“Is he peeking or probing?”
Sam
Warfare emerged directly from last year’s Civil War as a collaboration between the film’s director Alex Garland and military advisor Ray Mendoza. Here, they co-direct to portray a single encounter Mendoza experienced in Iraq in 2006, reconstructed from the memories of his Navy SEAL platoon. Warfare is unadorned in its depiction of modern conflict (like the Afghanistan battle sequences of the even more sparingly titled A War), avoiding crane shots in favour of handheld cameras shooting with wide lenses up close to give the impression of the viewer moving amongst the soldiers. The occasional drone view serves to heighten the distance of anyone not immediately on the ground. Unfolding in near-realtime, Warfare captures the staccato rhythm of a firefight punctuating long periods of silence, the waiting being most tense. The sound design is Warfare’s strongest weapon, from the lack of music (other than a deliberate diegetic pop song in the opening) to the subjective depiction of silence after an explosion or the cacophony of radio chatter overwhelming with distortion. It highlights the sonic impact of modern weaponry on its own troops. Most striking is the use of wounded screaming not as a punctuating moment but an ongoing, inescapable sound, amplified each time the injured are knocked or moved. Warfare is singular in its perspective other than a brief coda with the locals at the end. This all serves to make viewing Warfare an intense — at times overpowering — experience rather than an enjoyable one, but one that will certainly stay with you.
8/10
