It has taken Clint Eastwood seventy-six years to be able to direct Flags of our Fathers.
At an age when most directors are tending their gardens and writing their memoirs, Eastwood has developed into a director of uncommon power and scope. Beginning back in 1992 with 'Unforgiven' he has turned out a series of risky, well crafted films – 'Mystic River,' 'Million Dollar Baby' – that are marvels of economy, stripped to their essentials, dramatic yet resolutely unsentimental.
His spare technique is merely the logical extension of his laconic, minimalist, unactorly approach to the taciturn cowboys and vengeful cops he played all those years.
'Flags of Our Fathers' sees Eastwood take on his most ambitious project yet.
There are hundreds of actors, exotic locals, screen-filling CGI and big money involved. Eastwood pares his gory spectacle back to the basics. There are vast armies on the move here but he uses that only as a backdrop to the wrenching story of a group of terrified young men, true heroes, who face instant death on a day to day basis.
Iwo Jima, a small volcanic island in the South Pacific, saw the highest body count of any American engagement of World War II. Some 30,000 troops came ashore in February of 1945 hoping to dislodge 20,000 well dug in, fanatic Japanese. 2000 Americans died the first day.
Flags of Our Fathers is based on James Bradley’s 2000, non-fiction, bestseller. Bradley’s father was one of the young men in AP photographer Joe Rosenthal’s iconic shot of a group of marines attempting to raise the American flag over Iwo Jima. His father would never talk about his experiences, so, after his death, James set out to find the true story.
What emerged was a tale of heroism, sacrifice and crass exploitation.
Although he peoples his film with a number of colourful characters, Eastwood zeros in on three of the soldiers in the famous picture. John “Doc" Bradley (Ryan Phillippe), Rene Gagnon (Jesse Bradford) and Native American Ira Hays (Adam Beach).
The attack (shot in Iceland) is heavily reminiscent of Steven Spielberg’s charge up Omaha Beach in Saving Private Ryan (Spielberg produced Eastwood’s film). There is the same confusion and carnage with instant death possible at any second. But Eastwood avoids the cliché and has his own take on the horrors of war.
Cinematographer Tom Stern bleaches out his color stock allowing only hints of colour - tapping into our memories of the old newsreels of the attack itself.
As the brutal battle surges back and forth, the skillfully constructed screenplay by William Broyles Jr. ('Jarhead') and Oscar Winner Paul Haggis ('Crash'), leaps ahead to the aftermath. Rosenthal’s picture has captured the heart of the American public and the three soldiers are taken back home to raise money.
The war is bankrupting the country, support for the war is wavering and many want to strike a deal with the enemy. America needs heroes and finds them in the three boys.
Eastwood contrasts the brutal fighting with the hypocrisy of the PR juggernaut. The three are tortured by the image they are forced to assume. They keep saying that the real heroes died on those bloody beaches. They are relentlessly flogged by the flacks, culminating in a show where they are called upon to recreate the flagraising on a papier mache mountain in Soldier's Field in Chicago.
At first Eastwood sucks us in - treating it as a real assault - only to pull back to reveal the phoniness of the event.
While realizing the value of raising money for the war effort, the PR onslaught works its own insidious evil on the three soldiers. Gagnon seems to enjoy it but it will affect the rest of his life. Bradley, a genuine hero who, as a medic, continuously charged into gunfire to help the wounded, lives with the horrors he has seen and gamely goes through the motions.
The game however, effectively kills Ira Hayes. Haunted by shame and driven to alcoholism, Hays just wants to get back to his platoon.
The performances are nuanced and affecting - only Beach is allowed to stretch and will surely pull a supporting actor Oscar nomination this Spring.
For a director who shows such control, unfortunately, Eastwood lets the ending get away from him and allows the sentimentalism he carefully avoids throughout the rest of the movie to creep in but by then you’ve certainly bought into his characters and you’re along for the ride.
Eastwood also provides the spare and affecting score.
MPAA: Rated R for sequences of graphic war violence and carnage, and for language.
Copyright 2006 by Monsters and Critics
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