For the letter V, I choose a movie that exemplifies war movies that are made for pure entertainment. "Von Ryan's Express" is a movie that traumatized many Baby Boom boys because of the death of the main character. No war movie lover can watch it over again and not urge Ryan to run faster!
I chose "Unknown Soldier" (2017) partly to recognize Finnish war movies. This subgenre is a strong one. And the movie made my 100 Best War Movies. “The Unknown Soldier” is considered to be the greatest Finnish war movie. Directed by Aku Louhimies, it is the most successful Finnish movie of the 21st Century and the most expensive Finnish film ever. The movie is based on a famous novel by Vaino Linna and it is the third version of the book. The production used over 3,000 extras, some provided by the Finnish Defence Forces. The main actors were put through a boot camp to learn wilderness skills, how to cross-country ski, and how to stay warm in the winter.
“The
Messenger” is a film directed by Oren Moverman. It was his directorial debut.
He also co-wrote the screenplay. He was inspired to make the movie after pondering
the unseen aspects of the Iraq War. Specifically, he was upset about President
George W. Bush’s ban on pictures of soldier’s coffins returning to America. The
film had a low budget, but did not recoup its cost. It was critically acclaimed
and was lauded at a bunch of film festivals. Woody Harrelson got an Academy Award
nomination for Best Supporting Actor and also a Golden Globes nomination. The
original screenplay by Moverman and Alessandro Camon had an Oscar nomination.
The movie was on several critics’ top ten lists for 2009 films.
Staff
Sergeant Will Montgomery (Ben Foster) is back in the States after being wounded
in Iraq. He is suffering from PTSD and an eye injury. And he is depressed
because his girl did not wait for him to come home. At this low moment in his
life he is assigned to Casualty Notification. It’s unclear whether his
commanding officer doesn’t like him, but it is the type of job you would give
your worst enemy. Montgomery will be working with Captain Tony Stone (Harrelson).
Stone explains to Montgomery and the audience about how the system works. There
are strict rules for how to handle breaking the news to a loved one. For instance,
there is to be no physical contact with the grieving person. You can’t even hug
them. And you better be prepared for any of a variety of reactions to the
terrible news you deliver. To show the variety, the movie has them making six
notifications. In one, the wife and mother are so distraught that the mother
slaps Stone. He does not respond because he knows this is a common reaction. In
another, a father throws things at Montgomery and asks “Why aren’t you there?
Why aren’t you dead? Fucking coward!” By the time they get to the sixth one,
you will feel that any job in the Army has to be better than this. To avoid
being a total downer, the script has Montgomery develop a relationship with a
widow. The other relationship the movie explores is the relationship between
Stone and Montgomery. Not surprisingly, they don’t get along at first.
Montgomery has been hardened by his job and Montgomery does not want to be
doing it. The men gradually bond as you would expect.
I watched this movie for Memorial Day and it certainly fits the day. There have been other movies about fallen heroes, like “Taking Chance” and “Gardens of Stone”. And we have the famous scene in “Saving Private Ryan” when the Army vehicle pulls up to Mrs. Ryan’s house. But we have not had a movie that deals with the notification process and its effects on the officers who have to perform the task.The closest we have come is “We Were Soldiers” with its scenes where Mrs. Moore delivers the telegrams to her friends. Ironically, I found that I had more of a reaction to the notification of soldiers’ deaths than I have had for most of the movies I have seen that show soldiers dying. War movie lovers seldom see the aftermath of those deaths. Seeing how people react to the unexpected horrible news that will knock their lives off track makes one wonder how you might react under those circumstances. Would you be strong like the man who learns of his daughter’s death or would you break down? How would you treat the men who told you the terrible news? The movie is very thought-provoking.
It benefits from the pairing of Harrelson and Foster. They are both excellent. The pair are in virtually every scene together. They develop their characters in their car rides and their trips to bars. Both have flawed personalities, but they both take their job seriously. Both are suffering from PTSD. Stone has PTSD, not from war experiences (he is haunted by his not being in combat), but from his job. The Casualty Notification department offers counseling for the aggrieved, but I wonder if they have counseling for the notifiers. They should. It’s a very stressful job.
“The Messenger” is a better movie than “Taking Chance” and “Gardens of Stone”. It is a movie that is anti-war, but with a different argument for why war is terrible. You see the reactions of loved ones to the loss of a husband or child in a war that did not have to be fought. (That’s my opinion. The movie does not take a stance on the war.) And you can’t watch this movie without feeling empathy for the men who have to perform this soul-crushing duty. Unlike “We Were Soldiers”, Stone and Montgomery are strangers delivering the news to people they don’t know, but people who will haunt their memories. As they do theirs.
GRADE = B
Here is my list of the top ten movies appropriate for Memorial Day.
