Blitz review: "Steve McQueen's World War Two drama is intense, horrific, and impressively cinematic"

Blitz opened the 2024 BFI London Film Festival. Here's our review... 

A more mainstream offering than we might expect from Steve McQueen (Shame, 12 Years a Slave), Blitz pinpoints intimate tales of Londoners during the bombings of World War Two, occasionally pulling back (literally, the camera reversing skywards in scenes recalling Gone with the Wind) to reveal the awful scale of it all.

Highlighting the best and worst of humanity with a detailed sweep that is, at times, positively Spielbergian, this gorgeously crafted but frequently intense and horrific drama will invite comparisons to Empire of the Sun (1987) – not least because much of the action is viewed through the eyes of a young boy. 

Set in 1940, it sees munitions worker Rita (a customarily excellent Saoirse Ronan) packs George (strong newcomer Elliott Heffernan) off to the peaceful countryside on a train full of kids, only for him to jump to freedom and embark on an odyssey back to Stepney Green. His episodic adventures (there’s a hint of ‘boy’s own’ excitement, without ever trivialising the trauma) are intercut with Rita’s grief, day-to-day survival and search for her son after she learns of his disappearance

Exquisitely lensed in a muted palette with suffused lighting and a soft-focus sheen (especially the pastoral scenes) that’s rudely shattered by some devastatingly immediate set-pieces, Blitz feels like a gloriously old-fashioned epic shot through a modern lens. 

McQueen potently handles themes of race, class and gender: the general vibe of warm community spirit is punctured by officious male factory bosses, and by a white family pegging up sheets to section off people of colour while sheltering in a London Underground section. Stephen Graham’s band of looters mercilessly ransack corpses for jewellery, and likeable characters die suddenly.

And yet our East Enders carry on, clearing debris, gathering around the wireless, and singing in pubs. Flashbacks allow for jolts of excitement – a rowdily sensual party scene full of thrusting dancing recalls the sublime Lovers Rock episode from McQueen’s Small Axe anthology – and also fill in the blanks regarding George’s absent father.

As the traumas pile one on top of another, George’s mindset slips into a heightened, surreal space, allowing us to bear witness to a symphony of distress. But the human spirit will not be extinguished, and McQueen celebrates it without recourse to sentiment.

Blitz is released in select UK cinemas and US theaters on November 1 before streaming on Apple TV+ on November 22. 

For more upcoming movies, check out our list of 2024 movie release dates.