Parts of this blog were previously posted on the website I used to write for, but it's been tweaked a little. The men in my family were big into war films. They were also big into westerns, but some thing's just don't take. But war movies can be so much more than just about the battles. Some of the films I've listed here may not be really considered war films, but there is an element of war about them. These are some of my favorite films, in no particular order.
I can't stop talking about this documentary series on Netflix. It relates the story of five big name Hollywood directors - Frank Capra, John Ford, John Huston, George Stevens, and William Wyler - who, like so many actors at the time, volunteered for the army. They immediately began making propaganda films. The films were used to get the American public to back the war in multiple ways - by signing up, by buying war bonds, etc. What began innocuously turned into some of the most amazing, gritty film work ever. George Stevens was at Normandy for the D-Day landings and, more importantly, for the liberation of Auschwitz. It's his footage they showed at the Nuremberg trials to convict the Nazi higher-ups. John Huston recreated a battle so realistically it could fool anyone, and his recording of a hospital for injured servicemen afterwards is probably the first time the general public has seen what we now call PTSD. When the directors returned, they made the films that solidified them in the classic film canon. The film footage shown here had a profound effect on the five directors - Stephen Spielberg, Guillermo del Toro, Francis Ford Coppola, Lawrence Kasdan, and Paul Greengrass - who narrate the series. It will have a profound impact on you if you give it a try. This is basically a look inside the minds of some of our classic movie directors, and if you're a movie nerd like me, it's a must see.
It's a frustrating fact that history classes in high school gloss over huge swathes of actual history. When I was in school, we learned very little, if anything, about the role of African-American soldiers in the civil war. (I may be wrong, because for me history classes were second only to math classes as the best place to take a nap.) When I graduated from college and began to see history as not just a regurgitation of dates and names, it became so much more interesting. History does involve that, but the importance of history lies in the interrelation of events. And that's why I love a good war film. When they're done right, they show you the connections.
Glory opened my eyes to the fact that these men, many former slaves, risked their lives by returning to the places that enslaved them to fight for the right for others to be free. We all love to say that freedom isn't free. These men lived that and they died for that. And for the longest time their story was untold. This film has some incredible, powerful performances. Just thinking of Denzel Washington in one scene can bring tears to my eyes. In fact this film solidified Washington as one of my favorite actors. Morgan Freeman and Matthew Broderick also make this a must see to any best list, in my opinion.
Not all war films need to have guns blazing and troops marching. This beautiful, haunting film shows the effects of the war far from the front lines, and puts the internal battle of just one man in the forefront. I remember seeing this at a late showing right around Christmas. The theatre was full of older people. It didn't really sink in until late in the film that many of the people around us may have either lived through or lost loved ones in the concentration camps. This film shows us the power of the individual in the face of great tyranny. Oscar Schindler (Liam Neeson) was an incredibly charming and ballsy individual, though, something many of us lack. It's almost completely in black and white. I'm not sure if that's meant to evoke the newsreels of the day, or simply to add a poignant backdrop to the singular splash of color Spielberg does use. Even the music - the theme played on a solitary violin by Itzak Perlman - still makes me weep. It's just one of the most moving films I've ever seen, and it's one that should be seen by everyone.
I'm not sure how much Americans know about World War I. If ever there was an exercise in futility, it was trench warfare. Gallipoli is a peninsula in Turkey that is right at the mouth of the Dardanelles Straits. ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) were sent to attack the Ottoman forces there. All across Europe the armies, in their infinite wisdom, constructed massive miles-long trenches meant to protect the troops, and it kind of worked, until it failed, and then it failed disastrously. They got flooded when it rained, causing all sorts of illnesses, and trapped the soldiers when the enemy used one of the most insidious weapons ever, mustard gas. The main problem with the trenches is that in order to fight, you had to get out of the trench at some point, and that put you in danger. This is the story of two ANZAC soldiers who became best friends, Mark Lee as Archy Hamilton and Mel Gibson as Frank Dunne, who try desperately to make it out of this particular hell alive. The ending is heartbreaking, made even more so by the addition of a lovely, evocative piece of music by Tomaso Albinoni called "Adagio in G," which can be heard in the trailer above.
American troops go into a lot of dangerous places for a lot of different reasons. Our presence isn't always appreciated. We were in Somalia to back UN forces who were trying to get food to people who were starving. That's what we were told. And why wouldn't they want us there? As anything with war, the explanation is complicated. On one run things went south. Helicopters were shot out of the sky and suddenly what should have been an easy day turned into a desperate rescue mission. The action is tense and the film is gritty, giving you a real sense of the fear and desperation these men were feeling. I watched this so much I probably wore out the DVD. It's where I discovered one of my favorite actors, Jason Isaacs, whose performance is amazing. But then every performance in this film is amazing.
For the noncombatants like me out there, this is probably the closest we'll (hopefully) ever come to what it's like to go into battle, and it looks like this year's
Dunkirk will be following in its footsteps. The first few minutes show American troops landing at Normandy. It is loud, frightening, chaotic, and tragic. After that, the film shifts from the macro level to the micro as the story becomes about finding one GI in the haystack of the European theatre. Spielberg shows us the remanants of war; what happens to the civilians caught in the crossfire, the lingering enemies that hide in the rubble. It also shows men risking their lives for one of their own. I could have included this film or
Band of Brothers, because Shakespeare had it right when he wrote that rousing speech in
Henry V: "For he that sheds his blood to-day with me shall be my brother." It was true in the 1400s and it's true today. The bond of the battlehardened is unbreakable. Just knowing one soldier can live another day lends hope to all.
Maybe the best reason to watch this German film is to underst how universal the fighting experience is. The majority of the action here is played out onboard a submarine. We see the claustrophobia, the boredom, and the terror when the ship seems about to succumb to the pressure of the water around it. We also see the horror that accompanies taking another life, even when that life belongs to your enemy.
I just recently watched this and I found it really moving. It's the story of Desmond Doss. A Seventh Day Adventist, he refuses to carry a gun into battle. It almost gets him sent to prison, and it definitely gets him labeled a coward by the men in his company. He's eventually given the role of medic, which is what he initially signed up for. He and his fellow soldiers are charged with taking Hacksaw Ridge in Okinawa. After his unit retreated, Doss stayed atop the hill, searching for wounded soldiers that he could help. He winched down 75 injured men, men that would have died if not for Doss. It contains some of the grisliest battle scenes I've ever seen. Yes, it has religious overtones, after all, if it weren't for Doss's beliefs and convictions he would have been any other soldiers in the troop. But I see it as more than that. It's the power of the individual standing on his principles and performing incredible feats of heroism. It's one voice shouting in the wilderness and creating a hurricane. In today's world it sometimes feels like there's no point. What power does one person have when facing a sea of opposition?
Hacksaw Ridge answers that question.
I've written a whole blog on this one, so you can read that if you like. Suffice it to say, this is a beautifully shot, poignant film. I love the quiet simplicity of it, a rare thing in movies today, where you see the action progress without pages and pages of dialogue being thrown out at you. The adage is true that a picture is worth a thousand words, and Nolan tells this story more visually than anything else, which in my opinion, makes it that much more powerful. I've been saying it since the summer, it's at least a best picture nominee, but if it doesn't win cinematography, something's wrong. I haven't seen another film so amazingly beautiful as this. Granted, I haven't seen nearly as many films this year as I'd like, but I feel pretty safe making this assertion.
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