Armadillo

Upon this Danish documentary’s release swarmed a cloud of controversy as the lines between fact and fiction became considerably blurred. Detailing the lives of real-life Danish soldiers on the frontlines of the Afghanistan war, the film captures the intimacy of warfare through a poetic lens that somehow belies the often brutal scenes on show.

Following an infantry operating in a base named Armadillo, director Janus Metz opens the film with the soldiers’ final days in Denmark before being shipped out to Afghanistan. Scenes alternate between the tearful goodbyes of loved ones and rambunctious going-away parties, strippers et al. The shifts in tone are to be a constant in Metz feature as he dips in and out of traumatic moments with uncontrived ease, sparing the audience the occasional roadside bomb or tense military standoff with intervals of leisure that show the soldiers playing computer games, contacting home, studying weaponry and even watching pornographic movies.

The film doesn’t play the tried and tested formula of most documentaries – there are no talking heads here, no overarching commentary. Instead Metz positions the camera and the audience in amongst the men like just another comrade; we see them at their bravest and we see them at their most bored and mundane too. What is most striking about the film is the artful cinematography involved. More often than not the expressive visuals, adjusted as they are with tints and filters and other post-production effects, betray the documentary format to create a unique example of modern documentary-making.

For a dissection of the Afghanistan war that doesn’t patronise then look no further than Armadillo. It offers a deft blend of real life and creative license – whilst it never truly embellishes the material, it cunningly casts its strongest lights on the moments of subtlety that punctuate a soldiers’ existence, and always in non-judgemental shades.

Luke Woellhaf