Flags Of Our Father (15.)
Directed by Clint Eastwood.
Starring Ryan Phillippe, Adam Beach, Jesse Bradford, Barry Pepper, Paul Walker, Jamie Bell. 135 mins
It’s an Eastwood film but it’s produced by Spielberg and falls securely within the remit of his on going mission to make sure that the simple heroism of the ordinary men that fought World War II is never forgotten. After Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers, Flags moves the operation on to the Pacific theatre.
It’s the story behind a photo, the iconic shot of six faceless marines planting the Stars and Stripes over Iwo Jima. For the three soldiers still alive when the battle for a tiny Japanese held rock is over, that photo would be a ticket home, the government sending the “heroes” around the country to support the push for people to buy War Bonds.
It’s lazy to compare it to Saving Private Ryan but the parallels are so close you just can’t ignore them. They’re both stories of soldiers sent home for propaganda purposes, both feature brutal and ferociously intense beach landing scenes and both celebrate a taciturn low key bravery. They even look much the same. The battle sequences are shot using colour desaturization which strips the image of most bright colours and leaves it close to black and white. As in Ryan, this is in sharp contrast to the full palette of the domestic scenes back in the States. The difference is that this is on a larger scale; with its massive shots of the fleet and the aerial battles there are more CGI shots here than in the average Sci fi movie.
But Clint is a very different film maker to Spielberg. Spielberg grabs the audience by the hand and drags them along towards what he wants to show them; Eastwood sits back and gently tries to coax the viewer towards his objective.
Flags has a challenging narrative structure and the busy script by Paul Haggis and William Broyles Jr pulls lots of tricks. It switches back and forth between the battle scenes and the three soldiers struggling with being hailed as heroes in their homeland when so many of their comrades are dead. Sequences are introduced early on and then left hanging, waiting on a pay off in the second half. There’s even a little Citizen Kane nod, with a faceless and unidentified researcher trying to find out the significance of a man’s last words.
The aim is to try and chart the way the events on Iwo Jima resonate through people’s life and those of their off spring but it tends to dissipate the impact of the battle scenes. Eastwood allows the narrative drive to fritter away in the closing scenes because that’s true to the experiences of his characters.
It’s a thoroughly decent, honourable and honest movie but it’s like a brisk walk over old ground. If Ryan had never been made we’d be hailing it a masterpiece, but now it feels a bit redundant.
American Sniper review
Letters of Iwo Jima review
Invictus review
J Edgar review
Hereafter review
Gran Torino review
Directed by Clint Eastwood.
Starring Ryan Phillippe, Adam Beach, Jesse Bradford, Barry Pepper, Paul Walker, Jamie Bell. 135 mins
It’s an Eastwood film but it’s produced by Spielberg and falls securely within the remit of his on going mission to make sure that the simple heroism of the ordinary men that fought World War II is never forgotten. After Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers, Flags moves the operation on to the Pacific theatre.
It’s the story behind a photo, the iconic shot of six faceless marines planting the Stars and Stripes over Iwo Jima. For the three soldiers still alive when the battle for a tiny Japanese held rock is over, that photo would be a ticket home, the government sending the “heroes” around the country to support the push for people to buy War Bonds.
It’s lazy to compare it to Saving Private Ryan but the parallels are so close you just can’t ignore them. They’re both stories of soldiers sent home for propaganda purposes, both feature brutal and ferociously intense beach landing scenes and both celebrate a taciturn low key bravery. They even look much the same. The battle sequences are shot using colour desaturization which strips the image of most bright colours and leaves it close to black and white. As in Ryan, this is in sharp contrast to the full palette of the domestic scenes back in the States. The difference is that this is on a larger scale; with its massive shots of the fleet and the aerial battles there are more CGI shots here than in the average Sci fi movie.
But Clint is a very different film maker to Spielberg. Spielberg grabs the audience by the hand and drags them along towards what he wants to show them; Eastwood sits back and gently tries to coax the viewer towards his objective.
Flags has a challenging narrative structure and the busy script by Paul Haggis and William Broyles Jr pulls lots of tricks. It switches back and forth between the battle scenes and the three soldiers struggling with being hailed as heroes in their homeland when so many of their comrades are dead. Sequences are introduced early on and then left hanging, waiting on a pay off in the second half. There’s even a little Citizen Kane nod, with a faceless and unidentified researcher trying to find out the significance of a man’s last words.
The aim is to try and chart the way the events on Iwo Jima resonate through people’s life and those of their off spring but it tends to dissipate the impact of the battle scenes. Eastwood allows the narrative drive to fritter away in the closing scenes because that’s true to the experiences of his characters.
It’s a thoroughly decent, honourable and honest movie but it’s like a brisk walk over old ground. If Ryan had never been made we’d be hailing it a masterpiece, but now it feels a bit redundant.
American Sniper review
Letters of Iwo Jima review
Invictus review
J Edgar review
Hereafter review
Gran Torino review
