THE 100 BEST WAR MOVIES: 21. The Grey Zone (2001)

 

                When I taught the Holocaust, I present my students with a dilemma.  You are a Jew working in a concentration camp.  To stay alive, you have the job of removing the corpses from the gas chamber and bringing them to the crematorium.  One day a little girl is found alive among the bodies.  You and your fellow workers have to decide whether you will risk your lives by trying to smuggle her into the female population or turn her over to the S.S.  This dilemma is based on an actual incident.  That incident is part of the plot of a movie entitled “The Grey Zone”.  The movie was directed by Tim Blake Nelson (the goofy Delmar in “Oh, Brother Where Art Thou?”).  Looks can be deceiving, he was the only member of the cast or crew who had read the Odyssey.  He wrote the play that the movie is based on and then the screenplay.  His research came from the book Auschwitz:  A Doctor’s Eyewitness Account by Dr. Miklos Nyiszli.  The movie was filmed in Bulgaria.  Actual plans for the camp were used to make a 90% scaled replica of the crematoria and barracks.

                There have been many Holocaust movies, but few have dealt with the Sonderkommandos.  These were the “special units” that removed the bodies from the gas chambers.  They were given better food and housing, but they joined the corpses after a few months.  The movie is set in Auschwitz II – Birkenau in August, 1944.  Dr. Nyiszli (Allan Corduner) meets the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele and decides to collude with him on his human guinea pig experiments.  He figures the arrangement will help keep his wife and daughter out of the gas chamber.  He also has the attitude that at least some science might come from the experiments.  The other plot line involves a plot by some of the sonderkommandos to blow up the crematoria and the gas chamber.  They are aware that the clock is ticking on their employment.  In order to blow up the buildings, a trio of extremely brave women are smuggling gun powder to them from the munitions factory. 

            The movie hits several Holocaust images – the band playing as the Jews enter the “showers”, the burning of the Hungarian Jews in pits, the sorting of belongings.  However, the movie is not interested in depicting life in the camp.  In fact, the sonderkommandos are living a much better life than the typical prisoners.  They are literally feasting in their comfortable barracks.  This is not “Schindler’s List”, it is closer to “Escape from Sobibor” because it deals with resistance to the “Final Solution”.  Unlike that movie, “The Grey Zone” digs deep into ethics and choices.  The sabotage plot is going well until Hoffman (David Arquette) discovers a young girl among the bodies.  Nyiszli is brought in to help her recover.  He is let in on the plot.  Now we have two dilemmas.  What to do with the girl and should Nyiszli use his new knowledge to save his family?  He is under pressure from an S.S. officer named Muhsfeldt (Harvey Keitel) to tell about any plotting in exchange for preferential treatment for Nyiszli’s family.   These two arcs will get us to the explosive final scene.

ACTING:   A+                 

ACTION:   N/A

ACCURACY:  A0        

PLOT:  A+                   

REALISM:   A 

CINEMATOGRAPHY:   A  

SCORE:  not memorable 

 

SCENE:  the revolt

            “The Grey Zone” is an outstanding movie.  The reason it is not well known is it is grim, even for a Holocaust movie.  It also did not get much in the way of marketing.  It made less than $1 million! The budget was a measly $5 million.  Not a lot of it went to the cast, which is not all-star, but does have some excellent actors.  Harvey Keitel is great as Muhsfeldt.  The character is not your typical evil Nazi and is not predictable.  In fact, the whole movie is unpredictable – other than the obvious failure of the plot.  David Arquette plays against type as Hoffman.  He has a very powerful scene involving a Hungarian Jew who argues with him before going in the gas chamber.  It is one of several shocking moments in the movie.  The standout among the cast is David Chandler as Rosenthal.

            Aside from the great acting and interesting blend of cinematography (mostly hand-held and some POV), the strength of the movie is in the provoking of thoughts.  Should the girl be saved?  Is Nyiszli a villain or a man doing whatever it takes to save his family?  Are the sonderkommandoes in need of redemption?  Most importantly, what would you do in the circumstances the movie posits?  The film is a welcome addition to the Holocaust subgenre of war movies.  It is instructive of the sonderkommandos and covers several aspects of Auschwitz that are seldom portrayed in Holocaust movies.  It also is based on a true story so there is a history lesson here.  (See below for how accurate the movie is.)