10. The Story of G.I. Joe– this movie includes the famous death of Captain Waskow (Walker in the film)
9. 84 Charlie MoPic – a long range patrol in Vietnam is whittled down by the enemy
8. Bataan – a classic last stand by a heterogeneous squad in WWII
7. Gardens of Stone– focuses on the men who are in charge of interment at Arlington National Cemetery during the Vietnam War
6. Taking Chance - a Marine is tasked with returning a body to the man’s family
5. Last Flag Flying - a trio of Vietnam War veterans bring one of their son’s bodies back home
4. The Messenger
3. The Last Full Measure – an government official gathers information on the heroism of a medic who is nominated for the Medal of Honor
2. Lone Survivor – a special forces team faces enormous odds in Afghanistan when their mission is blown and they must try to survive (Ben Foster is one of the men)
1. Glory – this fantastic movie concludes with the burying of Col. Shaw and many of his men
BTW the movie “Memorial Day” is not a good movie.
My choice for the war movie that starts with the letter T that best exemplifies the war movie genre is "Tae Guk Gi". South Korean war movies have a very distinctive style of portraying combat. It is combat porn, but not in a straight to video way. "Tae Guk Gi" is generally considered to be their greatest war movie. By choosing it, I recognize their contribution to the genre.
I chose "Schindler's List" as the representative for the letter T because it is the best movie in the huge Holocaust subgenre. It was released in 1993 and immediately took a position among the great movies of any genre. It was produced and directed by Steven Spielberg. Modestly, he tried to convince Martin Scorsese, Roman Polanski, and Billy Wilder to direct the pic, but for various reasons they turned him down. Spielberg refused to make any “blood money” for the film. The movie is based on the novel Schindler’s Ark by Thomas Keneally. Keneally was inspired to write the book by one of the Schindlerjuden (“Schlinder Jews”). The movie was shot on location in Krakow, Poland. The scenes at Auschwitz used a replica outside the camp because Spielberg was refused permission to film in the camp. The film won numerous awards. It was awarded Oscars for Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, Art Direction, Editing, and Original Score. Liam Neeson was nominated for Best Actor and Ralph Fiennes for Best Supporting Actor. It was the most expensive black and white film made up to then (topping “The Longest Day”). It had been 33 years since a black and white movie had won Best Picture (“The Apartment”). It is #8 on AFIs latest list of greatest American motion pictures.
“The Giant of Marathon” is an Italian “sword and sandals” (peplum) film. It was directed by Jacquest Tourneur who was famous for his “stylish and atmospheric” films. He did a lot of B-movie horror films, the best being “Cat People”. He also dabbled in film noir including the classic “Out of the Past”. Some scenes had to be reshot by director Mario Brava because some extras were smoking cigarettes in the background of scenes. The movie was a success at the box office.
An opening title card tells us Greece is divided between Sparta and Athens. Athens is roiled by “internal conflict and treachery”. Bad timing because Persian Emperor Darius has his sights set on Athens. Luckily, there is a hero available. We meet Phillipides (Steve Reeves) as he dominates at the Olympic games. He returns to Athens and is put in command of the Sacred Guard. He is in charge of the defense of the city. He gets involved in a love triangle. Andromeda (Mylene Demongeol) is betrothed to the treason-minded Theocritus (Sergio Fantoni). He and Andromeda’s father are fans of the ousted tyrant Hippias. They hope to enlist Phillipides in their plot to help Hippias return to power. Theocritus sicks a femme fatale named Charis (Daniela Rocca) to seduce him. She falls in love with him. Who wouldn’t? Now we have a love rectangle. All of this is just killing time to the great battle. The Persians land outside Athens. Phillipides is sent to Sparta on a horse to get their help. (The real Phillipides ran, but Reeves is too muscle-bound to do that).
Here’s how the famous battle is depicted (the italic stuff is accurate): The Persians bring their horses ashore on rafts. They bring a giant drum with them. They catapult a skull at the Greek army to indicate it’s battle time. They march forward led by five horsemen, each leading a column. When the Persian cavalry attacks, it is met by arrows. The Greeks have leaf-shaped spear heads and rectangular metal shields. The Persians have odd -shaped metal shields. Miltiades orders his army forward from horse-back. The Persian horses run into the Greek shield wall. They are followed by chariots. The Greeks have set ditches as traps. The surviving chariots run into the shield wall. A chaotic melee results with the Greeks using swords. Phillipides arrives with Spartan reinforcements. Militiades sends in his reserves. Phillipides fights from a horse. He and others roll boulders down on the Persians. The battle ends before the Spartans can fight in it. The Greeks win. (Note how accurate the battle is.)
In reality, the defeat at Marathon caused Darius to return home, but the movie is not done yet. The Persian fleet sails to Athens so the movie can provide a similarly laughable rendering of the Battle of Salamis. It is actually more hilarious, but I’ll let you decide for yourself. I will warn you that if you thought the naval battle in the Colosseum in Gladiator 2 was ridiculous, it does not hold a candle to this scene. Spoiler alert: the Greeks win this battle too and Phillipides is the main reason. His duel with Theocritus is hilarious.
