At the time of its release, Dunkirk was praised as one of the best films about World War II ever made. It was added to a long list of films about the war, and was praised for its realism, its simple depiction of heroism and sacrifice, and its artful visual effects. Christopher Nolan chose to focus on a very specific part of the war and even said, "I didn’t view this as a war film, I viewed it as a survival story."
There have been many films devoted to looking more closely at both the events surrounding World War II as well as the war itself. In a comprehensive list released in 2017 by Esquire, editors listed Grave of the Fireflies, Schindler's List, Casablanca, The Bridge on the River Kwai, and Saving Private Ryan as among the top films about the war ever made. Another list for Time Out London states in its introduction, "The cinema of World War II is gritty, glorious and seriously extensive. There were so many great war movies made during the war itself, it's a wonder anyone was available to do any actual fighting. Since then, each decade has spun its own take on this epic conflict, mining nuance from what's often depicted as a black-and-white struggle between good and evil."
While the Second World War took place in the 1940s, films exploring its complexities are still popular to this day, with Dunkirk exemplifying the popularity of the topic. In an article for The Guardian in 2014, Andrew Pulver sought to analyze just what about World War II makes it such popular fare for cinema, noting that other wars that have taken place since hardly have the same cinematic popularity that World War II does. He writes, "Cottrell Boyce suggests that, since 9/11 and the Iraq War, rather than seeming a "remote" issue, "war is how we do business now." For Matthew Sweet, broadcaster and author of The West End Front, it's equally to do with what he calls "a growing sentimentality about the war." "It's the generation that had initially ignored their grandparents' war stories, but now have those Keep Calm and Carry On posters stuck up in their office cubicles, or who have bought those Boden union jack bags. It's a sentimentality that allows people to pursue a dream of the war, and which enables their fantasies and preoccupations about it. I'm afraid it's a very empty engagement."