            “The Grey Zone” is one of the top five Holocaust movies.  It is tough to watch because most of the movies in this subgenre have relatively positive endings.  This one is entertaining, but depressing.  Shouldn’t you be depressed when you finish watching a Holocaust movie?  I’m not criticizing movies like “Schindler’s List” or “Escape from Sobibor” because they tell true stories and those stories emphasize the strength of the human spirit.  But we need movies that question human behavior and decisions made under difficult circumstances.  Thank God this movie will be as close as you get to the “what if?” scenarios Nyiszli  and the gas commandos faced.

HISTORICAL ACCURACY:    The movie accurately depicts the work of the sonderkommandos.  These were squads of Jews who were forced into the “special units” when they first arrived at the camp.  Their job was to remove the corpses from the gas chambers and transport them to the crematoria.  It was not unusual for them to come into contact with the bodies of dead family members.  In exchange for this work, they were isolated from the rest of the prisoners and lived in their own barracks.  The barracks was nicer and they were well fed.  They were given food, medicines, and cigarettes accumulated from the victims.  The feasting shown in the movie was probably exaggerated, but they certainly were better off than the other Jews.  They also were protected from being shot by the guards for minor infractions or just because the guard was having a bad day.  Since they were “bearers of secrets”, they could not be allowed to survive, so every three months or so they were liquidated.  The replacement sonderkommandos’ first job was to dispose of their predecessors.

            The incident involving the young girl (she was probably around 15) was based on Nyiszli’s recollection.  He volunteered as a doctor and caught the attention of Josef Mengele.  Mengele put him to work doing autopsies and helping with his experiments.  Some of this involved Mengele’s twins.  His work and a bribe saved his family from the gas chamber.  They all survived the war.  Some historians dispute his information about the Sonderkommando. The girl possibly survived by being under the crush of bodies with her face pressed against the wet floor.  When the men discovered her, they called for the doctor and he revived her.  At this point, he brought the matter to Oberscharfuhrer Eric Muhsfeldt who he had a relationship with through his work with Mengele.  Nyiszli thought he could convince the officer to let the girl be filtered into the female work groups, but Muhsfeldt did not think the chance of discovery was worth it.  He had a guard shoot her.  The incident involving the girl was not connected to the uprising.

            The plot to blow up the crematoria and gas chamber is based on an attempted uprising by Sonderkommando XII in Auschwitz.  Small amounts of gunpowder were smuggled from the munitions plant on site by three Jewish women – Ester Wajcblum, Ala Gertner, and Regina Safirsztain.  The trio passed the explosives to Roza Robath who was part of the resistance.  The planned rebellion had to be moved up when word spread that their time as body disposers was about to come to an end.  On Oct. 7, 1944 they attacked the SS and Kapos with two machine guns, knives, and grenades.  They killed three and wounded twelve.  Part of a crematorium was destroyed, but for the most part the uprising was a failure.  Some did manage to escape, but were soon recaptured.  200 were executed in a manner similar to the movie.  The four women were ferreted out after the event, tortured, and executed.

            Erich Muhfeldt was a mass murderer who was executed for war crimes after the war.  He participated in the mass executions that attempted to cover up Madjanek when the camp was destroyed after the escape.  He then ended up at Auschwitz and was in charge of Sonderkommando XII.  He did have a creepy relationship with Nyiszli similar to the one shown in the film.

The Secret War of Harry Frigg (1968)

 

 

            Paul Newman was an established star by 1968.  In between “Cool Hand Luke” and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”, he made “The Secret War of Harry Frigg”.  For an actor with such a prolific career, he did not seem to be interested in making war films.  The only other one that I could find was “The Rack”.  That movie was a somber story of a Korean War collaborator.  “Harry Frigg” is the polar opposite and gave Newman the chance to show his comedic chops.  It was directed by Jack Smight, who went on to direct “Midway”.

