(2006, 132 min) Clint Eastwood tells the story of the six men who raised the flag on Iwo Jima in February of 1945, a turning point of World War II. The film centers on the three surviving flag raisers: Rene Gagnon (Jesse Bradford), John Bradley (Ryan Phillippe), and Ira Hayes (Adam Beach).
These men were canonized as true heroes on their return to the States, all because of a famous, iconic photograph. The guiding principal concept of the screenplay by William Broyles (Apollo 13, Jarhead) and Paul Haggis (Crash, Million Dollar Baby) seems to be the disconnect between the image of heroism and the reality of the moment (wartime or otherwise). Eastwood’s cinema paradoxically reinvents the same situation by positing the "real" depiction of war events leading up to and after the photograph was taken. Combat footage is frank, brutal and relentless, signaling the state of the art of the war film.
The return to the States is the pivotal theme at the heart of the screenplay. One soldier, Ira, being Native American, is singled out to illustrate the embedded racism of the era, probably supplied by Haggis, reminiscent of the hit-you-over-the head literalism of Crash. The script lets loose with a kind of skewed Capraesque like narrative viewed through a contemporary filter of cynicism.
As the flashbacks continue, the film descends into darker realms of the human spirit, providing a resonance lacking in the first half. The inner conflicts experienced by Ira identify him as a man at odds with his fellow countrymen and his own sense of self. In war, the mettle of a soldier is tested and forged. In peacetime, away from the battlefront, the forces of disassociation set upon man’s frail spirit, conjuring imaginary demons.
Eastwood and company successfully manage to convey these complexities throughout the second half of Flags of Our Fathers.
© TLA Entertainment Group
1 comment:
I never quite feel Eastwood plucks his loose strings in harmony, though.
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