Do Movies not Need Characters?

This seems like the closest a mainstream movie has gotten to eliminating the concept of characters from the movie. The characterization is minimal and even moreso the development of character RELATIONSHIPS is almost non-existent. My IMAX 70MM theater was packed like I think it hasn't been since Force Awakens and there was no eruption of applause at the end, which I usually hear from even smaller crowds on most first showings of movies. The audience didn't feel emotionally moved.

I think the actors do a good job of creating some sense of identification solely with their performances and expressions, with Tom Hardy being the standout. Mark Rylance is the only one who really gets a chance to do it with dialogue.

But I think the approach was more of an interesting experiment than a cinematic success story. If James Cameron had taken this approach with Titanic, the movie would have cut out the first hour or so and not have been nearly as successful. Cameron introduced us to fully fleshed out characters with their own traditional cinematic character arcs because he believed that movies need that. I think Cameron was right. At times, Dunkirk feels more like a history lesson than it does a traditional movie. We're being asked to witness historical events, but we're not able to really feel them, because there aren't well-developed characters we can identify with to use as an emotional entry point into the story. There is a difference between watching characters die and caring if they die.