            The movie opens with Pvt. Frigg in a stockade.  He is a malcontent who is imprisoned often for violating military rules.  But he always escapes. In this case, during a football game, he catches a pass and runs away.  “Friggs done it again!”  This lame opening does not bode well for the rest of the film.  The setup is that five generals (from various Allied forces) are captured in a steambath by the Italians.  They are held in a chateau in Italy.  Since they all rank the same, the escape attempts are foiled by the lack of unanimity.  The powers that be decide they find to have someone who outranks them and who is an expert on escaping.  Calling Pvt. Frigg.  He is promoted Major General even though “he barely has a firm grip on private”. (One odf the few funny lines.)  General Frigg is parachuted into Italy to be captured and linked up with the generals.  Escape plans are complicated by Frigg getting romantically involved with the Countess (Sylva Koscina).

            This movie was a puzzling career move by Newman.  He must have been searching for something light weight.  This movie has the weight of a feather.  Although his agent might be to blame, it does appear that Newman was having fun.  He is joined by a cast of familiar character actors.  Included in the film are Andrew Duggan, Tom Bosley, and John Williams.  Any baby boomer will be comfortable with them in a TVesque comedy.  The buffoonish Italian colonel is played by another familiar face -  Vito Scotti.  The problem is the material is not up to these veteran comedians.  The movie is simply not funny.  Newman gets no good lines and is left to mugging it as he plays Frigg as a hick.  He has to get involved in a lame, cliché romance.  To make it worse, there is no chemistry between Newman and Koscina. 

            “The Secret War of Harry Frigg” was a blip in Paul Newman’s career.  I doubt he bragged on it.  It is mildly entertaining because of the cast, but it is certainly not in the conversation when discussing the great war comedies. 

GRADE  =  C-

THE 100 BEST WAR MOVIES: 22. Apocalypse Now (1979)

 

Oh my God, where to start?  No other film on the list comes close to having the problems that this film had.  It was originally to be produced by George Lucas, but he went on to make the first “Star Wars”.  Francis Ford Coppola of “Godfather” fame inherited the endeavor and the script by John Milius.  Milius was inspired by Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness but envisioned the film as more of a standard action film than Coppola ended up with.  In fact, Coppola made lots of adjustments to the script to make it closer to the novel and deeper.  He also called in John Herr of Dispatches fame to add dialogue and write the narration by Willard (Martin Sheen).  The film was filmed in the Philippines.  This was partly because the Department of Defense took one look at the script and said not no, but **** no.  Ferdinand Marcos agreed to give the support of the Filipino armed forces.  Coppola got the helicopters he needed, but sometimes they had to leave a shoot to kill communist guerrillas.   It took 238 days of shooting and a total of 16 months from start to finish.  The length of time was due to several factors:  it was way over budget, a typhoon wreaked havoc, Martin Sheen suffered a heart attack, and Coppola was an obsessed perfectionist.  It is absolutely amazing that the movie was not a colossal failure.

            The movie was a critical success (although it does have its detractors).  Coppola did make back his investment (thank goodness) and won the Palme D’Or at Cannes even though he previewed an incomplete version.  Actually, it shared the top prize with “The Tin Drum”.  It won Academy Awards for Cinematography and Sound.  It was nominated for Picture (losing to “Kramer vs. Kramer”!!!), Director (Coppola lost to the awesome directing of “Kramer vs. Kramer”!!!), Supporting Actor (Robert Duvall -  losing to Melvyn Douglas of “Being There”!!!), Art Direction, Editing, and Adapted Screenplay.  The film is ranked #30 on AFIs list of greatest movies.

The movie opens to the sound of the Doors’ “The End”, helicopters swoop by as the jungle erupts with napalm.  This transitions to the whirling of a ceiling fan in a seedy Saigon hotel.  A special forces operative named Willard (Sheen) is going stir crazy.  He gets so drunk he punches a mirror and bleeds all over the bed.  (Sheen was actually drunk for this scene and accidentally cut himself – the cameras kept rolling.)  Two servicemen roust Willard, he asks “what are the charges?”  This is one of the greatest openings in movie history with one of the greatest opening songs.

