En la mira del francotirador

If you expect a war movie full of action then you should just skip The Wall. If you expect a war movie with a lot of different characters then you should just skip The Wall. But if you're in to watch a war movie with psychological warfare, where a sniper plays with the life of a couple American soldiers then The Wall is worth giving it a shot. Because that's what you get. Aaron Taylor-Johnson is the main character and you will almost watch him for the entire movie. His mate played by John Cena has a much smaller role. The other big role is for Laith Nakli playing the sniper but him you won't even see, he's just a voice in an earphone. So not much characters, not much action, but still enough suspense to make it an interesting war movie to watch.

This is a pretty simple movie, really. One man, a wall, a voice on the radio and an unending tension. That simplicity presents a strong challenge though. Aaron Taylor-Johnson has to carry the whole thing pretty much by himself and he does a great job.

It's an entertaining movie, well acted and paced. It's good, just not quite great.

I liked this film partly because it's different. Most military films have guns, bombs and explosions but this focused on the tension. Pretty simple idea and very cheap to make but that's a good thing. Well worth a watch

What starts out as an insular, straight-forward war thriller soon becomes a somewhat sillier, 'Phonebooth (2002)'-esque affair that's really only carried by our two leads' willingness to get down and dirty in the desert sand as they scramble for cover from the chatty sniper pinning them down. The pace in 'The Wall (2017)' is usually slow but there are several genuinely suspenseful and otherwise more energetic moments peppered throughout. The general design of the piece is also relatively realistic - including some stellar sound design that has the crack of each distant shot echo out only after the splat of its impact. This means that there are tangible stakes in almost every scene, even when there isn't any real entertainment. 6/10

It's effectively a remake of Phone Booth transposed to the Iraqi desert. It works very well. Very tense, very involving and very watchable. Recommended.