Review of The Thin Red Line (1998) by Olivierpiel — 25 Oct 2019
Terrence Malick is probably one of the few American cinematographers who understand Tarkovsky's "sculpting in/of time" definition of cinema and the imperative to infuse poetry in the medium. He understands cinema is not there to "tell a story". That's what books do.
He smartly understands that to show the inanity of war, and existence as a whole, he can't go down the easy way, that is the ultra-realistic, audience-pandering and shall we say almost pornographic "saving private Ryan" way.
However, he struggles to coherently bring his very good ideas to the screen. Too many voice overs show that he needs words, as a crutch, to help viewers understand his philosophy on war.
Few scenes are really "beautiful" or will stay with us for long, as Apocalypse Now managed to do. It seems his genius was to cast Jim Caviezel - aka Jesus of passion of the Christ- as his main character, a modern Alexei Karamazov, a soldier-monk, whose blue gaze just illuminates each of his scene with a form of saintly beatitude and echoes his scene in the lagoon.
The vast blue yonder, not the thin red line....
This review of The Thin Red Line (1998) was written by Olivierpiel on 25 Oct 2019.
The Thin Red Line has generally received very positive reviews.
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