Dunkirk: A Film Marred by Confusion

By Gavin McNeal 

May 18, 2025 

To be in a war means going through the struggle of the unknown. Questions about what is going on in the outside world, is your side is going to pull through and win. Not only that it also means going through the fight to live another day, seeing the look of fear and desperation in the eyes of your fellow soldiers. Those aspects of war are exemplified in the film Dunkirk directed and produced by Christopher Nolan, one of the best in his profession.  

The story of Dunkirk is told through the eyes of three different men with a shared cause. First there’s Tommy (Fionn Whitehead), a Private in the Royal Navy, who is looking to escape the German stronghold on a British vessel. In the air there's Farrier (Tom Hardy) a Royal Air Force (RAF) pilot who’s trying to make the ships have a safe escape. The civilians are represented in the way of Mr. Dawson (Mark Rylance) who helped rescue pilots that had crashed in the water along with other soldiers that were drifting at sea. 

In the heat of the evacuation cool heads are extremely needed. The Germans had a stronghold on France and if the Allies wanted to win this war they needed to evacuate. The time crunch to get everyone out calls for the desperation of having the civilians help out their military. In a time like this no one can be trusted, the soldiers are constantly looking for someone that is possibly part of the enemy.  Even though they aren’t working directly together Tommy, Farrier and Mr. Dawson are fighting to live another day and stop the reign of the Nazis. This can only happen if there is an escape from Dunkirk.  

While most people would think movies involve a lot of talking between characters, a choice was made while making this film to use as little dialogue as possible. It was a unique choice that I have never seen before in a movie. The viewing experience was a little different than I anticipated. At the beginning it was difficult to understand what exactly was going on since not a lot of the characters were talking. This made the watch frustrating with having to put the pieces together like it was a murder mystery. When really the goal was just to be watching a World War Two film. The absence of talking throughout the film goes in part with making the visuals and sounds as realistic as possible. It was like I was on ships, in the air with the pilots and in the water with the fallen airplanes. With the sounds it made the intensity of the moment real with the bombs dropping, bullets hitting the side of the ships and planes. The music would crescendo when the soldiers were waiting to see if German planes were going at another air strike. Though this happened because there was barely any dialogue it would’ve been nice to see more time focused on dialogue and less on the visuals and sounds to tell the story in a more coherent manner.   

The changing perspectives of the movie was an interesting choice that actually made the film more realistic in telling the story of what happened at Dunkirk. Tying in the planes, vessels and civilians all into one film made the storyline unique. It really put together all the efforts that are going on during a war. Viewers get a great piece of the action from all angles of the allies in Dunkirk, France. It was also a little frustrating at times when the scenes would shift to the next perspective. I would feel like I was understanding what was going on (which was already hard to do with minimal dialogue) and then the movie would move on to the next person they had to highlight. It’s not easy making sure all three stories are told within one movie, however the way it was done in this film wasn’t the smoothest. It felt like sometimes the transitions from one person to the next were rushed. If the movie had been longer they could’ve tied them all together nicely where it would’ve been easier to understand a lot more of what was going on.  

This movie specifically had tons of expectations due to Nolan’s pedigree and the importance of Dunkirk in World War Two. At first the film left me going back and forth if it was a success or a disappointment. The lack of dialogue was underwhelming, the visuals and sounds were stunning, the changing of perspectives was confusing,  at the end of the day what the film lacked was not made up for by the positives it had. Nolan has been known to not use a lot of dialogue and multiple perspectives; it just really didn’t work out in this film.