Ahead of the 2020 Academy Awards, Vulture is revisiting the endings of this years Best Picture nominees.
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When it comes to 20th-century military conflicts, theres no question which one Hollywood prefers.
Its predecessor has proven a tougher subject for movies to crack, especially American ones.
(For the British, it occupies a more prominent place in the collective historical memory.)
This is a story about integrity, the willingness to do anything even in the harshest conditions.
(Though the plot is fiction, the German withdrawal that acts as the inciting incidentactually happened.)
The films first act supplies many of the genre tropes weve come to associate with the First World War.
In1917s purest gross-out moment, Schofield accidentally plunges his bloody hand into the open stomach of a dead soldier.
The soldiers get into a debate about whether theres any meaning to be found in the war.
You should have taken it home, Blake says.
You should have given it to your family.
Men have died for that.
If Id got a medal Id take it back home.
Why didnt you take it home?
Schofield disagrees, with the bitterness of awar poet: Look, its just a bit of bloody tin.
It doesnt make you special.
It doesnt make any difference to anyone.
Hes shot by an enemy sniper, and only narrowly survives.
He stumbles upon a German sentry, and kills the lad in close combat.
He wont be able to deliver the message, and hundreds of men will die as a result.
Unless … he takes a shortcut.
(The scene features 50 stuntmen and 450 extras.)
Thematically, too, the final run flips what were used to seeing.
In a sequence that has traditionally been cinematic shorthand for futility, Mendes goes for hope.
But the film is also careful not to turn this individual triumph into a wider victory.
(With one notable exception, the much-maligned officer class gets a sympathetic treatment in1917.)
Zoom out, and the movies happy ending is not very happy at all.
Yes, a massacre has been averted, but the bloody stasis endures.
Viewers know the war will continue for another year and a half.
The films conclusion offers a mirror of this structure possibly one reason the film scoredthat surprise Screenplay nod.
Next, Schofields arc with Blake comes full circle, as well.
Having completed his perilous journey, Schofield searches the casualty tent for Blakes older brother.
After informing the brother of Blakes death, Schofield hands over his effects to be returned to his family.
These mementos are not meaningless, after all.
The magnitude of his efforts has brought Schofield around to Blakes way of thinking.
(The bookend effect of these closing scenes is also enhanced by the films casting.
Theres an inscription on the back: Come back to us.
This closing moment of catharsis encapsulates all thats proven divisive about1917.
After all, theres no such thing as an uncomplicated victory.