Willard is taken to an air-conditioned trailer where a general gives him the mission of assassinating a rogue Col. Kurtz (Marlon Brando).  Kurtz is in command of his own Montagnard army and is fighting the war successfully on his own terms.  He has “murdered” three Vietnamese civilans because he suspected them of being communist operatives (which they undoubtedly were).  Hey, you can’t murder in war!  The brass have decided he must be “terminated with extreme prejudice”.  Willard is given a PBR (riverboat) to go up river into Cambodia to bump off Kurtz.  The crew is heterogeneous in the best tradition of war movies.  The Chief (Albert Hall) is a no-nonsense skipper.  Chef (Frederick Forrest) is a saucier from New Orleans who is just trying to survive.  Lance (Sam Bottoms) is a drug-addled surfer dude. Clean (a fourteen year old Larry Fishburne) is a black kid from the Bronx.

The movie becomes episodic with Willard’s trek akin to Odysseus’. They are attached to an air cavalry unit led by the Pattonesque Col. Kilgore (Robert Duvall). There is an exhilarating assault on a Viet Cong village, done to the sound of Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries”. Charlie don’t surf, but Kilgore does. The assault on the village is a tour de force.  It is one of the most electric scenes in war movie history..  (It is revealing that Coppola was upset when audiences reacted most positively to this scene.)                

Chef and Willard make the acquaintance of a tiger in lieu of a cyclops.  “Never get out of the boat!”  Next, it’s a visit with the Sirens in the form of a Playboy show with an audience of honny grunts.  (In case you’re interested in doing some “research” that’s Playmate of the Year 1974 Cynthia Wood.)   The actors convinced Coppola to throw in a My Lai Massacre scene so the PBR stops a sampan to search it.  (This actually makes little sense considering their mission.) There is an extended stopover at a French plantation which was cut from the theatrical release. Willard steps back in time to colonial Vietnam. 

            They arrive at a bridge marking the border with Cambodia.  Lance is tripping on LSD and so is the movie.  He and Willard move through Dante’s Inferno searching for the commanding officer.  When Willard asks a soldier who the CO is, he responds “ain’t you?”  The scene is surrealistic and nightmarish.  The bridge marks the boundary between civilization and the primitive, between sanity and madness.

            Along the way, they lose two of their quintet. The surviving trio arrive at Kurtz’s kingdom.  The set is an amazing temple with human heads lying around (actual extras buried to their necks).  They meet a gonzo journalist (Dennis Hopper) who is a big fan of Kurtz.  Willard meets Kurtz in his lair.  Kurtz knows why Willard is there.  Although he’s obviously nuts, perhaps it takes an insane person to win an insane war.  Willard has to decide if he will carry out the assassination.

ACTING:   A                

ACTION:   A+ (6/10) the only combat is the village assault

ACCURACY: N/A      

PLOT:  B                

REALISM:   C  (I think this should be N/A, but Coppola insisted it was realistic)

CINEMATOGRAPHY:   A+

SCORE:   A

SCENE:  the village assault

QUOTE:  Kilgore:  “I love the smell of napalm in the morning… it smells like victory.”

CRITIQUE:  The perfectionism and effort that went into the movie shows.  Knowing the back-story of the problems Coppola faced makes the film a remarkable accomplishment.  Coppola said the production was “very much like the way the Americans were in Vietnam.  We had access to too much money, too much equipment; and little by little we went insane.”   The cinematography by the famous Vittorio Storaro won the Oscar.  Kudos especially for filming and lighting Brando so we are not distracted by his obesity.  (The one full shot of him is of a double.) Sound was also awarded. It is apparent from the opening sound of the helicopter blades that it deserved the accolades.  The music score was by Coppola’s father Carmine.  It is mostly synthesizer and fits the surrealist mood of the picture perfectly.  The music is restrained and does not push emotional buttons.  The Philippine location shooting provided some nice scenery.  The river and the jungles look like Vietnam.  The sets are amazing – the USO stage, the bridge (which was an actual bridge blown up by the Japanese in WWII and rebuilt for the film), the temple.   By the way, the temple set was rigged up with $100,000 worth of pyrotechnics for an explosive ending and then Coppola decided not to end the film that way.  He still blew it up.

