WARFARE

US/UK, 2025, 95 minutes, Colour.

D' Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Will Poulter, Cosmo Jarvis, Joseph Quinn, Aaron Mackenzie, Finn Bennett, Michael Gandolfini, Charles Melton, John Taylor Smith, Kit Connor, Noah Centineo.

Directed by Ray Mendoza, Alex Garland.

Ultimately, this is a very grim film. Many audiences will find some sequences unbearable to watch. But, this is a film of warfare.

The action of the film takes place over an evening and morning, the morning action seems to take place in real time. It is Iraq, 2006, three years after the American invasion. The audiences with occupying American forces. There are hostile Iraqis ready to attack, to serve as snipers against the Americans. And there are ordinary Iraqis, seen going about their ordinary business in the streets, shops, chatting… And there are the victims of the action, homes taken over for confronting the enemy, homes destroyed.

The film was cowritten and co-directed by Ray Mendoza, his own memories of the episode and the film noting at the opening that this is a version of memories rather than an objective study of what happened in the mission. In the film, Mendoza is the radio operator, most important for contact, for surveillance, for final rescue details. Mendoza is working with screenwriter and

director, Alex Garland (Ex Machina, Annihilation, Men) who startled many audiences with his imaginative version of conflict within the United States, Civil War.

The American cast, although the lead is Canadian and several significant actors are British (many of them familiar from films and from television series), recreate the camaraderie of the group, the film opening with a moment of shock for the audience with close-ups of an aerobics TV program, the group together, a lot of ogling, comment, the suggestion of boys being boys…

But, the cast went through several weeks boot camp, training in methods of warfare, but also the behaviour of soldiers under stress, in situations of attack and defence, rehearsing not only the action sequences but the collaboration of the men in moments of waiting, in moments of tension.

Audiences will be intrigued by the discipline and the manoeuvres for the men to get from their headquarters to occupy a home in the street, opposite a building which is under suspicion. Then there is the waiting, for something to happen, for someone to shoot, for more information to come from headquarters. Audiences share these moments of nothing happening, time passing, yet having to be on the ready.

The action sequences are vivid, but best described by the word, visceral (or, perhaps, gut-churning), for the men’s experience as well as for the audience’s experience: snipers, response, mistakes made, men wounded, calls for evacuating the wounded, explosions, and, another warning about the graphic close-ups of injured and dead men, listening to their screams, the pain, the cry for morphine, just the unbearable pain of being carried, the rescue. This is an alert to audiences who might find some of these sequences also unbearable.

So, in no way as an entertainment entertainment. Rather, an intense drama, the filmmakers’ serious attempt to immerse its audience in both the calm and the intense death reality of warfare.

1. The truth of the title? The focus on the American invasion of Iraq, and episode, 2006? The presence of Ray Mendoza in the operation? His memories, the writing of the screenplay, collaboration with Alex Garland and his reputation, interests, war? Mendoza and the staging of the action, memories of the experience?
2. Audience response to war, just wars, unjust wars, invasions? For the troops in the war? For those hostile to the troops? For ordinary people as victims of war?
3. The graphic presentation of the action, the action, the shooting, deaths, the close-ups of graphic wounds, limbs lost, soldiers in pain, screams, asking for morphine…? Audience identification, shock, uncomfortable, some seems almost unbearable to watch? Style of the film sometimes muting the sound, some moments of relief for the audience from the screaming?
4. The opening, the aerobics session, the glamorous participants, the group watching, ogling, irritating, the sexual atmosphere, the boys will be boys atmosphere?
5. The transition to the next morning, the men, so young, their training, the role of surveillance, support of the mission, details not understood but obeying the orders for support?
6. The realism of the film, the atmosphere of it unfolding in real time?
7. The group, their drill, in the streets, in line, plan, snipers, invading the house, the terror of the inhabitants, their being put together downstairs, the men deploying in the house, the sniper and his assistant, the radio operator, the tasks of the various men?
8. The eye of the sniper, his descriptions, the radio operator taking notes, the backup of headquarters aerial surveillance, the audience seeing the surveillance, from a high distance, the white dots indicating personnel and vehicles?
9. The seeming ordinariness of the street, shops, men and women, walking, wandering, the number of men passing by, going into the building? Their being described to headquarters? Suspicions?
10. The relief sniper, seeing the men with guns, not getting off a shot? The plan going awry? The range of snipers, their action, the dangers? Coming onto the roof of the building?
11. The action of the camera, during the quiet time panning around and catching people doing their jobs, some repartee, urinating into the bottle, chatter?
12. The camera in action during the bombardment, the roof, blowing the roof? Elliott and his being wounded? The contact with the bushmaster tanks? To evacuate Elliott?
13. Under pressure, going down the stairs, the strategies for the tanks to arrive, the fear of the inhabitants, their plea? The tanks, the timing, getting out, the explosion? The dead soldiers in the street, the graphic close-ups of the wounds, then the dragging of the wounded, there screams, the pain, getting them inside?
14. The focus on the details of the care for the two wounded men, morphine, their comments, pain and screams, stoic suffering? Some of the others shellshocked?
15. The relief command, coming in, the leader, competence, decisions to be made, discussions, surveillance, radio?
16. the final evacuation, the timing, the shooting, tanks getting away?
17. The Iraqi snipers coming into the street, standing about, what they had achieved, the Americans driving away? The destroyed house, the suffering of the family?
18. The nature of warfare for those in action and for victims of warfare?