The first thing to say about Armadillo is that the main reason for watching it is because of how impressive the level of access is throughout the film. Following a group of Danish kids who ship out to Afghanistan (and this is mostly what they are – kids), the camera is always very close to what is happening, going on patrols, having meetings with locals and being right there when bullets start flying; even with so much footage from front lines in the news media these days, this footage is still impressive and really well captured.
We see first-hand the boredom and the action and the reality of the fight and the "hearts and minds" battle. It engages and the film is well spread with action which is tense and dramatic, but the main thing it struggles with as a documentary is having a point to make. I suppose in this very partisan world, there is something to be said for the fact that the film doesn't seem to have a particular agenda but it also gives us a rather big weakness, which is that it does document what happens and what happens is nothing that we don't already know really well. We know that war affects the (mostly young) men who fight it, we know that civilians are regularly hurt, killed or just affected by the war around them and we know that in the heat of battle things are never as clear as they are later. The film shows us all these things but, because it doesn't have an agenda, it doesn't really explore or push them often – it mostly just documents them.
So, for an example there is a clash between young men trained to kill who are excited for action on one hand but yet also have to be controlled and stick to rules of engagement. This is touched on by the guys themselves but only briefly, while other issues get the same non-invasive treatment that is engaging but because it is quite passive it lacks an edge that other more structured films have. Indeed this weakness is compounded by the feeling that we know a lot of what we already see thanks to the news coverage on events involving soldiers going too far, or being changed by their experiences etc, so the content of the film isn't actually that new or insightful, leaving the degree of intimacy to be the main selling point.
For sure this is an impressive aspect of the film and probably worth watching it for, but it is hard not to want a bit more in terms of edge, direction and content on top of the strong yet passive documentation.
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