[Sam Mendes] depicting WWI as we've never seen it: simultaneously horrific and beautiful, immersive and detached, immediate and impossibly far removed from our own experience
ultimately the story is pretty simple, and there are a couple of contrivances run into along the way, but "1917" primarily exists as a technical achievement, and in that capacity it is a true marvel
the single-take World War I action drama is a genuine marvel of movie magic; MacKay and Chapman are excellent; It works as a visual miracle, a violent action picture, a grim anti-war fable, a character play and an emotional roller coaster
Sam Mendes's "1917" is an amazingly audacious film; as exciting as a heist movie, disturbing as a sci-fi nightmare; it's ambitious and unshakeable storytelling
legendary cinematographer Roger Deakins effectively drops the viewer in the center of the story and compels them to stay there, fully immersed in every muddy step, hunger pang, and rifle click
it's this sort of excitement that helps make "1917" such an astonishing and remarkable cinematic achievement. It's the epitome of widescreen filmmaking that should only be seen in theaters to deliver its fullest effect
all the "shots" in the movie are seamlessly connected, and Roger Deakins... perform a tour de force, moving the camera above and into the action in extraordinarily fluid, elegant and revealing ways that have never been seen before
a vivid and wholly engaging epic that seems destined to join the canon of quintessential war movies; There's no time to pause, even for great beauty, a lesson that even "1917" is often loathe to honor