Movies Reviews

Where Soldiers Come From (2011) – Movie Review

By Ron Wilkinson Sep 8, 2011, 16:15 GMT

A low key but powerful expose’ of the lingering effects of war on a most personal level.

Heather Courtney’s new documentary of the war in Afghanistan “Where Soldiers Come From” is all the more powerful for what it does not say. It is not the splashy, action-packed “Hurt Locker” or the gritty “Restrepo.” It is a simple story of nine 18-20 year olds who sign up for the National Guard to make some weekend money.

Not surprisingly, they are called into action in Afghanistan. In this way the film is like many others. It is the story of the life-changing events that are caused by war, told with a history-making realism using portable video technology.

What makes the film unique is that the filmmaker had shot a lot of footage and came to know the young men well before they were called into action. She started the project as a video essay about the “Upper Peninsula” region of the state of Michigan. She is from the area and was frustrated about how the area folk are portrayed in the media.

The area is one of the most isolated in the USA, being in the extreme northern part of Michigan, bordering, and jutting into, the vast, icy and forbidding waters of Lake Superior.

The area joins the state of Wisconsin but is part of the further distant state of Michigan. This cruel trick of political boondoggling makes it something of a political no-man’s-land. The isolation of the area is further enhanced by its being surrounded by the frigid waters of the Great Lakes.

The first landfall to the north is Ontario, Canada. Populated by northern European mine workers in the early 1900’s who kept busy and kept to themselves, the area lapsed into near-total obscurity by the late 1900s, which seems to suit the locals fine.

From what we can tell, the film was not originally about the war experience. It was supposed to focus on the lives of the “Yoopers” (“U.P.’ers”) as they are called. The film evolved into a story of the modern war experience as the subjects were called up for service in Afghanistan.

It is hard to imagine two more diverse experiences than growing up in the “UP” and graduating to go to war in Asia. The men went to war largely because their friends did. They grew up as a group and decided to go to war as a group. The people of the UP have never been shy about sharing their feelings.

This film is remarkable in its capturing of the candid feelings of the young men drawn into the war. From what we can tell, there is hardly a gung-ho war supporter amongst the entire bunch.

They go to war for four reasons; they need the money, they want the GI Bill college support, their friends are going and they want to support their country. That is also the ranking of the order of importance.
Historically, the people of the UP have survived by their own wits and with precious little help from the federal USA. They are willing to strike a fair deal in order to survive.

The deal they made was to join the National Guard and train one weekend a month and in the summer. The deal they received was to go to Asia and kill or be killed.

As it turns out they neither kill nor are they killed. The men come back physically intact. They have suffered some horrendous near misses as improvised explosive devices were detonated under their vehicles. It appears the vehicles they use have been upgraded significantly over the original “Humvees.” These are good for 600 pounds of explosive impact. They fly through the air, but those inside survive.

Even so, there are long lasting effects from repeated concussions and post-traumatic stress syndrome. The men tell each other, their wives, and loved ones that there is no telling how long it will take those effects to surface, or disappear completely.

This eerie sense of impending trouble is the strongest point of the film. Most of our returning soldiers are like these men. They do not get their pictures in the paper for things they did there, or things they did here.

They will go through life just a little bit more on the edgy side, than they used to be. They will be a little bit harder on their families and will find it a little bit harder to sit through classes and keep normal jobs.

This is the scariest danger of low-temperature war. The danger is that we will never know the subtle impacts that combat has had on our people or their descendants.

This film is extremely valuable in its low key and studied approach to exposing the examining the dangers of war. Like the IED, the explosion does not happen until one is immediately on top of it.

Documentary
Directed by: Heather Courtney
Release Date: September 9, 2011
MPAA: Not Rated
Country: USA
Language: English
Color: Color