There is a certain aesthetic one expects from a Paul Greengrass film. 22 July doesn’t veer far from his signature style, but it is subtler in its affect. While there is a lot of handheld work in his depiction of the horrible 2011 terrorist attack upon a group of Labour Party Youth campers in Norway, overall the film is toned down in that regard. You won’t need Dramamine to watch it.
More importantly, this is Greengrass in United 93 – and more to the point, Bloody Sunday mode. 22 July is a searing look at not only the event that left 77 young people dead, but also the aftermath. What it takes for a terribly wounded survivor (Viljar Hanssen – played with crushing vulnerability by Jonas Strand Gravil) to not only survive his physical injuries, but the emotional ones as well. Which cut much deeper than the bullets that pierced his body.
It’s also about the futility of “why?” Why would a young man who grew up in an unremarkable way be so set on delivering such mayhem on a group of young people? As played chillingly by Anders Danielsen Lie, mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik is an alt-right enigma with delusions of grandeur. We never learn the answer to his motivations. Which felt right to me. As rational human beings, we have a desire to make sense of all things. Especially the worst of things. To accept that we can’t understand something feels like a type of failure.
22 July posits with great humanity that maybe we would be better off tending to the hurt after such an awful event. That maybe some things are beyond us. Like trying to wrap one’s head around a psychologically damaged young man with no access to empathy. It’s a bold choice. I think it’s the correct one.
The film frontloads the horror of that day’s events. We barely have time to get to know the young campers or their counselors before their bodies start dropping. Greengrass films the event slowly, virtually in real time. Showing Breivik’s methodical approach. You get the sense his pulse barely quickened. That’s not to say yours won’t. Greengrass holds nothing back. Flesh is torn, screams and whimpers are heard, and blood hits the ground. It’s not exploitative or in any way “cool”. It’s matter of fact in its approach. Which makes it that much harder to take.
This is when we first get to know Viljar. A young man you can see is a natural born leader. Tall, handsome, and a reassuring voice to the other campers. He keeps his head while all about him are losing theirs. Until his is nearly taken off by a bullet over his right eye. Another bullet to the shoulder and one to the leg leaves him crumpled upon beach rock. His younger brother wants to help him. Viljar tells him to go, and so he does. It is quite simply devastating.
It was no surprise to me that Greengrass could film a sequence of such violence effectively. He’s one of the best in the business at that sort of thing. What I was not prepared for is how well he handled the remainder of the film. Which juxtaposes largely fruitless interrogations of Breivik with Viljar’s efforts to regain both his cognitive and physical abilities, as much as he can.
Remarkably, the brain damage concerns are dispensed with quickly. Despite having bullet fragments near his brain stem that cannot be removed, Viljar recovers his faculties quickly. His body is not nearly so fortunate. He will walk, but never again with ease. His right eye will be lost and replaced by a prosthetic. He will always be in pain. Which is nothing compared to the psychological damage inflicted upon him.
The beating heart of the film is Viljar’s struggle to recover not only his body and his mind, but his place in the world. It is an appropriately grueling journey. Made up of setbacks, anguish, and frustration. Watching Viljar come to terms with his infirmity is no easy sit. Nor should it be.
The film culminates with Viljar testifying at Breivik’s trial, facing down his butcher. Greengrass stays within himself here. He does not play the moment for uplift, or with big emotions. There is no obtrusive score telling you how to feel. Just a young man summoning all the courage in his broken body to state that he is still free and pointedly, his attacker is not.
It’s a simple message. It’s also a profound one. Viljar can make something of the rest of his life. Even while physically diminished. Whereas Breivik will quite likely spend his remaining days in solitary confinement. In victimizing Viljar and his fellow camp mates, Breivik has done the same to himself.
While Greengrass presents this sequence without fanfare, it is incredibly moving. And when Viljar stands alone in the Norwegian wilderness, the air making steam of his breath, he is nothing less than reborn.
saw it some days ago… **** 1/2 – B+
It’s a bit embarrassing how this film is NOT in conversation for Picture, Director, Screenplay or Film Editing… it’s admirable how it walks the tight-rope between focusing on the murderer, balancing with the pain of the victims without going over the top at any moment. I need to see the companion piece, said to be also really interesting but an even harder watch… recreating in a continuous shot the whole tragedy from the point of view of a teenage girl.
Jesus. I didn’t even know there was a companion piece.
well, a parallel project told in a single shot following the whole tragedy as seen by one of the teenagers… while the projects were completely separated and not related, it’s a kind of companion piece to this one.
