When Is a War Movie Not a War Movie?

Caught Flags of Our Fathers the other day. It's definitely among the most, "Hmmm" war movies I've ever seen (and infinitely better than The Thin Red Line, which tried to be a "Hmmm" war movie and ended up being a "Wow, this is boring" war movie).

One of the trailers was for the Dreamgirls movie. I'm not that familiar with the musical, but I have heard/seen a recording of Jennifer Holliday doing "And I Am Telling You". Like most people tied into the movie scene, I had heard that they'd been having problems casting that role in the film, eventually deciding on some chick from American Idol. At the end of the trailer a clip of her singing the song plays.

It wasn't bad. It was ok. It sounded pretty. That's sort of the problem.

Lyrically, "And I Am Telling You" is not a pretty song. It does not express pretty sentiments. It is not a sad song, it is not a happy song, per se, though there are moments of both emotions and many more in its 4 minutes. But the one thing it is not is fucking pretty. And there is, or should be no room in art for people who only want to look and sound pretty all the time. This is why ingenue roles, when badly written and performed, are boring: because pretty people, people whose every action and move are calculated to always present themselves as pretty, are boring. There can't be anything interesting going on because every fiber of their being is focused on being pretty; there's no room for the dirty and beautiful little details that make people neat.

Anyways, Flags. It's an interesting movie. Enough has been said of the fact that there are no blacks in Eastwood's depiction of Iwo Jima. Well, there is this one shot of them on the boat which feels somewhat random, but you don't really see any in the combat sequences. In his defense, black Marine units at Iwo Jima were apparently relegated to support duty, and the movie focuses most specifically on one platoon, the one which raised the second (and photographically immortalized) flag over Mount Suribachi. Personally, I don't think it matters.

More than anything else, Flags is about myth making. I suppose, from a certain point of view, that means it's about deceit, and it is. Even the picture itself, arguably the most iconic war photograph ever, is a lie; the first flag to be raised had a picture taken of its raising, but the film was exposed and ruined when the camera was dropped as the group the photographer was with was attacked. The picture that survives today was of a second flag being raised, one to replace the first flag, and it was the men from that raising that were hailed as the "Heroes of Iwo Jima".

Well, the ones that survived the next 20 some odd days of the battle, that is, which turned out to be three.

Ostensibly, Ryan Phillipe is the emotional lead of the movie, but it's the Native American character, Adam Beach, who's really the most interesting, I think. Beach returns against his will to a country that hails him as a hero yet discriminates against him; everyone calls him "Chief", senators make insulting remarks about his heritage and so forth. It is as fascinating as it is real and saddening, the dichotomy: you are called a hero, but you are never allowed to forget that you are subhuman, that you are and always will be, less than white. Even the other two soldiers are called heroes, but only insofar and for as long as it benefits the government and society. Like all heroes, like all icons, they are used, they are exploited, and eventually they are discarded to make their own way through the rest of their lives.

Perhaps that is inevitable, perhaps that is the way of things. Is this a result of the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately, instant gratification-seeking climate that exists in the world? Or is it unique to soldiers, is it because they remind us of things and actions that no person should have to do and remember?

There are numerous instances of savage violence that are depicted and alluded to in the movie. But Eastwood isn't trying to demonize the Japanese; early on it is explicitly said that there is no black and white in war, that no-one wins and all those terrible, terrible cliches. But, like all cliches, they're true. I wonder how other audience members reacted; the film cuts together the Marines advancing towards the Japanese guns slowly emerging ahead, behind and above, eventually opening up when the Marines are most exposed - which is exactly what happened. Viscerally, your first impulse is to side with the Americans, those good old boys being ambushed by the cowardly Japanese. But what if the Marines were, say, British colonials? And the people preparing to ambush them were members of the Revolutionary Army (ring any bells?)? What then? What if it was the Japanese landing on Hawaii, what if the American Navy had been battered and worn down, what if 22,000 American troops were told losing Hawaii meant an invasion of the continental United States, and they were facing the largest amphibious operation ever, 30,000 marines landing in a day and 40,000 more in the days to come?

What then? Would those same stealthily emerging guns be seen as the guns of defiance, of American ingenuity and honor in the face of a no-win situation, a modern day Thermopylae? And do people watching the movie think that? Or do they think, "Those scummy Japs, they don't even have the guts to get into a fair fight."

I wonder...and I sort of feel sad for the ones who think the latter.

All in all, I'm probably going to pick up the book. I'm also really looking forward to Eastwood's next movie, Letters From Iwo Jima, which will focus on the Japanese side of the battle and is intended to be the bookend to Flags.