Warfare Review: Alex Garland's War Drama Ratchets Up Tension

Yahoo

11-04-2025

Alex Garland, the director behind Ex Machina (2014), Annihilation (2018), and Civil War (2024), is a master at ratcheting up tension, and his latest film, Warfare, shows off how talented he is as filmmaker even with a threadbare story
Directed by Garland and co-writer Ray Mendoza, Warfare is set during the battle of Ramadi during the war in Iraq. D'Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Will Poulter, Cosmo Jarvis, Michael Gandolfini, and others play a platoon of Navy SEALs who get pinned down in a house during a firefight.
Warfare is not Garland's best film by a long stretch, but it does showcase his talents. Particularly, Garland is a master of tension. For a long time in the beginning of this movie, nothing substantive happens, and yet the film is mesmerizing. There are long shots of stillness as soldiers stare through a sniper rifle's sight, and it is transfixing to watch the level of concentration.
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Of course, eventually things go badly, and Garland's ability to shoot action scenes takes over. Unlike many modern films' action sequences, Garland gives the viewer enough clarity to understand the geography of the scene, but the feeling he renders is of total chaos. Particularly in the sound design, Warfare is able to render these soldiers' experiences, and it all combines to make Warfare an example of embedded filmmaking – a movie that feels like the audience is experiencing the events with the characters like an embedded journalist.
Since it focuses on one isolated event, there is little character development. Warfare is similar to Black Hawk Down (2001) because we get to know the characters through one event in an isolated capacity.
By the end, Warfare becomes unexpectedly nationalistic, as Garland, a Brit, thematically celebrates the heroism of these soldiers while also displaying the pointlessness of the war. The final shot, like the last moment of Civil War, is drenched in irony and leaves the audience reflecting on the film's meaning.
Warfare is a tense, nerve-wracking experience, mostly due to how good Garland is at his craft. It is far from his best work, but he's such a good filmmaker that even his minor films feel significant.
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