Flags of Our Fathers
Many films take to task the after effects of war. Flags of Our Fathers, based on the novel by James Bradley and Ron Powers, focuses on two areas; the battle at Iwo Jima and the battle at home.
Three of the men who raised the flag at Iwo Jima, in what became a poignant and symbolic photo during World War II, are sent home from the front lines to lead a war bonds tour raising money at a point when the government has run out of cash. Their return home is a battle with their conscience, struggling with being salesmen and the fact that they are home while fellow soldiers remain in combat. One, Indian Ira Hayes, struggles the hardest, never wanting to be on the tour and dealing with brutal memories of war which fuels his alcoholism.
Flags of Our Fathers hits all the high notes of the book, the battles, the hypocrisy and insensitivity of a public relations machine, those seeking advantage of the soldiers and the camaraderie of those who fought.
Where the film falters is its use of flashback and narration. Author Bradley knew of his father’s role in raising the flag but little else. While rummaging through his father’s things he came across much more and began interviewing those he knew, which becomes part of the film. Throughout Flags we see Bradley’s son interviewing different soldiers. It is this flaw of telling and not showing that hurts the truth behind the film. The story isn’t told chronologically and when cutting back and forth between these flashbacks the story loses steam in addition to emotional impact. It would been more powerful for the narrative to have ran from boot camp training to the bloody battlefront and subsequently the war bonds tour, to see these men age emotionally and physically.
However Flags is a solid film, a visual history lesson of not only the military but our government, who for better or worse, uses its military to protect America’s interests and to remind them that those interests come at a price. There are scenes of brutal realism, soldiers dying reminiscent of Saving Private Ryan. The battle scenes are uneven and cursory at best, seemingly random coverage of a large battle. The film is shot in muted colors as if one were looking at aged photographs and postcards. Flags doesn’t seek to take advantage of the current war to serve its story or to make statements, respectively leaving that for the viewer to decide.
- Brian Tucker
The Prestige
In Carter Beats the Devil author Glenn David Gold wrote that ‘the secret protects the audience, not the magician.’ That statement holds just as true for dueling magicians, Borden (Christian Bale) and Angier (Hugh Jackman) in The Prestige, a wonderful turn of the century mystery involving illusionists, science, murder, revenge and frequent twists.
As young students working for a popular magician, Borden accidentally kills Angier’s wife in a trick involving a water tank she’s dropped in, hands bound in rope. Angier blames Borden and thus sets off a life of competition, revenge and ultimately Borden in prison for Angier’s murder.
Whereas Angier is more of a showman and lacking originality in his tricks, Borden is the opposite, more creative than flashy – but incredibly talented. Their rivalry reaches its peak with a trick called The Transported Man, in which the magician disappears through a door and reappears across the stage through another door. Angier grows increasingly jealous of Borden’s success, and of his new wife and child.
He sets out to shamelessly copy Borden. To trump him, Angier spends great sums of money on an invention by Nikola Tesla to take The Transported Man trick to a new level. It works, but with a price.
The Prestige is a magic trick itself. Several plot twists are illusions themselves, some of which are easily spotted, some not. But that’s the fun of the film and its story. Set in Victorian England, the film highlights the fact that while audiences know that there’s really no magic they enjoy wondering how it the illusions were done, being fooled. In a scene where Borden shows his wife how a trick is done she’s disappointed with knowing. It’s not knowing that makes the illusion special as implied in Gold’s book.
The Prestige is the final portion of an illusion, in which everything is restored to normal (for example, when a dove made to disappear finally returns). Director Christopher Nolan and his co-writer brother structure the film with scenes that serve as misdirection, jumping back and forth in time, only revealing so much. There are twists and turns, some will easily stand out, but it is still an entertainingly good ride, reminiscent of when films were rich on story and short on special effects.
- Brian Tucker
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