Steve McQueen's 'Blitz' is slow and underwhelming
Steve McQueen's 'Blitz' is slow and underwhelming
The Philadelphia Film Festival closing film is a surprisingly unsuccessful effort from a normally great director.
Blitz seemed to have all the pieces in place. It’s the latest film from normally reliable director Steve McQueen, the man behind Shame, 12 Years a Slave, Widows, and the Small Axe series. It stars Saoirse Ronan, normally a perennial of first-rate prestige movies, and is structured as the sort of historical epic McQueen has done well in the past.
Unfortunately, Blitz, which was the closing night film at last week’s Philadelphia Film Festival and opens in theaters Friday before landing later in November on Apple TV+, is ultimately quite underwhelming. It never quite finds that extra gear that the director’s best work has always had, nor does it carry much of McQueen’s signature.
Set during the titular historical event in 1940 — but not concerning itself much with the event’s historical or military aspects — Blitz stars Elliott Heffernan as George, a 9-year-old biracial boy who has a series of Dickensian adventures, especially after his mother (Ronan) evacuates him from London to the countryside on a train.
At various times, he jumps off a train, falls in with a group of criminals (led by Stephen Graham), is accompanied by some revolutionaries (including Leigh Gill), and ultimately gets to be a hero. The film also occasionally returns to Ronin as his mother, who is given fantastic blond hair but otherwise not much to do.
We also get some backstory about what happened to his father, and we’re constantly reminded that while they may have been fighting the Nazis at the time, English society at that particular time was pretty damned racist.
The main action in the film takes place over a short period, but at the same time, the film feels slow and ponderous. Also, I’m not so sure how the film is going to play on TV screens, which I imagine is how the majority of people are going to experience Blitz. It’s not quite as long-winded as Occupied City, McQueen’s four-hour documentary about the Nazi occupation of Amsterdam from last year, but it feels like it at times.
Steve McQueen’s films tend to have indelible, memorable moments and images. Shame stayed with me for a long time, especially that scene on the subway. 12 Years a Slave — which also screened at PFF in 2013, back when it used to be held at the Kimmel Center — is full of them, and I still remember the gut-punch moment in Widows.
As for the Small Axe films, Lovers Rock was my favorite film of 2020, and I’d say the “Silly Games” scene is my favorite movie sequence of the decade so far, just about as magical as movies get, and it’s something I’m still angry I’ve never had the chance to watch along with an audience.
But there isn’t anything that magical or memorable in Blitz. In fact, I’ve barely thought of the film since I saw it.