interconnected takes create the impression of nearly continuous movement. This is far more than a technical effect. In doing so, the film denies its characters something that is normally taken for granted in cinema: time between two scenes. There is hardly any reassuring “afterward.”

When Blake and Schofield have made it through a dangerous stretch, there is no cut showing them already at the next location. They have to cover the entire distance to get there. Climb a ladder. Cross a trench. Walk through mud. Scale a fence. The distance itself becomes part of the story.

This creates an unusual form of suspense. The destination is known early on, as is the urgency. Nevertheless, it’s hard to gauge just how far they still have to go. Blake and Schofield can only keep going and hope that their message arrives in time.

George MacKay and Dean-Charles Chapman portray this situation in a correspondingly unspectacular way. Blake has a very personal reason, because of his brother, to reach the destination as quickly as possible. Schofield seems more reserved and cautious. No grand, melodramatic camaraderie develops between them. They talk, argue briefly, help one another out, and keep moving. It is precisely the normality of their conversations that reveals just how young the two actually seem amid this devastated landscape.

The war itself is often revealed only through its aftermath. Dead people and animals lie where the soldiers must pass. Buildings are damaged or abandoned, trees destroyed, landscapes turned to mud. 1917 doesn’t linger on every one of these images long enough for the viewer to grasp their meaning. Much of it simply lies along the path. Blake and Schofield don’t have time to dwell on it for long.

This is another reason why the elaborate cinematography doesn’t come across as a series of beautiful war panoramas. An open field offers a clear view but no cover. A trench shields them from prying eyes, but makes it nearly impossible to see what lies beyond the next bend. Ruins provide cover and create new blind spots. Every space alters the nature of the danger.

Yet 1917 requires surprisingly little conventional combat action. The threat often arises simply from the possibility that something could happen. An abandoned place is not automatically safe. A seemingly clear path can change within seconds. Even calm becomes temporary.

The nearly uninterrupted movement has another effect: broad historical contexts recede into the background. Strategies, front lines, and military decisions exist, but Blake and Schofield experience only tiny fragments of them. For them, the war consists of the next obstacle, the next encounter, and the question of how much time remains. Generals can shift lines on maps. The two soldiers must cross these lines on foot.

Thus, a grand war story increasingly becomes something very simple. Two people must keep going. 1917 therefore does not depict World War I from a distance, but as a journey that must be conquered meter by meter. The destination is known. Only the path to it cannot be shortened.