Until now, Steve McQueen has never taken his audience for granted. With Blitz, however, he’s done just that, presuming the story of a mother and son searching for each other amidst the chaos of WWII to be worth telling because, well, war is bad, and people are their best when they band together, and most of all because crotchety factory managers can shove it up their arse. Would 12 Years a Slave be a masterpiece by simply relying on the harrowing nature of Solomon Northup’s ordeal to draw in viewers? Would Widows be peak modern pulp without the psychological and locational specificity that’s woven into each moment? Would this former teenager have imperiled himself to see Shame in one of the only Manhattan theaters that ran the NC-17 drama were it not for the unusual thoughtfulness of its filmmaker? McQueen’s latest feature is guilty not of doing something different but of doing so much less.
Blitz begins in the immediate aftermath of a German air raid. A hose wriggles free of a firefighter’s grip and impales his helmet, shattering our ears with the harsh sound design that instantly locks us into Widows’ Chicagoan underworld. From that point onward, though, Blitz unfolds with hardly a trace of McQueen’s signature and wastes little to no time separating Rita (Saoirse Ronan) and nine-year-old George (Elliot Heffernan), as if the pathos inherent to the story are sufficient reason for us to care about its characters and exalt in their inevitable reunion. The main plot kicks into gear once George escapes the train evacuating him and other children out of London. Along his torturous trek back home, the runaway youngster meets other displaced youths, a kindly soldier (Benjamin Clementine), and a troupe of graverobbers led by a Fagin-like crime boss (Stephen Graham).
From another, lesser filmmaker, Blitz would be a solid, though still forgettable, effort. Is holding it to a higher standard unfair because movies should ideally be judged on their own merit? Perhaps, but to argue that a new project from an esteemed director doesn’t carry certain expectations is disingenuous. Swapping his usual austerity for dry sentimentality, McQueen has crafted a dramatically inert War Horse with the aesthetic of Sam Mendes’ recent output and the middling aspirations of late-twentieth-century Oscar bait. The story’s simplicity could be mistaken for a nod to the stiffness of the “Keep Calm, Carry On” generation’s upper lip were it not for the rousing emotions McQueen attempts to elicit with scenes that are as hamfisted as they are predictable. Simultaneously wooden and saccharine, Blitz is a film at odds with itself.
Indifference is always the most frustrating state in which to leave a movie; that the one in question happens to be directed by Steve McQueen is both upsetting and confounding. How did a singularly bold artist at the height of his prestige make such an impotent film? One segment—a jazz-club soiree not dissimilar to hour-long dance party Lovers Rock that, like a piece of performance art, freezes at the sound of sirens before we see looters sweeping the ruins on the following day—teases the layered experience this could’ve been. Unfortunately, the movie has by then already squandered too much potential for us to have much faith in where it’s still going.
Blitz is the most disappointing release of 2024 and the least interesting project of McQueen’s otherwise brilliant career.
Director: Steve McQueen
Cast: Saoirse Ronan, Harris Dickinson, Kathy Burke
Writer: Steve McQueen
Producers: Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Arnon Milchan, Yariv Milchan, Anita Overland, Michael Schaefer, Adam Somner
Music: Hans Zimmer
Cinematography: Yorick Le Saux
Editor: Peter Sciberras
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