FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS Reviewed by Harvey S. Karten
Paramount Pictures
Grade: B+
Directed by: Clint Eastwood
Written By: William Broyles Jr., Paul Haggis, from book by
James Bradley with Ron Powers
Cast: Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford, Adam Beach, John
Benjamin Hickey, John Slattery, Barry Pepper, Jamie Bel, Paul
Walker
Screened at: AMC, NYC, 10/21/06
Opens: October 20, 2006 When Andy Warhol predicted that in the future everyone would be famous for fifteen minutes, he just might have considered the case of six fellows who fought for the U.S. in World War 2. Three actual characters who serve as principals for Clint Eastwood’s epic movie-–John Bradley, Rene Gagnon, Ira Hayes–did indeed become famous , but while their celebrity status lasted for more than fifteen minutes, it did not remain all that much longer. They were heroes because America needs heroes, especially in wartime. They became former heroes, however, when the war was over, and if they did not die during the fighting, they were discarded, forgotten about, relegated to menial jobs as though they had been no better than healthy draft dodgers. One of the themes of the 76-year-old director’s film, “Flags of Our Fathers,” then, is the impermanence of heroism. Another motif tackled by Mr. Eastwood, the artificiality and spin involved in the creation of human legends, emerges bell-clear. There was no need for this theme to be spelled out toward the picture’s conclusion. Still a third, overriding idea, evokes what director John Ford said in a 1961 movie: “When truth becomes legend, print the legend.” There you have it: we need heroes, we’ll choose some to be heroes whether or not they stand out in a crowd of brave souls, and we’ll etch their achievements into the permanence of legend. Movies, of course, do not reach into our emotions because of their ideas, but as a result of actions. Eastwood’s “Flags of Our Fathers” has plenty of that coupled with lots of speech-making. They alternate in a series of flashbacks and flash-forwards. Some in the audience will be wrapped up more in the war scenes on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima; others will be amused, maybe even riveted by the way the country pushed an agenda to carve out a legend. As for why the need for the spin: the U.S. was already over three years into a long and costly world war. Money was running out. The best way to raise funds so that we would not be “fighting the Japanese with rocks” as one person put the scenario, is to sell war bonds. The way to sell these bonds and to raise the billions needed to bring the conflict to a satisfactory conclusion was via a speaking tour. Take some of the young soldiers who raised the American flag over Iwo Jima, a scene immortalized in a photograph by war journalist Joe Rosenthal, and send them on a speaking tour across the country to urge Americans to buy these war bonds. The story, based on a book by James Bradley (with Ron Powers styling the prose), which deals with the author’s dad John Bradley–who was one of the sextet who raised the U.S. flag. The book, adapted into a screenplay by William Broyles Jr. and Paul Haggis, begins with the notion that Navy man John Bradley has refused to discuss his experience in the Far East, and fills in the gap in our knowledge by showing us what happened and how the actions on Iwo Jima were spun into legend. Because U.S. planes even as late as 1945 could not fly far enough to reach the Japanese mainland, U.S. strategy called for the capture of islands, each of which would become a stepping-stone to Tokyo and environs. The opening battle scene on the five-mile-wide island recalls the first twenty minutes of Speilberg’s “Saving Private Ryan.” As Marines and some Navy men move by foot across Iwo Jima, thinking that the place was so quiet that everyone must be dead, Japanese machine guns open fire from within fortified and camouflaged pits, mowing down a considerable number of those who reached the beachhead first. Eastwood cuts to the war’s end and the tour involving three of the heroes of the campaign, repeatedly returning to the battle scenes. What emerges on the field, filmed in washed-out colors that make the film virtually black-and-white, is death by the scores. Japanese are bayoneted; Americans are cut down. In one scene, perhaps the most vivid in the picture, an American soldier and a Japanese counterpart lie within a few feet of each other, each dying and unaware of the other’s presence. Ultimately, when the island appears to have fallen into American hands, Navy man John Bradley (Ryan Phillippe), and Marines Rene Gagnon (Jesse Bradford) and Ira Hayes (Adam Beach) raise the American flag. However, the flag raising that resulted in the most famous war picture of all time is actually a staging, taken a few minutes after the initial event and involving a larger flag. As the three proceed on a public relations tour after the war,a reluctant Ira Hayes, an American Indian of the Pima tribe, is embarrassed and frequently the butt of unconscious racism. He is called “chief,” he is asked jokingly whether he attacked the Japanese with tomahawks, he is asked about his “squaw” back home, and in one case he is refused a drink in a Chicago pub because, says the bartender, “I don’t make the rules: we don’t serve Indians.” Hayes, an alcoholic whose disease remains in check during the fighting, reverts to drunkenness, leading to more racial epithets. By contrast, Rene Gagnon (Jesse Bradford) loves the attention, even parading about banquet halls with his fiancé, while for his part, Bradley seems perplexed by the whole situation, insisting that the real heroes are dead and that he is nothing special. “Flags of Our Fathers” is a well-made, expensive pic, and to director Eastwood’s extra credit, he even composed the somber musical score. If it lacks some of the emotive appeal that the director must hope for, it’s principally because battle scenes of this nature have been done before, most impressively in Spielberg’s “Saving Private Ryan” and Ken Annakin’s more prolix 1962 film “The Longest Day”–a retelling of the Allied invasion of Normandy with an all-star international cast, which won Oscars for effects and cinematography. As for any criticism of U.S. treatment of Iwo Jima and the flag raising, I say that the end justified the means, at least in this case. After all, whether these three deserve to be singled out as heroes or not, they did risk their lives in the same manner as the others, and if billions can be raised for the best of all causes by giving them legendary status, what’s the problem? Rated R. 131 minutes 2006 by Harvey Karten
harveycritic@cs.com Member: NY Film Critics Online | 
