Alex Garland and A24 invade Iraq with the harrowing trailer for Warfare

Garland and his Civil War military adviser, Ray Mendoza, are no longer playing wargames. 

By Matt Schimkowitz  |  December 16, 2024 | 8:00am
Photo courtesy of A24
Film News Warfare
Alex Garland and A24 invade Iraq with the harrowing trailer for Warfare

Following up on the domestic fantasies of last year’s Civil War, A24, Alex Garland, and Ray Mendoza are doing another tour of duty. Co-written and co-directed by Garland and Mendoza, Warfare tells Mendoza’s actual war story as a Navy SEAL in Iraq. Mendoza, who served as Garland’s military supervisor on Civil War, earned a Silver Star for his leadership in a sniper overwatch mission in Ramadi, Iraq.  Here, the directors embed the audience in his lived experience with 1917-style immediacy with a real-time true story about modern military combat circa 2006. Understandably, the trailer is harrowing, filled with moments of violence, bloodshed, and mayhem.

Here’s the synopsis:

Written and Directed by Iraq War veteran Ray Mendoza and Alex Garland (Civil War, 28 Days Later), Warfare embeds audiences with a platoon of American Navy SEALs in the home of an Iraqi family, overwatching the movement of US forces through insurgent territory. A visceral, boots-on-the-ground story of modern warfare, told like never before: in real time and based on the memory of the people who lived it.

Warfare enlists a who’s who of up-and-coming stars caked in dirt, sand, and viscera. Led by Reservation Dogs D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Warfare has a battalion of TV, streaming, and film stars all sporting the same haircut, including Will Poulter (The Bear), Cosmo Jarvis (Shōgun), Kit Connor (Heartstopper), Finn Bennett (True Detective: Night Country), Michael Gandolfini (The Many Saints Of Newark), Noah Centineo (The Recruit), with Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things), and Charles Melton (May December).

Warfare opens in 2025.

 
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