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Contact (1985)
Director Alan Clarke based 'Contact' on the memoir of A.F.N. Clarke, a British paratrooper who served in Northern Ireland in the late 70s. The two men worked together to strip the story back to the absolute bare essentials with startling effect. The camera follows the unnamed "Platoon Commander" ('Hellraiser's Sean Chapman) very closely as he wearily leads his men across the countryside. There is no music, virtually no onscreen titles, minimal dialogue (which is mostly confined to military nomenclature), no explanation of the context and little story, yet it's so powerful. You feel tense in the chest as you wait for something to happen to the platoon, sometimes it doesn't, the rustle of leaves and the snap of a twig, was just that and then without warning there are explosions of violence and terror.
Chapman's performance is amazing, conveying everything with haunted eyes and silence. You don't know exactly what is going on inside his head but you know it's not good. In the scenes where he stands and stares at sleeping children, or an old couple, you aren't sure if he's considering killing them, or remembering when he used to feel human. Other scenes where he's putting himself in danger, do not come across as a heroic desire to protect his men but as a sincere death wish. It's all conveyed with such clarity without a word being spoken. Apparently some people, including men who had actually served in NI, initially mistook it for a documentary, it feels that real. An anti-war masterpiece.
There don't seem to be any clips of 'Contact' on the internet? There's a trailer for the blu-ray boxset it's from though...
Director Alan Clarke based 'Contact' on the memoir of A.F.N. Clarke, a British paratrooper who served in Northern Ireland in the late 70s. The two men worked together to strip the story back to the absolute bare essentials with startling effect. The camera follows the unnamed "Platoon Commander" ('Hellraiser's Sean Chapman) very closely as he wearily leads his men across the countryside. There is no music, virtually no onscreen titles, minimal dialogue (which is mostly confined to military nomenclature), no explanation of the context and little story, yet it's so powerful. You feel tense in the chest as you wait for something to happen to the platoon, sometimes it doesn't, the rustle of leaves and the snap of a twig, was just that and then without warning there are explosions of violence and terror.
Chapman's performance is amazing, conveying everything with haunted eyes and silence. You don't know exactly what is going on inside his head but you know it's not good. In the scenes where he stands and stares at sleeping children, or an old couple, you aren't sure if he's considering killing them, or remembering when he used to feel human. Other scenes where he's putting himself in danger, do not come across as a heroic desire to protect his men but as a sincere death wish. It's all conveyed with such clarity without a word being spoken. Apparently some people, including men who had actually served in NI, initially mistook it for a documentary, it feels that real. An anti-war masterpiece.
There don't seem to be any clips of 'Contact' on the internet? There's a trailer for the blu-ray boxset it's from though...