Film: Of Blood and a Poet. - film reviews of `The Thin Red Line' and `Shakespeare in Love' - Review - movie reviews

National Review, Jan 25, 1999 by John Simon

Modern war movies, like Tolstoy's happy families, are all alike. Old wars are another story: Salamis, Thermopylae, Cannae, Lepanto-those battles were different. But from World War I on, a certain sameness sets in. We are introduced all too briefly to far too many characters who remain interchangeable, especially so in helmets and battle gear. Shouted commands are often unintelligible, strategies and tactics hard to follow. Lately, men have begun dying more graphically, more gorily. And sometimes we see women at war. Still, though it was not coined for cinematic warfare, the old saw applies: plus ca change . . .

Nevertheless, some war films make it by concentrating on special aspects: ski troops, a submarine, a military hospital. Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line, from James Jones's eyewitness novel about Guadalcanal, is largely straight fighting, yet it does achieve some genuine distinction. Thus there is a lot of Jonesian philosophizing in interior monologues of various characters, sometimes in rapid succession. Though frequently sophomoric, they come, after all, largely from very young and not especially educated persons, although one of them manages a Homeric tag in the original Greek. It would be nice, however, if the same character, Sgt. Welsh (well played by Sean Penn), did not almost simultaneously declare that "a man alone is nothing" and "you've got to shut your eyes and look out for yourself."

The film was shot partly on Guadalcanal, where some of the natives participate, and mostly in Australia. To my untutored eye, it all looks seamless and persuasive. Of course, it helps that this action takes place in exotic sea- and landscapes, that soldiers move through man-high grasses where the wind soughs, and bodies elicit a thwacking sound as they push through the often dry blades. Alternatively, men move through towering forests, into which the light penetrates in seemingly separate rays, as if through tiny skylights or cathedral windows.

John Toll's cinematography works many wonders. His camera is often one of the soldiers, swaying a little side to side as it trudges on, or lurches, rushes, jumps about during battle. It captures frequent and sudden changes in weather: seas of grass undulate green and gold, water shimmers silvery-black. Periodically, the camera sidesteps into an idyllic glimpse of some bird or beast: a crocodile easing itself into a bath, an upside-down sloth or pendent cluster of bats.

At times we get blocks of color: everything blue-green or exploding orange and red. At night, a single match may illumine no more than one eye and a bit of nose. Everything seems to be-or really is-shot in natural light. The lens takes refuge, as the soldier's gaze might, in an expanse of unbesmirched sky or lushly gilded sunset cloud banks, or is jolted by a blood-bespattered blade of grass. At times we are blinded by mist; at others, dazzled by eerie clarity.

Malick directs in psychological time. Some terrible moments stretch on and on, others race desperately by. Often more goes on in one shot than a single viewing can encompass. Pvt. Bell, demoted from officer, is haunted by memories of his wife: of the two of them in intimate situations, or her alone on a beach or a swing. Miranda Otto has that cozily homey look: pretty but not glamorous. When Bell (Ben Chaplin) gets a pitiful Dear John letter from her in voiceover, he wanders off forlornly with that scrap of white paper dangling like a slipped bandage from a limp arm. When men advance into danger, there is a special choreography as, capering to the right and left, they try to forestall an ambushing enemy.

The point of view changes restlessly. Now we look out of a Japanese hilltop bunker from which havoc is wreaked. Now we are privy to a walkie-talkie argument between the ambitious Colonel Tall (Nick Nolte), who orders a suicidal frontal attack, and Captain Staros (Elias Koteas, surprisingly good in an atypically sympathetic role), who refuses to sacrifice his men. Gunfire may natter sporadically or burst into sudden bombardment like an uncheckable firestorm. We may see a bullet go through someone, or we may come across a dead soldier with both legs torn off at the hip. Or, again, mere intense acting will convey that Sgt. Keck (Woody Harrelson) has blown off his own lower half.

But the emphasis is less on engulfing horror than on individual anxiety and resolve, frenzy or terror. Pvt. Witt from Kentucky, the nominal hero, often stares bemusedly as his mind monologizes; Jim Caviezel, a newish actor, has such a thoughtful, confidence-inspiring air that we easily immerse ourselves in his roving bewilderment. And so many poignant details! An old Melanesian walking unconcernedly past an army column marching in the opposite direction. Dogs (coming from where?) chomping on something (dead soldiers?) as no one heeds them. A native village that provides fleeting asylum-mothers with tots, children playing games, a singing procession-but also natives sharply bickering and an ossuary full of skulls to signal death in Arcadia.