This is perhaps the film’s greatest achievement: it rejects the seductive rhythm of combat

Warfare strips away everything that usually defines the war movie genre: the exposition, the character arcs, the soundtrack swells, the slow-motion deaths, the tidy conclusions.

It offers, instead, a claustrophobic, unbearably honest account of one unit's time in Ramadi , Iraq , on November 11, 2006 .

John Maclionn : Warfare's first half is a study in dread. The film forces the audience to experience the inertia of war: not as cinematic pause, but as terrifying stasis before everything breaks.

He says it's rare for a war film to let the audience feel the psychological toll of inaction, not just action.

In a country where less than 1 percent of the population served in Iraq or Afghanistan , Warfare is a jolt to the system.