I managed to find myself some free time earlier in the week and spent it watching Dunkirk, a film by Christopher Nolan. I have to be honest, I didn't even know it existed until I watched a music show on BBC which included the singer Harry Styles. It was mentioned that he was in the movie.
How would I sum it up? Well, brilliant and harrowing.
As the name suggests the movie covers the Dunkirk evacuation which occurred in 1940. In short hundreds of thousands of men (nearly 400,000 I believe) were evacuated after being pinned to the coast in Northern France; their only escape by sea. The Navy didn't have the capacity for such an evacuation so the armada included fishing vessels, yachts tugs and any other vessel capable of carrying people. The evacuation took place between 27th May and 4th June with up to 64,429 troops being evacuated in a single day.
So what was harrowing about the movie as it wasn't particularly gory?
Simply how it brilliantly depicts the horror of the event from being a sitting duck on the beach whilst being attached from land and air. The horror of being trapped in a vessel being torpedoed. Being caught in oil slicks which could ignite at any time...I'm not sure I need to go on.
I very much recommend if you're into thought provoking movies.