‘Blitz’: McQueen’s average attempt at Best Picture

Reviewing the Opening Gala of the 2024 London Film Festival

The first section of this review is spoiler-free.

Just over a decade ago, Steve McQueen made history with his film 12 Years A Slave, where he became the first Black British director to win a Best Picture award. Needless to say, the film swept up countless accolades and countless hearts in the process of its delayed release, taking advantage of the commercial attention.

With McQueen’s latest foray into Black storytelling, he has brought the wondrous Elliott Heffernan to our screens, who plays young George evacuated to the countryside during the British Blitz. Although Heffernan and Saoirse Ronan are an incredibly complementary pairing, there are certainly elements of this film that do not feel as great of a match.

For a story that could have been so rich, I expected more from Elliott’s story than what was presented. To have a young Black boy as the face of such a heavily British story of war could be transformative for the war genre and open it up to more representative tales of the battlefield, but apart from a great 20 minute section in the middle of the film, Elliott’s Blackness is not acknowledged in expectedly unique ways.

Regardless, as per usual, the grandeur of the Royal Festival Hall at London Film Festival made the auditory experience phenomenal. McQueen’s sound design is undoubtedly powerful even in its use of silence. Muted scenes in any war film are a direct path to empathy and they are successful in showcasing the awful bombing through the eyes of an innocent, rebellious child.

It seems Ronan will receive several nominations for Best Actress, but I wonder if her role is outstanding enough to warrant this. Although, it’s strange to hear her London accent and even stranger still (yet welcomed) to hear her sing. On technical merit of dialect alone, her performance is mesmerising. Her connection with Elliott and his father creates some real tear-jerker moments, but upon reflection, the script nor the story was anything special.

Spoilers ahead!

I really appreciate cohesive stories, especially when the sub-plots that seem irrelevant eventually come together. I wasn’t sure that the inclusion of Harris Dickinson’s character was essential. Even thinking back, he adds little to no value to either Rita or her father’s lives. Clearly Rita is a woman still grieving the loss of her lover, Marcus - but we don’t see any more of him other than an unsettlingly violent end to their time together. It seems this only serves the film as an opportunity for heartbreak, only to move swiftly on to a very neatly presented ‘lesson’ of Elliott coming to terms with his Blackness.

I think there’s definitely people in audiences that this will be a totally new story for, and that’s great. But for a director like McQueen who has repeatedly shown us the narrative depth that he is capable of creating, I felt that Elliott’s story was surprisingly limited.

Nevertheless, as a whole, the film was enjoyable in its occasional tension; when switching to the sub-plot of Albert played by Stephen Graham, we get elements of the grit that McQueen was rewarded for so significantly with 12 Years A Slave. Maybe more of this would have brought Blitz up to the standard I expected its story to be.

You can read my review of Blitz on Letterboxd here.