Dir. Janus Metz Pedersen, Denmark, 2010, 105 mins, in Danish with English subtitles
Review by Francesca Neagle
“You have guns; they have guns…And if they win, they’ll cut my throat.”
A local madrasa teacher politely and firmly declines to cooperate in answering questions about the Taliban, posed by one of the freshly-stationed Danish soldiers in Helmand province. “Armadillo”, named after the Afghanistan base he and his fellow soldiers are stationed at, is a documentary that provoked furious political debate about foreign policy in director Metz’s native Denmark, and even knocked blockbuster Prince of Persia off the top spot at the box office there last year. Yet the film itself is inherently unsensational. It’s understated, and contains relatively little actual combat. Instead it focuses on human interaction, and the addictive nature of war. And although the gunfire scenes are powerful, it’s the focus on humanity that stands out: The experiences of the local Afghan population, whose homes and livestock are often destroyed in battle; the perceptions of the terrified families of the soldiers back home and of the soldiers themselves as they fight their enemy.
Metz and cinematographer Lars Skree are embedded with a group of young soldiers on their first tour of duty. As the platoon begins to fight increasingly fierce battles with the largely unseen Taliban, we watch the effect of modern warfare on these soldiers unfold. It’s clear that the enemy isn’t just the Taliban. These soldiers are fighting to retain the sense of idealism, which prompted their decision to join the army and defend the civilian populace. The repeated reference to the idea of “making a difference” and the individual personalities that come across in this narration-free film, make it even harder not to be disturbed by the soldiers’ differing attitudes in the aftermath of the most pivotal scene. Although the soldiers were later cleared of any wrongdoing, they were accused of misconduct on a night patrol in which five Taliban insurgents were killed and their bodies manhandled, – it is tough to watch. Back at base, the men share jokes and banter like a sports team celebrating a match victory in a locker room. It is suggested that those who have been killed have been “liquidated” or executed once they had already been rendered non-dangerous. But we know these men and we’ve seen this banter in the camp earlier: after playing video games, after watching porn, after making emotionally-charged phone calls home. What we’ve already seen of them counter-balances and contextualises the brutality.
But it is nonetheless clearly difficult for Metz to portray ambiguity and independence in his filmmaking, as he faces the same life and death situations as the men he is filming alongside. Metz is fighting a battle of his own: that of bias. Real warfare isn’t usually seen on the big screen. Gunfire exchange, grenades, military manoeuvres…these are usually reserved for news bulletins or fictional war movies. Embedding with troops to document real experiences objectively is generally the reserve of journalists. So because the footage is perhaps more expertly photographed than that which is captured by news agencies, and enjoys the benefits of post-production and other cinematic devices such as a controlled musical soundtrack, “Armadillo” has an almost “Apocalypse Now” feel about it. It feels dangerously manipulative on occasion but is nonetheless clearly intended to be open to interpretation. It certainly leaves one questioning one’s own attitude to war – and perhaps that is the most important thing.