            The acting is top notch.  Harvey Keitel was the original Willard, but after two weeks Coppola fired him for not being passive enough on camera.  Martin Sheen was brought in and was perfect.  It’s easy to overlook his narrative readings which added greatly to the film. The narration may be the best ever in a war movie.  He portrays Willard as a weary assassin who is good at his job and aware of its moral ambiguities.  His trek is a descent to a lower level of humanity.  A journey into the heart of darkness (get it?).

            The supporting cast is strong.  Duvall shows the range that made him one of our great actors.  Keep in mind that his previous Coppola film was as the uncharismatic Tom Hagen of the Corleone Family.  His performance is iconic and he dominates his screen time.  The PBR crew is solid.  However, Fishburne does come off as a rookie actor and Bottoms was only partially acting since he was literally on drugs for most of the shoot.  As far as Hopper, the film did revive his career, but you get the impression he is simply playing himself.  The elephant in the room (get it?) was Brando.  He almost drags the last part of the film down.  Coppola does a masterful job getting something better than disaster from him.  I felt sorry for Coppola.  After surviving a typhoon and his leading man’s heart attack, the worst was yet to come.

            The plot is flawed.  The first two-thirds of the film is mesmerizing.  The odyssey format works well and the flow from exposition to intense action is fine.  The movie builds eerily to arrival at the final act.  There is suspense and pathos.  Unfortunately, Coppola was frustrated by how to end the film.  The route he chose may have been the best under the circumstances, but from the arrival at Kurtz’s base the film goes a bit flat and loopy.  Kurtz is a major disappointment after spending two hours to get to him.  He is not a mad genius.  He’s just insane and past his prime.  You have to blame part of this on the obstinate and ill-prepared Brando.  Throwing in the manic Hopper does not help.  The film has drawn most of its criticism for that final part.  However, if you research the production, Coppola made good decisions on plotting.  His decision to adhere more closely to the novel than Milius intended was wise.  Those who find fault with the death of Kurtz should reflect on the fact that originally the film was supposed to close with Kurtz and Willard battling shoulder to shoulder against a Viet Cong attack and then Kurtz was to shoot down an American chopper sent to rescue them.  Gag!

            The themes of the film include the idea that the insanity of war drives people insane.  This fits into the standard anti-war aim of most war movies, but you seldom see this take.  Kurtz has clearly gone insane under the pressures of command.  However, isn’t Kilgore more insane than Kurtz?  Willard is sliding down the slippery slope of sanity the deeper he goes into the wilderness.  Another theme is the question of who are the good guys in Vietnam?  Who is a better role model?  Lt. Gen. Corman (G.D. Spradlin) sitting in his air-conditioned trailer giving out assassination orders against a decorated American hero who has gone off the reservation or Kurtz who has his own private army and effectively kills the bad guys?  What about  Kilgore?

CONCLUSION:  “Apocalypse Now” is one of the great war films.  It has so many memorable moments, lines, and scenes.  I hate to belabor the point, but tell me something you remember from “Kramer vs. Kramer” (the “Shakespeare in Love” of 1980).  Normally I only care about what ends up on the screen, but I have to make an exception for “Apocalypse Now”.  It was fascinating reading about the production, listening to Coppola’s commentary track, and watching his wife’s documentary “Hearts of Darkness”.  You have to give extra credit for Coppola’s effort.  When you know what went into the making of the picture, you can cut him some slack for the final part.  There is little doubt in my mind that the film had sustained its momentum to the end, it would have to be considered the greatest war movie ever.  As it is, it ends up as a flawed masterpiece.