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On DVD: “Jarhead’ isn’t that bad
Caught up the other night with “Jarhead,” recently out on DVD. It’s the memoir of James Swofford, a Marine who fought in the Gulf War — except that he and his fellow leathernecks never ever got to fight.
This is a movie that dramatically illustrates the idea, which you’ve heard before, that war is 90 percent boredom and 10 percent sheer terror — and if you recall that conflict, you will remember that we had more than half a million troops massed in Kuwait for more than 122 days before they got to attack Iraq. And then the ground war wrapped up in just four days before Bush Sr. declared it all done.
Swoff and his Marine buddies wait and wait and wait in this picture, and then the war races past them so fast that by the end, they haven’t fired their rifles. The movie is about that paranoia, anger, frustration and suppressed hostility — about the weirdness of being trained for something that never ever comes. The men all go a bit crazy waiting to fight and never being able to, wanting to kill and never getting the chance.
A lot of critics pounced on this movie when it came out last year, and I think rather unfairly. First of all, the complaint that “nothing happens,” which I saw in a lot of reviews, is a fact of history, not a flaw in the screenplay. If anything, William Broyles Jr’s script does a good job at keeping things interesting and getting into the characters’ heads, when the fact of their boredom is the key plot point. It’s a nifty trick, well pulled off, I thot.
If anything, the movie shows the surreality of war a little better by it being threatened, promised even, and then never happening. The Marines’ reactions to not getting to act out their desire for violence is even scarier than it might have been otherwise.
Altogether, a worthy film. Ignore the critics on this one (they didn’t seem to get it) and check it out.
Comments
By susan
April 19, 2006 1:57 PM | Link to this
my youngest son was one of the critics that expressed disappointment with the movie because ‘they didn’t blow up enough sh …’ er, stuff. i, however, liked the movie. forget that i love marines. it was a good depiction of the human condition butting up against semper fi … wind something tight enough and it will eventually snap. no saints in this outfit … as a matter of fact, there were some outright jerks but there were also some guys who wouldn’t merit a second look but would display the courage to save somebody’s life the way we pop pistachios. no big deal. i can attest … that is the let’s-get-it-done-and-get-home reality. they ain’t always pretty but, god bless ‘em, they’re there. they shouldn’t be taken for granted or used to garner a few percentage points in the polls. they’re far too dangerous … and too precious … for that.By Sir Critic
April 19, 2006 12:43 PM | Link to this
I very much agree with you on this one, Ron. “Jarhead” did indeed get a bad rap. The fact that “nothing happens” is the very point of the film. I guess critics were expecting something a little more aggressive like “Apocalypse Now” or something that spoke more directly about the current war. Critics leaned too much on their preconceived notions, rather than reviewing what was actually on the screen. All too common mistake.