Warfare (2025).
Warfare is co-written and co-directed by Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza. I’m sure most people reading this are familiar with Alex Garland’s work, but Ray Mendoza might be a mystery to you. That’s because he’s a former Navy SEAL who has consulted and advised on the military aspects of many films, including Alex Garland’s 2024 film Civil War. His work on this film, however, was instrumental, because it’s the true story of his squad and an hour and a half siege they endured during the beginning of the Battle of Ramadi in 2006.
The film takes place in real time and follows Mendoza and his squad as they commandeer an Iraqi multi-unit home. Why they do this is unclear - the film does a great job of not holding the audience’s hand and simply drops you into the action and plays the scenario out in real time. No exposition dumps, no backstories. Once inside the home, they find that more and more unfriendly Iraqi men on the street are moving and gathering with a sense of purpose, and then an announcement is made over a PA system - they’re calling for arms because they’re about to murder some American soldiers.
The rest of the film focuses on the soldiers trying to get out of this hairy situation. The first attempt at an extraction goes horribly wrong and then it’s absolute chaos for the rest of the run time. I went into this completely blind as I do with all films, so I was expecting a jingoistic war film that I’ve become accustomed to, but this went in the complete opposite direction. While war films like Black Hawk Down certainly show the horrors of war, they’re also entertaining and fun. Warfare is not fun, it’s stressful as fuck. I haven’t felt this level of stress since Uncut Gems, and this is due to a few things - the filmmaking style, the realistic performances and the sound design, which are all amazingly well done.
The sound design is particularly incredible. You feel every bullet whizzing by, every explosion, every scream. There’s a “show of force”, which is called upon several times during the encounter, in which a US jet flies low to the ground and kicks up dust at sonic speeds. The first time it happened it felt like my fucking hat was going to blow off in the theater, and it wasn’t less impressive when it happened again. The first real explosion surprised the hell out of me and rumbled the whole theater. If this isn’t nominated for a sound award at the next Oscars, they’ll have made a mistake. I also always enjoy when they show comparisons with the actors to the real people involved at the end of the film. The casting in this one was on point.
I don’t think anyone will walk out of this film thinking that it would be cool or fun to join the military, which is not exactly what I was expecting when I heard the co-director was an ex-Navy SEAL. These guys go through hell. People in the squad are basically stun locked after the IED goes off. There are no heroes, there are no winners. Guys risking their lives for sledgehammers. I couldn’t help but feel awful for the people whose home was randomly chosen and then completely destroyed, and all for nothing. The way I feel about Warfare is similar to how I feel about the 1985 film Come and See - they’re both amazing, realistic depictions of war that will make any sane person realize that war is hell. Come and See is definitely more brutal, but the sentiment is the same - both amazing films that I don’t want to watch again.
