"Everything is based on memory." So declares early on-screen text in Warfare. It’s a signal that writer/director and Iraq War veteran Ray Mendoza is basing Warfare on the memories of himself and fellow soldiers. There is no book or other pre-existing media to draw from. Just the recounting of soldiers who were actually there in the field. That distinctly subjective approach is at direct odds with the increasingly objective filmmaking style Mendoza helped Warfare co-director/co-writer Alex Garland refine in last year’s Civil War. With that feature, Garland perfected an aloof visual aesthetic already permeating his earlier works like Ex Machina and Men.
Civil War’s manifestation of this detached ambiance succeeded best in executing small-scale tension, like that “what kind of American are you?” scene with Jesse Plemons. Unfortunately, Civil War ended with a barrage of noise that Garland’s filmmaking approach captured with little personality. Now, Mendoza and Garland bring that objective visual style to a profoundly personal story. Warfare, like Civil War, vividly demonstrates the upsides and grave downsides of their de facto aesthetic.
Save for a prologue briefly dipping into the past, Mendoza and Garland's Warfare script is almost exclusively concerned with the exploits of various Navy Seals in one multi-floor home in Iraq in November 2006. Among the soldiers in this home looking out for enemy fire are a movie version of Ray Mendoza (D'Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai), lead sniper Elliot Miller (Cosmo Jarvis), Officer in Charge Erik (Will Poulter), newbie gunner Tommy (Kit Connor), and Petty Officer Sam (Joseph Quinn). Initially, the camera chronicles this group waiting for any sign of adversarial forces and trying to not draw unwanted suspicion.
Mendoza and Garland’s clinical approach to Warfare extends to a script eschewing the dialogue standards of other war movies. The on-screen versions of Mendoza, Miller, and company don’t speak in expository dialogue relaying their backstories nor do they share cutesy nicknames offering glimpses into their personalities. Instead, they speak in short bursts of technical jargon. Verbal communication only happens when there’s no other choice. This, combined with the story starting in media res with the main characters already on their mission, conveys Warfare dropping viewers into “reality” as it unspools. Garland and Mendoza are just here to bear witness to it.
Those early sequences heavy on silence see Mendoza and Garland’s filmmaking style greatly benefiting Warfare. When the screen’s dominated by empty space and unnerving stillness, clinical filmmaking lets viewers interpret so much into what’s missing on-screen. In Civil War, for instance, you can’t help but dig your nails into your armrest as your mind imagines what the unnamed Jesse Plemons soldier could do. Similarly, Warfare’s earliest scenes keep viewers holding their breath over what could happen any second as these men trade water bottles, take turns operating in a sniper position, or engage in other mundane activities of war.
All the while, Mendoza and Garland’s removed camera quietly conveys the idea that tranquility could erupt into grisly chaos at the drop of a hat. A tiny moment of Sam rubbing his fingers across a dusty surface is an especially successful piece of early quiet reality. Given how intentionally vague the backstories of these soldiers are, there’s no telling what’s racing through Sam’s mind here. Maybe he’s reminded of home. Perhaps he’s experiencing a childhood memory involving dust. Then again, he might just be killing time any way he can. When the camera operates like a fly-on-the-wall observing subdued activity, Warfare excels.
Then an unseen enemy combatant throws a grenade into the house these soldiers are occupying. Suddenly, Warfare gets loud. Very loud. Unfortunately, Garland and Mendoza’s indifferent filmmaking style does not go well with excessive noise and bombings. Civil War epitomized how, when the screens filled with chaos, this directorial approach simply feels workmanlike. Ambiguity has left the building. Everything is too surface-level and literal for its own good. An unpassionate rendering of screaming and explosions has replaced interestingly detached tableaus of unspoken tension.
Even Mendoza joining in the directors seat can’t stop Warfare from succumbing to the same problems that plagued Civil War. In both cases, thinly sketched characters that work fine for quiet scenes of tension aren’t very compelling anchors for extensive wartime gruesomeness. In Warfare’s case, the problems are exacerbated since the heavy emphasis on bullets and human misery take ups way more of the runtime. Bizarrely, the two filmmakers and cinematographer David J. Thompson don’t exploit the limited backdrops of Warfare to deploy truly striking pieces of blocking. Instead, this feature’s most intense sequences unfold through standard quick cuts, medium shots, and close-up images.
The latter element especially is a dismal fit for this story. Any time the camera got close to the faces of these soldiers, I didn’t feel like I was staring into the window of someone’s soul. I was reminded how Warfare hadn’t invested me in these characters before putting them through excruciating emotional and physical torment. Such anguish is a critical component of Warfare. This project communicates war’s agony with nonchalant framing of dismembered limbs lying in streets or young men screaming over their mangled body parts. Straightforward visual and storytelling sensibilities, though, deprive these conceptually unnerving images of their emotional impact.
Everything is told linearly while visual traits that might alienate certain mainstream audience members (namely unbroken or exorbitantly wide shots) are eschewed. Even the claustrophobia of being trapped in this house is undercut by cutting to outside elements like fellow soldier Jake (Charles Melton) and his platoon or aerial shots of the area (complete with dots representing enemy soldiers) mimicking a radar screen. The latter element especially exists just to spoon-feed information to audience members. Beneath Warfare’s admirably unorthodox details like eschewing a score or the threadbare dialogue are frustratingly timid elements. What should be a feature imbued with terrifying chaos instead makes countless concessions towards mainstream sensibilities. Like land mines hiding in the ground, Warfare constantly surprises viewers with wasted visual and narrative potential.
Most notably, despite that opening on-screen text, Warfare doesn’t operate like a memory. People’s yesteryear recountings are fragmented, flawed, messy. Through those “defects,” we uncover latent parts of ourselves. Warfare, meanwhile, is an inertly orderly production. Even after a bomb unexpectedly goes off, the editing and cinematography remain cogent. It’s all too well-rehearsed rather than evoking jagged warzone recollections. Mendoza and Garland never quite nail Warfare’s visual aesthetic as either channeling memories or simulating viewers being in the same room as these characters. The images flickering on-screen lack the necessary personality to differentiate themselves from endless other war movies obsessed with graphic injuries and men sticking together.
On paper, Warfare should be something only Ray Mendoza could’ve crafted. In execution, though, it’s only the earliest quietest Warfare sequences that radiate with a distinctive perspective. The rest isn’t especially idiosyncratic or subversive in the crowded pantheon of Iraq War movies. Compare this aloof generic film to Elegance Bratton’s similarly personal The Inspection, which had both a rawness and distinctive visual variety that Warfare lacks. There’s unquestionable competency in several areas of this new Mendoza and Garland collaboration, particularly in the excellent sound design. For most moviegoers, though, Warfare will eventually inevitably blur together with memories of other war features.