Needless to say, you should not get your history from a sword and sandals movie, but even by that subgenres low standards, this movie gets almost everything wrong. And it’s not like there aren’t plenty of books about the Battles of Marathon and Salamis. The historian Herodotus is famous for his love of a good story even if it was questionable, but even he would not have swallowed what this movie is depicting. But Hades, no one would watch this movie to write a term paper on the battles. The movie was meant to be entertaining. It succeeds in that if you are easily entertained or you are a big fan of muscle men. Reeves was a huge star in Europe, mainly because he appealed to women. The guy was an absolute hunk. There is a scene where he and other hulks swim bare-chested in tight loin-clothes. You might want to have some smelling salts nearby if you watch this movie with your wife or girlfriend. And you might want to have some protection for your ribs because Ms. Demongeol is beautiful. The actress was a huge star in France and a sex symbol in the 1950s and 1960s. Her career spanned seven decades and over 100 movies.
The movie is unpredictable because it is so inaccurate. I had no idea what was going to happen in battles that I know a lot about. (I have written a novel about Marathon and am working on one about Salamis. Trust me, this movie is not a source.) If you don’t take the movie seriously, you will get some good laughs. Some of them will come from the subtitles. I watched it on Tubi. The subtitles had a hard time with the names of characters. Andromeda was spelled “Ramadan”, for instance.
“Jupiter’s Darling” is an American movie that could be described as an historical musical comedy. It was based on Robert Sherwood’s play “The Road to Rome” (1927). MGM made the dubious decision to make the movie as an Esther Williams picture. Williams had been a big star famous for swimming in her movies, but her career was waning at this point. It ended up as one of only two flops she made for the studio. It was not her fault because the concept was flawed from the beginning. The shoot was a difficult one for the actress who was coming off a pregnancy. She punctured an eardrum (for the fifth time) and had to limit her swimming. A body double was used . It could have been worse. She refused to film a scene where she jumps off a cliff on a horse. A stuntman volunteered to do it and broke his back. Her co-star was Howard Keel who was a big star in musicals. He had made several movies with Williams. George Sidney (“Anchors Aweigh”) directed and went over budget so much (painted elephants were very expensive) that the tepid box office resulted in a huge bomb.
The movie features several historical characters, led by Hannibal (Keel). It is 216 B.C. Hannibal is the barbarian at the gates. Rome appoints a dictator named Fabius Maximus (George Sander). His fiancé is the feisty Amytis (Williams). It does not take long for her to hit the pool. Hunky statues swim with her and cute baby Cupids. Welcome to the first choreographed swimming scene in a war movie. Meanwhile, Hannibal is on the march with his elephants. He sings with his men. Amytis and her slave girl go to spy on him and are captured. Their relationship begins rockily as in every romance movie ever made. We get the clicheish love triangle. Don’t bother guessing who Amytis ends up with. If you can’t wait to find out, don’t go to a history book. This builds up to the climactic assault on Rome. Here is how the movie depicts it (the facts are in italics): Hannibal uses smoking chariots and elephants with battering rams. The defenders use hot oil and fire ball catapults. Fabius hurls a white flag javelin, but Amytis urges him to fight (this after she had told Hannibal about a lose brick in the wall). He offers a huge amount of tribute if Hannibal desists. He doesn’t want the money, he only wants Amytis. She decides to be a patriot and go with him.
It’s hard to believe that anyone was surprised that this movie failed. When I finished it, I asked myself “what the fuck was that?” Well, at least it is better than “Braveheart” and just as accurate. The movie has its charms. The technicolor is vibrant and the sets are extravagant. Amytis has the best swimming pool in Hollywood. Some of the songs are catchy and the actors are good singers. There are ten songs in the movie. Unfortunately, when the singing ends we are left to suffer from some truly bad acting. It should be said that as an actress, Williams was a good swimmer. The dancing is fine, especially by the elephants. If you want to see elephants wiggle their asses, this is the movie for you. It is surprising that the movie has not developed cult status. It is entertaining in a campy way. And if you know the actual history of Hannibal, it is downright hilarious. In its defense, the film is up front about its veracity. It leads off with “The history which describes Hannibal’s attack on Romeis very confusing; this story will do nothing to clear it up.” Before you say “no shit”, it is unlikely many people who saw this in a theater knew much about Hannibal. But no one would have thought Hannibal went swimming with an upper-class Roman woman.
So which one of these campy extravaganzas is better? It depends on whether you are a fan of “sand and sandals” or musical swimming. Both are terrible when it comes to history. I would give the edge to “Giant” because it has Steve Reeves, some dastardly villains, and two hot women. It has two set piece battles that are astounding in their total lack of connection to the actual events. Everything in “Jupiter’s Darling” is ridiculous.
GRADES = Giant = C / Jupiter’s = D
