Review of Flags of Our Fathers (2006) by Markbayer — 08 Dec 2006

Director and American icon Clint Eastwood follows up Million Dollar Baby, which was controversial but shouldn't have been, with a surprisingly subversive critique of America's participation in the Last Good War that even managed to hoodwink ultrapatriotic right-wing movie reviewer Michael Medved (Baby's prime and most notorious detractor) into uncritically awarding it three and a half stars.

(Maybe it's the title.) While Eastwood and writers Paul Haggis and William Broyles Jr. never mention Iraq, the parallels are certainly there for all to see: their movie's vision of World War II is one where funding and public support are controlled and manipulated by (largely fraudulent) PR gimmicks, and both Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman are shown to have historical predecessors.

Ultimately, this is all a lot more interesting to discuss than to actually watch: Eastwood's storytelling approach derails itself with a tortuous, serpentine flashback-within-flashback structure of the kind that occasionally works in romantic dramas and spy thrillers but virtually NEVER in war movies, as the poor reception given to the similarly-structured 1944 Humphrey Bogart French Resistance drama Passage to Marseille (made by the people behind Casablanca) will bear out.

(Saving Private Ryan wisely limited itself to making the entire movie a simple journey through only one character's past; perhaps Steven Spielberg, doing co-producer duty here, was trying to top himself.

If so, quit while you're ahead!) Eastwood's use of decolorized cinematography in his depiction of the struggle for Iwo Jima is visually effective but nowhere near as gripping or as frightening as Ryan's opening battle sequence, and the use of highly unconvincing special effects and props to depict battlefield gore doesn't work at all.

Actors as frequently bland as Jesse Bradford, Ryan Phillippe and Paul Walker, playing servicemen, do nothing to intensify our identification with them, and the only time Flags of Our Fathers really hits the mark is in its fascinating portrayal of Pima Indian Ira Hayes (movingly played by Adam Beach) who generally accepted racist jokes about squaws and wigwams from his fellow Marines as good-natured male bonding but couldn't handle the official and unofficial racism of the folks back home, and because of that AND the knowledge that he was ordered to promulgate a fraud for the sake of building support for the war and selling war bonds, became one of World War II's most poignant psychological casualties.

In the last couple of months, we moviegoers have been treated to two inspirational football dramas, two period pieces involving magicians, and THREE films in which a real-life character is so fascinating and beautifully played that he just dwarfs all the other stuff surrounding him.