Because it’s in Norwegian?
no, it’s not. The norwegian actors spoke english. It’s not dubbed.
yes, the norvegian one, shot in continuity, shows only the massacre and no aftermath, although with just one appearance from the killer. its superb work from joachim trier, a tough sit and surely a companion piece.
imho both are great
Yes, its a very political movie that should appeal to liberal voters ..could be a sleeper coming under the radar ; its one of the few movies i’d be keen to watch , but there again I liked United 93
it’s funny how “liberal” transfer so differently to european culture. “Liberal” in Europe, is basically corporate fascism, in politics.
At least in my language it’s a difference between “liberal” and “liberalist”, the first being the opposite of conservative and the second meaning extreme belief in financial liberalism
still, the american concept of “liberal” isn’t “left-winged” by any means. Only americans think a “liberal” is a socialist or something like that. Lol. When I hear someone as right-winged as the Clintons or Obama are “liberal”, I can’t help but laughing. Bernie Sanders might be closer to a political CENTRE, still not left.
Based on the little information I have of the American political system I’d agree that claiming that the American democrats are in any way “ultra-left” is quite ridiculous.
Also, I hope you don’t mind me getting nerdy about definitions but I find it even more absurd in the American political discussion that people seem to treat “liberal” and “left-wing” as the same thing, which they’re not, even if in a lot of political contexts the two of them collide. If we want to define liberal against conservative in an exact way that also works in a historical context an easy definition would for example be between interest in individual rights against communal rights and conservation of the old way of doing things (thus liberal, a person is liberated, and conservative, interested in conservation). Thus by that definition for example certain elements of the Republican party are actually very liberal (for example the opinion that the state should be doing as little as possible) and there are such things as liberal right-wing parties. What the way of talking about liberal as being interchangable with left-winged is is more social liberalism than anything else (which once again, like you noted, is an ideology that is not even remotely the same as socialism but actually just about the state making sure that everyone has the chance to achieve the things that classical liberalism talks about by helping those in the weaker situation. Basically the problems with classical liberalism that caused it were from what I’ve understood for example that classical liberalism said: “A factory owner can order his employees to do absurdly dangerous work for absurdly long hours because he, as a person, has a right to make as much profit as he can” which is of course emphasizing the individual rights of the factory owner but at the same time denies the individual rights of the employees)
anything capitalism-friendly isn’t left, per se. #Politics101
I’m once again going to go into historical definitions and am going to write a lot of quite obvious things to make sure that I’m not misunderstanding you as saying something you’re not: sure it can be. The left is generally against extreme financial liberalism but it’s not like all left-wingers are Marxist, looking to take out capitalism, especially since the left-wing-right-wing divide pre-dates Marx and socialism (the French revolution in 1789 compared to the release of The Communist Manifesto in 1848 since utopist socialists probably shouldn’t be counted as being against capitalism). Of course most ultra-left parties in history have been socialist parties but it’s not like we should define the whole left side of the political discussion as socialists or in the political discussion the left becomes a small group against an enormous right and center, which would make the defining of things as left and right as something extremely pointless.
The reason why I agree with your point about American politics is not because the Democratic party aren’t socialists but because to my unknowledgeable eye the American political discussion seems to be stuck in the right because points that have been natural in for example large parts of Europe for decades seem to be considered “wild thoughts that won’t actually work” in the States and anyone who approaches those topics is claimed to be “ultra-left” even though for example where I live even most of the right-wing parties agree with these principles
It’s a weird thing around the Oscar circles that people would give a film a B+ then say it really should be in Oscar consideration. Surely the movies being voted best of the year should be A to A+ movies?
(This is not a comment on this specific movie btw I have not seen it)
When “C” films like “A Beautiful Mind” or “Crash” end winning Best Picture, anything B+ and up, deserves to be in conversation. I have minor issues with 22 July, but think that overall it may be on par with United 93, without the surprise factor that one did have (how many people did actually see “Bloody Sunday” before?). Still, the only masterpiece I’ve seen this year, “The Death of Stalin” isn’t in conversation anymore – which is embarrassing as it should be a lock already for SAG ensemble and various Golden Globe nominations in Comedy/Musical (Steve Buscemi, Simon Russell Beale, Jason Isaacs could all get nom’d there at once, plus the Picture itself, and the Screenplay). We should have by now, this one as an almost locked nominee for Adapted Screenplay, but there’s no push for a film that could easily be a nomination sweeper (there’s luxury and minimalism in its production design, costumes ,cinematography, film editing, score) but somehow has gone under the radar and then forgotten.