'71
Directed by Yann Demange
- thriller
- action
- drama
- war
The story
A young British soldier must find his way back to safety after his unit accidentally abandons him during a riot in the streets of Belfast.
What it’s like
Handheld and claustrophobic, '71 lives in tight streets under overcast Belfast skies, with grey brick, rain-slick pavement and the sickly orange of sodium streetlamps, its palette washed toward bruised browns and cold blues. The camera stays close to its young soldier's face and shoulder, so the city arrives in fragments: smoke hanging in alleys, the flat crack of gunfire, the sudden thud of an explosion that rattles the frame. Sound design does much of the work, with long stretches of tense near-silence broken by shouting crowds, sirens and a restrained, pulsing score that rarely swells. The vibe is taut, grimy dread with flashes of raw human kindness. It suits a late night alone with the lights off, or a wide-awake evening when you want to be gripped rather than comforted. The pacing is relentless and the tone bleak, with an arc about a frightened young man forced to trust strangers on every side. Violence is frequent and sudden, sometimes brutal and bloody, with real fear throughout and some hard-to-watch injuries. It is for viewers who want a grounded, unsentimental survival thriller and can handle a sustained, harrowing atmosphere.
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